Ascension Day

by John Matthews

  As the grey too started to swill away, get whited out, Jac opened his eyes and focused: a monitoring machine at his side steadily beeping, a nurse by the end of his bed checking a clipboard chart, looking up at him as his eyes flickered open.

  ‘Ah, you are with us again?’

  Jac looked down at himself, blinking, still trying to make sense of everything. ‘But… but I was shot?’

  The nurse shook her head. ‘No, senor, not you. You have a cracked shoulder joint, which was also dislocated, and a lot of water had to be drained from your lungs. It was the other man with you, el hombre negre. He was shot twice from behind.’

  The blood warm and swilling all around him, maybe even too the last impetus of the bullets hitting Jac as they’d come straight through Nel-M. But it not computing in that instant that it could possibly have been Nel-M shot. Nobody there to shoot him? ‘Who… who shot him?’

  The nurse shrugged. ‘The police don’t know. They are still investigating.’

  But then the rest hit Jac, what he’d been there for in those final minutes, and he tried to sit up. Larry! His eyes shifted to the clock on the wall, 11.47 p.m., 10.47 p.m. in New Orleans, the tears welling, stinging his eyes. Almost five hours since Larry had been executed! And this time his father’s die-hard tenet, look to the bright side, didn’t, couldn’t help; no bright side possible. The tears flowed freely, the nurse looking at him with concern.

  ‘You shouldn’t cry, senor. You’re alive. You made it.’

  ‘I know,’ Jac said, wiping at the tears with the back of one hand. But that’s half the problem, don’t you see? he wanted to scream at her. I feel ashamed to be alive. Getting the proof to save Durrant and still letting him die made it all the more painful. Unbearable. ‘It’s… it’s not me,’ Jac explained. ‘It’s my friend.’

  The nurse lifted her eyes hopefully. ‘But your friend – he’s made it too, senor. He was hurt much worse than you with a stomach wound, muy malo… but they’ve already operated and the surgeon thinks he’ll pull through.’

  Jac could see from a name-tag that her name was Carmita Terra. He shook his head as he realized she was talking about Truelle. ‘No, not him – another friend. In New Orleans.’

  ‘Oh.’ She looked blank for a second, then, seeing how distraught he was, tears once again welling, she gave a tight-lipped grimace, her eyes softening. ‘I am sorry to hear about your other friend, senor. So sorry.’

  In those last minutes, Larry had stopped looking at the clock.

  But everyone else started watching it all the more then; and as the final minute approached, their eyes were riveted to it. They could hardly shift them for one second to look at anything else.

  None more so than Warden Haveling as he watched the second hand start on its final 60-second sweep.

  And everything suddenly fell deathly silent. Not only in the observation room looking onto the death chamber, but in the prison beyond, inmates looking up from their bunks with heavy, expectant eyes; the protestors outside, having stopped playing their music twenty minutes ago – even the mutter of their voices at that instant died as they looked on at the prison gates, breath vapours pluming gently on the cool night air; and half of New Orleans, too, hands halted mid-air with coffee cups or beers as live newscasts took them to reporters outside the prison gates in those final seconds.

  Though two more people didn’t look at the clock then. Josh Durrant, bedroom door shut, face down on his bed as he started sobbing. And Francine, TV off, refusing to acknowledge the time, tried to distract herself by preparing dinner, but her hands felt like lead, hardly able to move or pick up the right things; until, in the end, she wasn’t able to move at all, her eyes gently closing as they filled, feeling those final seconds tick inside her with her laden heartbeat.

  All of that silent expectation weighed heavily on Warden Haveling’s shoulders as he watched the second hand make that final sweep; the silence so heavy that you could actually hear the clock ticking, making the seconds seem to pass more agonizingly, before finally, the last few seconds ticking down with the slow deliberation of full-swing axe-blows, Haveling gave a small, solemn nod towards Torvald Engelson.

  Engelson acknowledged with equal solemnity, half-closing his eyes for a second, and then he lifted one hand towards the two medics.

  They started feeding through the sodium thiopental.

  Carmita’s eyebrows furrowed at something Jac had said the moment before.

  ‘New Orleo, senor? There have been some calls from there for you. Mickel something?’ She looked towards the corridor outside. ‘Your other friend in white brought your phone with him in case you needed to call anyone.’

