Ascension Day

by John Matthews

  ‘Were any days mentioned for the kid’s games? Or perhaps who they were playing?’

  Clutching at straws. It was becoming painful even to watch; the increasing edge in Ormdern’s voice, the heavy pulsing behind Larry’s eyelids as he searched desperately for that one fragment of detail from twelve years ago that might save his life now.

  Finally: ‘No, sorry… can’t remember anything being said about dates or times for the kid’s games. Just how proud Nat was, you know… being there for the kid. Supporting him.’

  ‘I know.’ A concluding tone, Ormdern looking back through his notes and last session’s transcript for anything he might have missed asking about the Bayou Brew that night.

  The silence suddenly heavy, stifling, only the sound of flicking pages through the speaker, merging, becoming one with the ticking of the clock and the pounding, thunderous roar in Jac’s head… last chance… last chance… save him… save him!

  Jac leapt up as the coffee splashed against one thigh. Unconsciously, he’d gripped the paper cup too tight, splitting it.

  Ormdern looked up briefly, Jac’s sudden gasp through his earpiece obviously startling him. He went back to his notes for another fifteen seconds or so, though with the silence the pause seemed interminable, before speaking again.

  ‘I want to move on now, Larry… to when you first read or heard about Jessica’s Roche’s murder… and first of all try and pinpoint that time in relation to the night we’ve just been talking about – when you were playing pool at the Bayou Brew.’ Ormdern left a heavy pause to let the thought and the shift in time settle with Larry. ‘Was it just the day after, two days… or maybe more?’

  Jac was at the edge of his seat, breath held. Probably their last chance to be able to pinpoint the day.

  It took a long time for Larry to focus his thoughts, the pulsing behind his eyelids becoming more rapid, frantic, the clock ticking on the wall probably seeming deafening to everyone in the room, not just Jac, in that forty second wait.

  Larry gently moistened his top lip with his tongue as he spoke, his head lolling slightly. ‘I… I don’t know… A day or two, I think. Not long, anyway.’

  ‘Please, Larry… think. Think hard. It’s important. Which is it? Just a day, or two days?’

  Jac clenched his hands anxiously as Larry sank back into thought. There’d been an anxious moment too in his pre-session with Larry when he’d slid across the photos, and shortly after had made a verbal slip: ‘On our second meeting together, you mentioned…’ Quickly realizing and correcting: ‘I mean, on your second meeting with Jac McElroy…’ But it was too late, Larry had picked up on it, staring at him intently in that moment, eyes boring past Ayliss’s brown contact lenses, stripping away the prosthetic cheek and jaw bulking and the shoulder padding, as he uttered with a hushed, incredulous breath, ‘It’s you, Jac… isn’t it? It’s you!’ And Jac, not saying anything, but giving his answer with a nervous look towards the glass screen and Folley; the sound link was off, but he worried in that moment that Larry’s body language might give the game away or Folley might be able to lip-read. But Folley held the same nonchalant, slightly bored expression, hadn’t picked up on anything, as Jac gently nodded his acquiescence; and Larry at the same time had quickly killed his sly, disbelieving smile as he picked up on the signal not to give the game away to Folley.

  Larry finally spoke. ‘I… I’m sorry. I don’t know… can’t say with any certainty.’

  Jac eased out a resigned breath. Ormdern had mentioned that even if the memory of the murder had been suggested or somehow overlaid, its addition could create uncertainty in Larry’s mind about the time gap from his pool game. But the end result was the same, Jac thought, feeling his stomach sink: last chance gone.

  ‘Okay…okay. When you did actually hear or read about Jessica Roche’s murder… exactly when or where was that? Morning or afternoon? On the TV or in a newspaper?’

  ‘TV.’ Larry answered almost immediately, then paused longer for thought before continuing. ‘But there was no sound on… I couldn’t hear what was being said. Only saw her face on the newsflash.’

  ‘Why was that?’

  ‘Because I didn’t want to. I’d made sure to avoid all newspapers and early morning TV… but there she was suddenly, as I was passing a TV shop window.’

