The Dying Minutes

by Martin O'Brien

  His days weren’t numbered. They were over.

  Dinner was brought in at 6:30. Ward door unlocked. Two trays wheeled in on a trolley. The orderlies lifted their two patients, plumped up pillows, settled them back and placed the trays on their laps. Usually Lombard was fed, but this time he elected to do the job himself, trembling hands reaching for knife and fork, dipping into the dark beef stew and pushing it into his mouth, chewing, watching the man opposite. He hadn’t spoken since they’d brought him in, and he didn’t speak now, not even a glance in Lombard’s direction.

  There was a reason why he had chosen, on this occasion, to feed himself. And when the orderlies came back to collect the trays and hand out their medicines, Lombard slid the plastic knife beneath his sheet, making a fuss as the tray was removed, cursing the orderly with croaking breaths, spitting out the pills they tried to give him, the missing knife overlooked.

  Of course, it was only plastic. But if he held it close to the tip he knew it would be enough to do some damage, to gouge into the eyes of the man opposite when he decided to make his move. At least Lombard would have something to defend himself with. He’d go down fighting. The way it should be.

  Once the orderlies had disappeared, the evening wore on, hot and stuffy, the fans above them barely moving the stagnant air, just the hourly check-ups from now till morning: water jugs topped up, temperatures taken, pulses felt for, the straightening of a sheet, nothing more. No conversation. Only the squeaking of the orderlies’ plimsolls on the lino-tiled floor.

  The fluorescent strips between the fans flickered out at ten, but there was still enough light from outside, through the line of windows, to see the layout of the room, the beds. Two hours later it was pitch black in there.

  For the last twenty minutes, Lombard had lain still, putting out a gentle snore. At one o’clock, the door was unlocked and one of the orderlies made his rounds, flashing his torch, then left, re-locked the door.

  And that’s when Castel made his move.

  The soft brush of a cotton sheet pushed back.

  The gentle squeak of bed springs.

  The slow sticky sound of bare, sweaty feet on lino.

  Lombard couldn’t see him, but he sensed him coming close. Sensed the heat of him. The way the air seemed to part, give way before his bulk.

  Silently, he drew the plastic blade from beneath the sheet, pressed his thumb and forefinger against its tip and waited for the moment.

  One second. Two. Three. Four. Five.

  And then, out of the darkness, he smelled an odd mixture of hand cream and onions, and suddenly a pillow was over his face, pressing down, a knee brought up to pinion his right arm before he had a chance to strike out with the knife. Castel must have known, must have seen him hide the knife away. Or simply been cautious. Just in case.

  Lombard tried to cry out, he tried to twist and turn, he tried to buck off his assailant like a wild horse its rider.

  But in just a few moments, these tiny efforts exhausted him.

  Suddenly there was no strength in his body.

  Just a bitter will to fight back.

  But there was no fight he could make.

  The weight on him was too great.

  Hot, sweaty, lumpy. Pressing his body down.

  The pillow stifling his grunts, his breath.

  He felt the knife slip from his fingers.

  Tried to draw a breath.

  Felt his face redden and bulge.

  Felt his throat constrict and burn.

  His lungs scream.

  And then, in the darkness, there came a gradual easing, as though the pressure had somehow been lifted off him.

  No longer any sense of weight or movement or struggle.

  No smell of hand cream and onions.

  Nothing.

  Just a soft darkness.

  44

  IT WAS ALWAYS going to be a night job. No alternative. For something like this, on rue Vandon, in the heart of Endoume, the cover of darkness was as critical as the Browning automatics that Beni and Jo-Jo carried in stiffened nylon holsters under their black leather jackets. With its shops and boutiques and the close proximity of a number of popular restaurants lining the busier avenue Galère, a daylight hit on rue Vandon had never been an option. There were simply too many people around, too many cars and vans and motorcycles clogging up the single-lane, one-way, slightly sloping thoroughfare between Galère and Fiolle.