  Mike Coultaine. Calbrey. Jac nodded. ‘Yes, I… I might need to make some calls.’ But he was thinking more of calling Alaysha, telling her that he was all right and pouring out his soul, before hearing all the bad news from Coultaine. He wasn’t sure he could face that news right now. But when Carmita returned with his phone a minute later and he tried Alaysha’s number, there was no answer.

  He scrolled down and looked at the time of Coultaine’s calls: one forty minutes before Durrant’s execution, no doubt to press for what was happening his end, Not much time left now… then two more since, one twenty minutes after and the other just over an hour ago to find out what had happened. Though Coultaine probably already half knew if he’d spoken to the hospital staff or Calbrey. With a tired sigh, Jac pressed to dial Coultaine back.

  It answered after the first ring.

  ‘Mike… it’s Ayliss, uh… Jac.’

  ‘Jac…. Jac! Thank God! You’re back in the land of the living!’

  ‘Yeah… yeah.’ Jac’s voice subdued, not really wanting to share Coultaine’s exuberance at him still being alive at that moment. He exhaled heavily. ‘I’m sorry, Mike… I tried. And the damnest thing is, I had the proof right there in my hand at the last moment! Truelle had –’

  ‘Jac… Jac! Stop! That’s why I’ve been calling… there’s still time!’

  ‘What?’ Jac sat up sharply, sudden lance of pain in his shoulder. ‘What do you mean – still time?’

  ‘Durrant got an injury the night before, which was stitched. But as the first of the knock-out feed came through and he strained against the straps, one of the stitches burst and the wound started bleeding. Head of the execution team, guy called Engelson, stopped it right there. It was re-stitched, medics then had to check and re-check him, the media here meanwhile having a field-day… and finally it was re-scheduled.’

  ‘When?’ Dizzy from sitting up so sharply, the room swam in and out of focus for a second.

  ‘Midnight. Just over an hour from now.’

  Jac’s eyes darted frantically. The tape had been shattered, ruined! His eyes fixed back on the nurse. Truelle!

  ‘Gotta go now, Mike. Got some fast shuffling to do.’ And the second he hung-up, he asked the nurse, ‘My friend shot in the stomach – where is he? And how long before he comes round?’

  ‘I… uh.’ Momentarily flustered as to which question to answer first. ‘Just around the corner, next vestibulo. Not far. And a while.’ She held one palm out. ‘Though I can’t say exactly how long. Only his doctor can answer that.’

  ‘You’ll need to give me a hand with these. I have to get up.’

  ‘Senor, you’re not meant to… por favor!’

  But with Jac already half-up, seeing that he was going to rip all the tubes off in any case, she quickly attended. Detached the monitor links and IV and saline feeds.

  ‘You’ll have to show me where,’ he said over his shoulder, already breaking into a run, Carmita struggling to keep up a few steps behind.

  Jac felt the pain knifing through his shoulder sharper with each stride, the corridor tilting and shifting at one point, Jac bracing with a hand against one wall, afraid that he might be passing out again.

  ‘His operation was only completed twenty minutes ago,’ Dr Delgado, Truelle’s surgeon, informed Jac when Carmita located him a minute
later. ‘So, at least another five or six hours before he comes round.’

  Jac’s stomach dived. ‘Any possibility of sooner?’

  Delgado shrugged. ‘Three and a half, four hours perhaps. But you’d be lucky to get more than a few words out of him then – he’d still be very groggy.’

  Jac cradled his head in one hand, rubbing at his temples, the buzzing back suddenly, the corridor swaying again and tilting away for a moment… all options sliding away with it. And towards its end he could see Brent Calbrey sitting, elbows on knees, hands steepled thoughtfully against his chin.

  Friends… insurance policies! Truelle said that he’d left details of the whole thing in envelopes with them.

  Jac went towards Calbrey and asked him. ‘Left with close friends, apparently. Any idea who they might be?’

  Calbrey shrugged. ‘No, sorry. He didn’t mention anything. I didn’t know many of his friends Stateside.’

  ‘Both killed recently,’ Jac prompted. But Calbrey’s expression remained vague. ‘Are you sure he didn’t say anything… anything?’ The clinging desperation in Jac’s voice echoing off the corridor walls as Calbrey shook his head.