  Jac’s stomach fell again, as if a second, surprise trapdoor had suddenly opened. A completely different story to the one he’d got last time from Larry! Ormdern, too, looked perplexed, flicking back a page in his notes to double-check the earlier account.

  ‘Are… are you sure about that? TV shop window rather than at home in the afternoon or early evening?’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’ Larry’s brow knitted briefly with another thought. ‘Okay… maybe early evening was the first time I actually heard it. But I remember clearly standing by that shop window seeing it for the first time.’

  ‘And what time of day was that?’

  ‘Mid, late morning, maybe.’

  Jac stared back hard at Larry. Was Larry telling the truth now, or in his earlier account to Jac? Or was he clever enough to realize that his sub conscious had suddenly produced a different story, so he’d slipped in a caveat…. ‘first time I actually heard it’. Maybe, with all of that reading, he was cleverer than all of them: knew and recalled perfectly well that he’d killed Jessica Roche, and now was just playing them all, getting them searching desperately through the haystack of his past for needles that he knew had never been there. Maybe, too, Larry had lied earlier about seeing those photos he’d slid across, realizing then that his subconscious had again given something away.

  Just when Jac thought he knew Larry, was getting closer to him and the truth of what happened twelve years ago, he’d do another quick flip, become a conundrum again. A mystery.

  Yet if Larry knew that his subconscious would give him away, why subject himself to this now? Was it just that with only days left to live, a random chance was better than no chance at all? One last laugh up his sleeve at them all desperately fluffing around him, trying to save his life. The attention he’d never got from his own family. But why then had he wanted to die when Jac first met him? Or was that the ultimate double-play: the last person you’d suspect of trying to fool you about their innocence was someone who’d already given up on being saved?

  Perhaps, as Jac had suspected all along, Larry just didn’t know. The memory loss had stayed with him, and he had no idea if he’d done it or not.

  ‘And how did you feel, Larry, when you first saw her face on that TV through that shop window?’ Though now the question seemed almost superfluous.

  ‘I… I felt terrible, you know. Sick inside like you wouldn’t believe.’ Larry gently shook his head. ‘That’s… that’s why I tried to avoid seeing it. Because I couldn’t believe I’d done it… and once I’d seen it on the news, then it was suddenly real. Official. I had done it.’

  And now Jac would have to tell Larry, as he’d promised to when the next day he got Ormdern’s report: ‘Sorry, Larry… looks like you did do it.’ At least one consolation: when he was executed in a few days time, in his last moments he wouldn’t be left with that crushing sense of injustice that it was for something he hadn’t done.

  TV! The thought suddenly flared from the back of Jac’s brain.

  Sitting there watching the last minutes of the session tick away, that final thought about Larry’s guilt just hadn’t sat comfortably, and everything suddenly came flooding back – Gasping for air as he fought back up through the dark lake… Running from the lights of the police helicopter… Walking back into Libreville disguised as Ayliss… Surely all of that hadn’t been for nothing. Surely? Could he possibly have read it all so wrong? Put his life on the line and…

  And suddenly the thought had flashed like a supernova to the forefront: TV! If Mack Elliott had asked the chicken guy to pipe down because he couldn’t hear what was on the TV, then whatever was on must have been important!

  Jac leant over an
d shared the thought with Ormdern through the mike. Ormdern nodded slowly, Larry’s eyelids gently pulsing as his mind questioned what was happening, why the sudden pause?

  ‘Okay, Larry. Sorry. I want to take you back again to the Bayou Brew and the pool game. Specifically that moment you mentioned when Mack Elliott told off the chicken guy because he couldn’t concentrate on what was on the TV.’

  ‘Yeah… yeah.’ The pulsing slowly settling as Larry got the memory back again.

  ‘Now, what was it Mack Elliott was watching? Why was it so important that he had to tell the chicken guy to shut up?’

  ‘I… I’m not sure.’ The eyelid-pulsing increasing again. ‘The TV’s turned away from me… I can’t see what he’s watching.’

  ‘And did he tell you? Something important perhaps that he wanted to watch that night?’

  ‘No…no. He didn’t mention anything.’