  But after the shops shut for the day the traffic eased, pedestrians and motorists alike, and it was a great deal easier finding a parking space, never more than fifty metres from the stepped entrance of Résidence Daumier, the six-floor block of balconied apartments half-way along the street where Jean Garnolle lived with his wife, Clara.

  When Aris Moussa, René Duclos’ fixer, had told them what the boss wanted, Beni and Jo-Jo had reckoned they’d have the job done and dusted in no time. A day scouting out the neighbourhood, and just the one night for the hit. A lot more fun than picking up dog-crap, Beni decided.

  But it hadn’t worked out like that. For the last three nights Jean Garnolle hadn’t shown his face. As though he sensed that someone was out there, waiting for him, and that he was safer staying inside.

  Right on both counts, thought Beni, sitting behind the wheel of his Mercedes on the fourth night of their stake-out, the engine still ticking from the long evening drive into Marseilles from Toulon, parked close enough to Résidence Daumier to observe not just the entrance but the zig-zag fire escape that dropped down the side of the building into a shadowy sidestreet, the only ways into and out of Résidence Daumier. Here we are, waiting for you, and all you want to do is stay inside and watch TV.

  For the last three nights, at about the same time that the streetlights had come on along Vandon, so, too, had the lights in the fourth-floor apartment where the Garnolles lived. And for the last three nights that’s how they’d stayed until midnight when the lights were switched off, only the glow from a television set in what Beni reckoned had to be the couple’s bedroom. Any other apartment block in Endoume, there’d have been no problem – just take the lift, knock on the door and show the Browning. But Résidence Daumier wasn’t ‘any other apartment block’. It was high-end, the kind of place that cost big money, with a rota of uniformed concierges on duty twenty-four-seven. Which would have meant making their approach through that marble hallway and waiting for said concierge to ring ahead. Not an option.

  Across the road a movement caught Beni’s eye: the Daumier’s concierge coming out on to the step to take in the evening air. And twenty metres beyond him, there was Jo-Jo coming back up the slope with coffees and baguette sandwiches from Café Gente on the corner of Galère. As he closed on the concierge, Beni saw Jo-Jo settle his head in his collar and keep his eyes on the pavement. The concierge watched him pass, idly, not much interested. He might have been if Jo-Jo had crossed the road and got back into the Mercedes. But Jo-Jo didn’t do that. He just kept on walking, with Beni watching in the wing mirror until he turned the corner into rue Fiolle. Good old Jo-Jo. No flies on him. Five minutes later, the concierge went back into the building and two minutes after that, Jo-Jo was back at the Merc, sliding into the front seat with the coffees and sandwiches.

  ‘Did he watch me?’ asked Jo-Jo.

  ‘All the way to Fiolle.’

  ‘You think he’s made us? The car? He’s been on the same time the last three nights.’

  Beni shook his head, sipped his coffee. ‘Not a chance. Just stretching his legs, taking the air.’

  It was then that the streetlights began to flicker on, starting at the bottom of the slope and working their way up to the Merc. Little orange globes that burned into life against the darkening night sky. And right on time, the lights in the Garnolles’ apartment snapped on too.

  But they didn’t stay on.

  As Beni balled up the sandwich wrapper and tossed it in the back and swallowed the last of the coffee, the lights on the fourth floor went out. A few minutes later,
the time it would take for the caged lift to crank down four flights, Jean Garnolle pushed open the main door to the block and stepped out with his wife. The bald head, the big ears … Beni recognised him immediately. He had worked for Duclos long enough to have known the man down in Toulon, before he retired. Soft, lispy kind of voice he had, Beni remembered. Tight as a clam with Duclos, but kept himself to himself with the rest of them. Only spoke if he was spoken to, and then it depended on who was doing the speaking. He had a way of not seeing you, like he was looking right through you.

  ‘It’s him,’ said Jo-Jo, dashing out his cigarette in the ashtray.

  ‘The wife, too,’ replied Beni. ‘Couldn’t be better.’

  In the plan that Beni had hatched, the wife was crucial. When they made the hit, Garnolle had to be with the wife. If he wasn’t, the chances were that he’d do something stupid. He knew who they were, he probably knew what it was all about. He’d try and make a run for it; there would be all kinds of trouble, and someone was sure to end up shot. In all, a fuck-up. And Monsieur Duclos didn’t like fuck-ups.

