Ascension Day (34 page)

There was a small hold-up along
Esplanade Avenue
, but as soon as he was clear of the main downtown traffic, twenty yards after making the turn into
Claiborne Avenue
, Jac hit play again on the recorder now on his passenger seat.

‘
It… it was another robbery, that’s why I felt guilty. And not just ‘cause I’d promised Franny I wouldn’t rob again, but because it went wrong… terribly wrong.
’

‘
In which way did it go wrong
?’

‘
There was somebody there when I broke in – a woman. Shouldn’t… shouldn’t have happened.’
Durrant’s breathing erratic again
. ‘I… I’d checked for a few nights b’forehand, and there was no car either in the drive – or lights on that I could see. She… she wasn’t mean’a be there
.’

‘
And where was this house
?’

‘…
Garden District
.’

‘
Do you remember the road
?’

‘
Coliseum Street
. But I don’ remember the number exactly. Four hundred and something.’

‘
That’s okay,
Lawrence
. Relax, take it easy. And, in your own time, tell me what happened there
.’

Jac became aware of Truelle’s tactic: getting background detail, district, road, because they were easier for Durrant to relate, got him talking more freely. Truelle had obviously worried that if he asked straight out ‘What happened with the woman?’, Durrant might lapse into rapid-breathing catatonia, and that would be all he’d get. Even now with a more general, soft-edged approach, there was a long pause, only the sound of Durrant’s uneven breathing coming over on the tape.

Jac turned the volume up as he hit the start of the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway; with the increased tyre-noise on the rougher road surface, he couldn’t hear whether Durrant had started speaking again or not.

‘
As… as I said, 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’da  been no light on there either
.’

‘
So you broke in at the side
,’ Truelle confirmed as Durrant paused again heavily, as if each time he side-tracked it took a moment to get the sequence clear again in his mind. 

‘
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 t’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 preparin’ 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…
’

Jac’s hands gripped tight at the steering wheel, feeling Durrant’s tension coming across in waves, as if he was right there alongside him as Jessica Roche confronted him, the police photos filling in the details of the room in his mind. He was suddenly reminded of Coultaine’s words:
depth of detail… things that only the killer could possibly have known.

Durrant’s breathing was again erratic as he struggled with the images; or perhaps in anticipation of what he did next. ‘
“What are you doing?”
she barked. She was pushy, had me rattled, and strange thing is… I don’t even remember takin’ out the gun, but suddenly it was there between us… her eyes wide, staring at it…
’ A heavy swallow, Durrant fighting to get his breathing under control. ‘
You know, even then I didn’t plan to… to…
’

The pause was even longer this time, and it looked for a moment as if Truelle had lost Durrant completely, his final actions too traumatic to voice, or perhaps part of him in denial that he’d actually done it. Jac tapped two fingers on his steering wheel, counting off the seconds, the sun creeping out from behind a cloud stinging his eyes as it reflected off the water. Jac slipped on his sunglasses and half-opened one window, feeling the warm Bayou breeze tease his hair. But memories of Isle de Rey seemed distant today as he felt himself immersing deeper into the shadows of the Roche residence of twelve years ago.

‘
Plan to what, Larry
?’ Truelle prompted as the silence prolonged. ‘
What happened then
?’

Jac tapped out another fifteen seconds with his fingers before Durrant’s voice finally returned.

‘
It… it all felt unreal, distant – like it was happenin’ to someone else and I was just looking on.  But in… instead of stepping back, she stepped forward… and I… I panicked – did the wrong thing… I didn’t mean to… and… and she was layin’ there then, blood everywhere, looking at me with wide eyes. And she was in pain… real pain… a pitiful, throaty groanin’ that went right through me. So I… I…
’

Even though Jac knew what happened next, he found his own breathing rapid and short in anticipation, almost matching Durrant’s, and his hands gripped tight to the steering wheel started to shake. A sign to his right displayed the 10-mile Causeway mark.

‘
I didn’t want to… but she was in pain… the blood bubbling up from her mouth… her wide eyes almost pleadin’ with me…
’

Long silence again. Ragged, uneven breathing.

‘
What happened then, Lawrence
?
What did you do
?’ Truelle’s prompt quicker this time; the edge-of-the-seat listener, impatient for what happened next, in that heated moment holding sway over the trained psychiatrist.

‘
She wasn’t meant to be there… wasn’t meant to be… I… I…
’

And Jac, impatient too, fast-forwarded in his mind to the close-up police photos of Jessica Roche, both shots fired, stomach and head, sepia-grey blood pools radiating from each.