  Slow sigh from Ormdern, the disappointment evident in his voice. ‘Okay… from where you are, what can you hear coming over the TV?’

  Marked pause from Larry as he applied more thought. ‘Some cheering and clapping… a commentator’s voice in between. A few shouts and jeers at some points.’

  ‘What’s the commentator saying?’

  ‘I… I can’t tell from where we are… it’s too faint. Just a mumble. The cheering, clapping and shouting comes over stronger.’

  ‘Okay. Cheering and clapping… some shouts. Any laughter?’

  ‘No… no. Just the cheering and clapping.’

  So obviously not a sitcom or even a variety or chat show, Jac thought. They would normally have some laughter.

  ‘And how long did it go on for… how long was Mack Elliott watching?’

  ‘Maybe twenty minutes or so… half-hour, max.’

  That ruled out a sporting fixture, too.

  ‘And anything else you might recall about what Mack was watching then? Anything you might have heard or he mentioned?’

  ‘No… that’s it. Just remember some cheering and shouting… and him telling off the chicken guy.’

  Already two minutes over the session time. Nothing else that Ormdern was going to find out. But if Larry couldn’t remember what Mack Elliott was watching that night, maybe Mack himself could. Although it was twelve years ago, they now had some strong guideposts: cheering and shouting, guy in a chicken suit that he threatened with a Billy-club.

  Having thanked Ormdern, ‘I’ll look forward to reading your final report tomorrow,’ Jac paced back through the endless corridors with that cauldron of conflicting thoughts from the session still burning through his head. He opened his car window and breathed deeply of the outside night air, trying to lose the heat and claustrophobia of the prison, and the second he was clear of the final guard-post, took out his cell-phone and dialled Mack Elliott’s number.

  Outside the prison gates, the crowd had swelled to eighty strong. One group, with long hair and long white flowing robes, as if they were a flock of angels or modern-day Messiahs, held up a large placard:

  STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN

  Go Larry, go…

  Then you can get your own back on Candaret!

  Don’t let him in when he shows there!

  …Though unlikely that’s where he’s headed.

  The Devil claimed his soul years ago!

  To one side they’d set up large speakers blasting the song out, the display no doubt inspired by Larry’s strong religious beliefs.

  ‘Come on…’ Jac muttered impatiently as he sped away from the prison. Last chance… last chance.

  But as Mack Elliott’s line continued ringing emptily in Jac’s ear, all that reached him was Robert Plant’s voice sailing hauntingly on the night air, singing about the feeling he got when he looked to the west, his spirit crying for leaving.

  36

  ‘Have you heard from Jac at all?’

  ‘No, not a thing,’ Catherine McElroy said. The truth, but even if she had heard from her son, the last person she’d tell was her sister Camille. Family allegiances would hold for no more than twenty-four hours before Camille’s ‘Citizen’s duty’ wrestled advantage and she phoned the police.

  ‘Terrible business… terrible,’ Camille aired, though she was probably thinking more of the shock impact to her society set than to family, Catherine thought. ‘It would probably be a lot better if the police had found him. At least then you’d know where he was, know that he was safe… and be able to see him and talk to him. Find out what happened.’

  ‘Yes… I suppose so.’ Some sense in that, Catherine supposed; but still she remained guarded, unsure whether Camille was just fishing to see whether she might know more than she was letting on.

  ‘God knows what I’m going to say to Tobias Bromwell… if I ever speak to the man again. His number has come up twice now on my call minder, but I just don’t have the stomach to phone him back. Don’t know what to say. Too embarrassed.’

  Now they were getting to it, Catherine thought; the condolences and niceties out of the way, now they were getting to what really made Camille’s world turn. ‘I understand,’ Catherine said numbly. That’s practically all she’d felt since hearing the news about Jac: numb.

  ‘And you had absolutely no inkling of what was going on, what might be about to happen?’

  ‘No, of course not.’ The first edge to Catherine’s voice; a ridiculous suggestion even by Camille’s normal thick-skinned, lame-brained standards: “Mom, I’m going out with a lap-dancer and we’re planning to murder her ex-boyfriend.”

  ‘So you didn’t even know about this other girlfriend? This… this lap-dancer?’