  Coming down the steps, the Garnolles turned right, linked arms and set off down the slope towards Galère.

  ‘You ready?’ asked Beni.

  Jo-Jo nodded, and the two men got out of the Merc.

  Keeping to their side of the road, they followed their targets to the corner, quickening their pace when the Garnolles turned right again and started out along Galère. They caught up easily enough, now just a few steps behind them, but both men knew it was far too busy to try anything here, still early enough for there to be people around: late-night shopping at the Arab grocer on the corner, at the kebab houses and roadside grills, the air laced with the charred scents of chicken and lamb on the spit. Hands in pockets, slowing their pace now, Beni and Jo-Jo kept a steady fifteen metres behind the Garnolles, walking past without a glance as the couple suddenly stopped up ahead and entered a small Lebanese restaurant.

  Taking a table at a café across the road, the two men ordered beers and settled down to wait, keeping an eye on the restaurant opposite. The longer it took them to eat their meal, Beni decided, the happier he’d be. In a couple of hours the Arab grocer would close up shop, the street wouldn’t be so busy and the way home would be quieter, hardly anyone about on rue Vandon.

  It was closer to three hours, however, before the Garnolles reappeared, Jean Garnolle coming out on to the pavement and helping his wife with her coat. At the café Beni slipped some notes from his bill-clip but as he and Jo-Jo pushed away from their table another half-dozen people came out of the restaurant, all of them talking, laughing … and joining the Garnolles on the pavement. Not just an easy diner à deux. A party, goddammit. Beni’s heart sank. If Garnolle or the wife invited anyone back to their place for a drink, they’d be fucked. Another night’s stake-out down the pan, and old man Duclos would be wanting to know why the fuck such a simple job was taking so fucking long. If it didn’t happen tonight, thought Beni, there was going to be some serious trouble back in Toulon.

  But the Garnolles did not invite anyone back with them, or if they did the invitation was not accepted; thanks but no, it’s late, another time. And when a cab with its light on cruised down Galère, one of the men stepped to the kerb and flagged it down, while another flourished his car keys and offered lifts. With final waves and calls of farewell – bonne nuit, adieu, à la prochaine – the group dispersed and the Garnolles set off, alone, for home.

  Just as Beni had hoped, the strip was quieter now, the grocer on the corner closing up, and rue Vandon, when they turned into it, ten metres behind the Garnolles, all but deserted.

  ‘You set?’ asked Beni with a final look-around, checking the pavements, lit windows, feeling a light drizzle settle on his face.

  ‘Set,’ whispered Jo-Jo, and the two men pulled down the peaks on their trucker caps and reached into their leather jackets.

  45

  JEAN GARNOLLE WAS not in a good humour. It was late, it was starting to rain, and he was ready for his bed. He’d spent the last three hours sitting with half a dozen people he hardly knew – Clara’s friends – in a restuarant where the chairs were uncomfortable and the food not to his liking. Plate after plate of fiddly Lebanese mezes that tasted of lemon and breadcrumbs and chopped coriander rather than the tidbits of lamb and beef and prawns that they covered, the whole tedious meal made only bearable by a very creditable Château Musar. If it hadn’t been for the wine, he’d never have lasted as long as he had.

  But it was over. They were nearly home and he could put the whole ghastly evening behind him, pour himself a cognac and call it a night. In the old days, of course, working for Duclos, this would never have happened. He’d have been able to make an excuse back then. Tell the wife there was a meeting in Toulon he couldn’t miss, he had documents to go through or accounts to complete, he’d be back too late. But he couldn’t do that now. He was retired. He was trapped. There was no option.

  ‘Did you enjoy yourself, chéri?’ asked his wife, as they turned the corner and started up rue Vandon.

  ‘I did, I did,’ he lied.

  ‘Isn’t Jean-Marie just a riot? So amusing.’

  ‘Jean-Marie?’