  Jac felt himself swaying uncertainly, the grey edges threatening to drag him back under. And in that moment it struck him that maybe it was better if they did, or if he hadn’t woken up in the first place? To get two shots at saving Durrant, and still fail. The cruellest fate of all.

  He asked Calbrey the time, 12.07 a.m., fifty-three minutes left now, but it hardly mattered, there was nothing left to –

  Briefcase! As Calbrey checked his watch, Jac recognized it from Truelle reaching for it earlier ‘…apart from what you’ve now got on tape, there’s something else that will…’ Jac confirmed with Calbrey that it was Truelle’s briefcase.

  ‘Yes, I… I brought it with me because it’s got his papers – including his blood group on a donor card.’

  But Calbrey became hesitant when Jac pressed that there was probably something in it he needed urgently, and Jac’s patience snapped. ‘Look! I don’t have the time to fucking argue with you – I’ve got a man’s life to save! You can sort it out with Truelle later whether or not you were meant to let me have it.’

  Calbrey handed the briefcase over with a palms out, hey, I’m not the enemy. It was me who fished you out the sea, for Christ’s sake.

  Jac opened the briefcase, saw the buff envelope addressed to Truelle at the Sancti Spiritus apartado – ripped it open with trembling hands.

  Cassette tape, nothing else inside as Jac tipped the envelope up. Anthony Redmort written on one side of the tape, no other wording. Jac began to worry that it was nothing to do with Durrant, just another patient’s history.

  Jac asked Carmita if there was a tape-recorder somewhere in the hospital, and within three minutes she’d got one from another floor.

  As Jac pressed play, Truelle’s voice from twelve years ago – conditioning Durrant with all the details of the robbery and murder of Jessica Roche – echoed eerily along the corridors of the Sancti Spiritus hospital, Jac’s voice crashing in after the first few sentences as he punched the air: ‘Yes, yes… oh, fucking yes!’

  Pain rocketed through his shoulder, even though he’d used his good arm, but he hardly cared at that moment. He dialled Candaret’s number straight away.

  ‘Governor Candaret… Jaa…Darrell Ayliss. Larry Durrant’s attorney. Earlier today, I received a full confession from Leonard Truelle, Larry Durrant’s psychiatrist of twelve years ago, that he falsely conditioned Durrant in regard to the murder of Jessica Roche. All of this a conspiracy led by Mr Roche with a certain Nelson Malley doing his bidding – who in fact was probably the real murderer. And now a tape which categorically supports this, which I think you’d want to hear…’ Jac played almost a full minute of the tape over the phone before bringing the receiver back to his ear. ‘I’ve got the entire tape right here, Governor, but I think that’s probably enough there to have given you the flavour.’

  ‘I don’t know, Mr Ayliss.’ Candaret sighed, Roche’s call still fresh in his mind. White House drifting out of reach. ‘You call me now at the eleventh hour with a completely fresh account of the murder, supported by some tape from years ago played to me over the phone. It’s not exactly conclusive.’

  ‘The tape I’ve got here,’ Jac’s voice strained, breath staccato with exasperation, ‘goes on for almost an hour – Truelle giving every possible detail of Jessica Roche’s murder for Durrant to repeat at his next session. You can’t get more conclusive than that.’

  ‘I hear what you’re saying, Mr Ayliss. But the problem I have with that is one of –’

  ‘Governor Candaret,’ Jac cut in, exhaling tiredly. ‘I don’t have the time now to fool around. And more to the point, nor does Larry Durrant.’ Jac’s patience was gone. Long gone from hit men, almost being drowned twice, police hunting him like a rabbit on a false murder rap. ‘If you don’t phone Libreville prison right away and stop Larry Durrant’s execution – then when I get back to New Orleans, I’m going to make sure to get on every TV and radio show I can and play this tape. And when I do, I’m going to make it clear, crystal clear, that I played this same tape to you now in front of two good witnesses –’ Jac nodded at his end, smiling tightly towards Carmita and Calbrey – ‘and you still let Durrant’s execution go ahead.’

  Candaret’s sigh was heavier this time, almost a groan. It looked like the White House was sliding out of reach now either way, but it would do so a lot quicker dragged through the media over Durrant than by Roche meddling in the background. He clarified a few details about the set-up between Roche, Truelle and Malley, then asked: ‘And tell me, Mr Ayliss – did Mr Roche know earlier today that something on this front might be happening?’