  Catherine half-smiled to herself at Camille’s difficulty in even saying the word. ‘No, I didn’t,’ she said, hoping that Camille didn’t read the half-lie. All she knew, from Alaysha directly while Jac had been in the hospital, was that she did some ‘modelling’. Perhaps Alaysha didn’t know what Jac might have already said, and they’d have both got around later to telling her more.

  Camille sighed heavily. ‘That’s where it all starts to go wrong, don’t you see? That initial deception. Two-timing poor Jennifer like that. And, for reasons that now become obvious, not telling anyone about this other girl.’

  ‘What, you think one might lead to the other?’ Normally, Catherine wouldn’t have said anything, but she could feel her blood boil as Camille had continued: her society-circle embarrassment over Jac’s two-timing and dating a lap-dancer put before the fact that he was being hunted like a rabbit by the police, might not even be still alive, with herself and Jean-Marie worried out of their minds. ‘Like some sort of prelude: date a lap-dancer… next step murder.’

  Only a split-second pause, but Catherine could practically hear Camille’s flinch of surprise that she had dared to answer back. ‘No, of course not. But you can bet your bottom dollar that this girl had more than a little to do with putting Jac up to it.’ Camille snorted derisively. ‘Types like that.’

  ‘Like what, Camille?’ Maybe Camille had been grating on her nerves for a while, but now, with everything with Jac, her patience levels were exhausted.

  ‘Like, you know… I surely don’t have to spell it out.’ Again that reluctance to even say it, as if it would somehow soil her lips. ‘But one thing’s for sure: she’s certainly an entirely different kettle of fish to a girl like Jennifer Bromwell.’

  ‘She only takes her clothes off for money… no doubt to put groceries on the table for her little girl. There’s no sin in that.’

  ‘Please… spare me.’

  ‘And do you really think the likes of old-man Bromwell built up their fortunes by being squeaky clean? I hear he was involved in some messy low-rent housing early on. Complaints about rats, damp and unsanitary conditions, and strong-arm guys busting doors down and kicking whole families out in the dead of night when they complained too hard. Not exactly what he’d like to be quizzed about at one of your little dinner soirees.’

  This time the surprise was clear at the other end; an audi
ble gasp. ‘Sometimes, Catherine, you’re so… so French.’

  Catherine wasn’t sure whether the comment was due to her laissez-faire attitude about people taking their clothes off for money, or her socialist-slanted dig at Tobias Bromwell – but she decided to take it as a compliment. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘And while we’re on the subject of low rents – don’t forget whose house you’re in!’ Camille hung up abruptly.

  Catherine took a fresh breath, feeling strangely invigorated. Camille might soon put in the thin edge of the wedge about her and Jean-Marie moving on, finding their own place – one more problem she didn’t need now on top of all else – but all she knew was that at that moment, despite everything, she suddenly felt better. Freer.

  ‘And as… as I looked back, there was this woman. Don’t know even what made me look back at that point, maybe the sense of her eyes on me... but there she was suddenly, this woman with her dog. Her eyes meeting mine for a second before I ran on.’

  ‘How far away was she?’

  ‘Maybe eighty yards the other way from the Roche house. A hundred or so from where I was then.’

  Jac stood twenty yards beyond the Roche house, where Larry would have been that night twelve years ago, and looked back to where he’d have seen the woman. Still dark, with just the first tinge of dawn light, the light values wouldn’t be far different to that night, Jac thought.

  Jac rewound on his hand-held recorder and looked back towards the house.

  ‘…There were no lights on at the front, or the side – which is where I broke in. Maybe if I’d gone round the back, I’d have seen a light on… or maybe she’d gone to bed early and there’d have been no light on there either.’

  ‘So you broke in at the side?’

  ‘Yeah. Removed a glass pane and wired through on the frame so as not to break the alarm circuit. Two minutes, and I was in. Took a quick tour to see where the best stuff was, and found a safe in the library that I reckoned I could break by drilling the lock without too much trouble. And I was just preparing for that when I heard something behind me, and she… she was suddenly there. Like… like out of nowhere. Not there one minute… then the next…’