  ‘Jean-Marie Artaud. Sitting opposite you. With the round spectacles. He runs EDC, did he tell you? The Experimental Dance Company on Cours Julien. I’ll have to take you there. It’s quite the …’

  But that was as far as she got.

  Just a few steps from their building, Jean Garnolle felt a hand grip his arm, a mouth at his ear.

  ‘Keep walking or my friend will shoot your wife.’

  ‘What’s going on? Get off me …’ he heard his wife say, her arm torn from his, staggering a little on her heels.

  For a moment Jean Garnolle assumed it was a mugging, tried to shake off the restraining hand, thought about his wallet, his credit cards. But as he turned to his assailant he recognised the face, or more precisely the small white scar that seemed to divide the man’s left eyebrow. Two eyebrows, one above the other.

  He frowned, squinted. ‘I know you …’

  ‘Someone wants a word,’ said Beni. ‘Like I say, do as I tell you or your wife dies.’

  Garnolle, in that instant, knew exactly who Beni was, and who it was who wanted a word. He went pale.

  ‘Yes, yes, I understand. Of course.’ He turned to his wife, still struggling in Jo-Jo’s arms, just seconds away from giving out a good, wholesome scream. ‘It’s okay, Clara, don’t fret, chérie. It’s okay. Just do as they say and we’ll be fine … Just act normal.’

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Beni.

  ‘But Clara …’

  ‘… stays here with my associate. Just to make sure you behave. Come on,’ he said, and tightening his grip on Garnolle’s arm, he steered him across the road and up the slope towards the Mercedes.

  Garnolle did exactly what Beni asked, holding out his wrists to be secured with duct tape and climbing into the boot of the Merc where a blanket and pillow had been put down. No argument. If he tried anything, he knew that it would be Clara who paid the price.

  Starting up the Merc, Beni pulled out of the parking space and let the car roll down the slope, flicked on the wipers, slowing as he passed Résidence Daumier and coming to a halt where Jo-Jo and Clara were waiting, huddled together under an awning.

  But Clara, as Beni and Jo-Jo knew, was simply the means to an end. Once her husband was in the car, once they had him where they wanted him, they had no further use for her. Left alive she could have raised the alarm, given their registration number to the police.

  Beni nodded and Jo-Jo wrapped his arm round Clara’s shoulder as though to give her a farewell hug. Instead he buried the muzzle of his Browning in her chest and fired three times, holding her as she jerked away from the gunshots, lowering her body down into the shop’s shadowed doorway.

  As though she was sleeping. Just a drunk.

  She could be there hours and no one would bother her.

&nb
sp; It was done.

  46

  POLINEAUX WAS RED in the face with fury. Delon, his nurse, would have had him back in bed and in the oxygen tent in seconds if he had seen him now. But Delon was not there. Just Didier.

  ‘He’s what?’

  ‘Dead.’

  ‘Lombard’s dead?’

  ‘He had AIDs.’

  The old man quietened, frowned. ‘AIDs? What’s that?’ he asked, in a scared, querulous tone.

  The question took Didier by surprise. Didn’t the old man know about AIDs? Or was it old age, this forgetting? Just a beat or two behind the action. It was happening so often these days.

  ‘It’s an illness,’ Didier replied, carefully. His boss didn’t like talk of disease and death, but he chanced it. ‘Like cancer. You don’t get better.’

  Polineaux growled like an angry cat, deep in his throat. And then, ‘You believe it?’

  Didier looked puzzled.

  ‘That he died naturally, I mean. Of this … AIDs thing.’

  Didier registered another jolt of surprise. Perhaps the old man wasn’t quite so slow after all. ‘There’s a whisper one of the prison staff might have been behind it,’ he replied.

  ‘Who? Do we know who?’

  ‘According to Pisco, Lombard was in an isolation ward. Like solitary, except some schizo was put in there with him. Following morning Lombard’s dead.’

  ‘Who set it up?’

  ‘Pisco says the assistant warden, Jules Ranque.’

  ‘Ranque? Ranque?’

  ‘The one we’ve been softening for the kitchen contracts. Couple of years now.’