  ‘Yes, he did. In fact, he sent Malley to try to kill Truelle before he could talk.’

  ‘I see.’ Now Candaret understood that earlier call from Roche. There were a few things he hated, and being manipulated was one of them. He was a politician; that was his job.

  ‘As… as soon as I get off the phone now,’ Jac said, ‘I’ve got to call the NOPD to pick up Roche. Not only for this now, with Durrant and the attempt on Truelle, but two other murders that I know of.’

  ‘That’s okay, Mr Ayliss.’ His sigh now calmer, more satisfied. ‘That’s actually a call I’d like to have the pleasure of making myself. After I’ve called Warden Haveling to stop Larry Durrant’s execution.’

  Bye-bye waited until he’d reached Cienfuegos before he made the call.

  ‘It’s all done.’

  ‘Clean? No hitches?’

  ‘Some small last-minute complications, but I got aroun’ them. Nobody saw me.’

  ‘That’s good to hear. See you soon. Give my regards to Fidel.’

  Small complications? One thing you learned working for Malastra over the years: play everything down so as not to raise the old lizard’s blood pressure too high. As soon as he’d phoned Malastra from New Orleans airport to tell him that Nel-M was booked on a flight to Nassau, everything had been a mad rush: a suitcase dropped off for him complete with clothes, passport and a plastic Glock 17 that would pass undetected through airport X-rays. Then he’d had to call again from Nassau airport.

  ‘He’s heading on to Cuba.’

  ‘I told you. I told you.’ Malastra convinced that Nel-M somehow knew that they were on to him and was fleeing. ‘Keep with him. Finish it.’

  There’d been a brief opportunity when Nel-M had been sitting in his car looking on at the villa with the white Corvette – but then somebody came out of a house two up from where Bye-bye was parked to put out the garbage, and, the moment gone, he decided to wait until it was dark. Not long to go, nobody would see him then.

  But as soon as it got dark, Nel-M was on the move. Bye-bye followed and watched the tableau of figures on the promontory, hoping to get Nel-M as he came back his way. But when Nel-M tumbled over the edge with the other man, Bye-bye ran in. The third man was on the groun
d, looked like he’d blacked out or was already dead from his two shots. Bye-bye hoped for a minute that Nel-M might have got mangled on rocks or had drowned, save him the trouble; but looking down at them, he saw that Nel-M seemed to be on top of the other man, pushing him deeper under. He squeezed off two quick shots and ran back to his car.

  In his office, Carmen Malastra smiled ruefully as he started deleting the whole sorry saga from his computer, the last to go the cam photos of Gerry Strelloff handing the envelopes to Raoul Ferrer.

  They thought they’d worked it all out so well: Jouliern skimming off the tables, handing the money to Strelloff, then Strelloff handing to Ferrer. The rule was only casino employees checked; but even if there had been a spot check of Ferrer one night, he was a street loan-shark, he’d be expected to be carrying a lot of cash.

  But Malastra didn’t believe in coincidences, and that’s where they’d slipped up, made their big mistake: the hit on Ferrer, with Nel-M even having the bare-faced cheek to call and apologize with some feeble excuse about Ferrer ripping-off Roche, and a sweetener pay-off to boot. That’s Malastra thrown off the scent, Nel-M no doubt thought. Then Gerry Strelloff killed as well – too much of a coincidence – with someone else in the frame so that it didn’t link back directly to Nel-M.

  From that moment Malastra was on to it, and as he looked back through the video-cam footage of the casino floor and saw the envelopes being passed between Strelloff and Ferrer, he knew. He knew without any remaining shadow of doubt: Nel-M had been in on it with Jouliern from the start – he should have guessed earlier that it was a bit rich for Jouliern’s blood to plan on his own – and Nel-M’s part of it had been to get rid of the couriers in the middle so that there was no possible trace back.

  But in the end, that’s exactly what had alerted him: they’d tried to be too thorough, too clever. Divine justice, Malastra thought as he made the last delete key-tap.

  When Alaysha had seen George Jouliern’s name on the back of the envelope that the messenger held out, her heart leapt into her throat. A note from the grave: ‘They know. They know it all. And they’re coming to get you.’ Or maybe the messenger would now hand her a second note from Malastra: ‘We found this letter addressed to you from George Jouliern. Just go quietly with the messenger, no fuss, into the car parked outside.’