Whether the image momentarily distracted Jac, or he glanced fleetingly at the tape recorder in expectation of Durrant’s next words, the only warning was a reflected glint striking his eye – something suddenly different in the vista of roadway and sun-dappled lake spread each side.

A truck overtaking, its chrome bumper catching the sun as it veered lazily from its lane towards him, suddenly swung sharply across his front wing, pushing him towards the side-barrier.

Jac swerved, stock reaction, hitting his brakes hard as the barrier loomed before him. But they did nothing,
nothing
… and in panic he swung the wheel back, but not enough: he hit the barrier at a thirty-degree angle at almost the same speed, feeling himself shunted sharply forward and the airbag exploding against him, along with something else, sharper, harder, against one leg.

Momentary darkness, then the sun and lake seemed to be fighting through a hazy-grey mist. And, as the mist became darker, denser, Jac realized with mounting panic that his car was in the lake and sinking, feeling the first water swill against his thigh as it poured in through the half-open window.

Sinking…
sinking
… Jac felt as if he was in a washing-machine tumbler, the water swirling in relentlessly, the car swaying, tilting – then as it finally hit the bottom of the lake, a cloud of mud was thrown up, cutting visibility to almost nil. How far was he down: thirty feet, fifty?

Jac frantically tried the door, but it wouldn’t budge with the pressure outside. His heart raced, his breath falling short, the water already up to his waist. Maybe the window, but it wasn’t open enough to get through. He fumbled for the switch in the gloom, found it, pressed it – but after a second it fizzled out with a spark and the window stopped moving. Two-thirds down, maybe enough.

Jac squeezed his head and shoulders into the gap, but the surge of water rushing in was too heavy, impossible to push against. No choice but to wait until the pressure equalized, he pulled back and hoisted up until his head was against the car roof. Water up to his shoulders now, breathing in the last foot of air.

Trying to time it right, the air-gap ten-inches, eight… praying that he wasn’t too far down to make it to the surface,
six
… and fighting to keep his breathing even – ragged and frantic as it kept time with his racing pulse – so that he had maximum air in his lungs when…
four
…

Jac made the break then, got his head and shoulders quickly through, his chest… but as he tried to snake his waist through, he felt something snagging on one leg, holding him back. His seat belt or maybe part of the air-bag.

He wriggled hard, desperate to free it, knowing that he was using vital air with each second lost. And as Jac frantically jerked and tugged to get free, the images of Jessica Roche were again there with him, the sepia-grey of the police photos merging with the murky waters surrounding him, clogging his nose, his mouth, suffocating his last breaths.

Maybe because they were the last images in his mind before his car hit the barrier; or because he now shared Jessica Roche’s emotions in those final seconds as Durrant’s gun barrel pressed against her temple. Hoping against hope that she might survive, but knowing in her sinking heart that it was already too late.

19

18
^th
February, 1992
.

Silence. The thrum of the city pushed away and cushioned by the resplendent mansions of the Garden District, each sprawling edifice with its cosseted oleander-, juniper-, bamboo- and magnolia-rich grounds a punctuation space of tranquillity separated from its neighbour; on and on until the city itself and its hubbub seemed distant, remote. Almost another world.

Jessica Roche was wrapped in the spacious cocoon of that silence, the only sound coming from the house itself: the TV on low with a
Cheers
re-run, a grandfather clock ticking in the hallway, the faint hum and churn of the dishwasher in the kitchen – their maid Rosella had packed it and wiped all surfaces clean when she’d left for the day fifty minutes ago – the sharpest sound the turning of magazine pages as Jessica Roche flicked through a recent
Elle Décor
.

She glanced fleetingly at her watch. Over two hours gone, they’d be well into the desserts, brandies and after-dinner speeches by now. ‘One of those boring business functions, all of the talk will be about trends and quotas and how to improve tanker facilities at
Port Arthur
. You wouldn’t enjoy it.’

But at the back of her mind she’d begun to wonder if Adelay was purposely keeping her away from business functions because of their recent argument. It had all been behind closed doors, nothing overt that anyone else would have been aware of, even Rosella.

 Maybe this was his way of punishing her, shutting her out in the cold for a while. Leave the trophy wife at home to cool-off, realize her ‘place’. Or perhaps, keeping her away from business functions, a more direct message: don’t get involved in my business matters and things that don’t concern you.

In sober reflection, possibly she had been too volatile, rash, taken things a step too far – or at least threatened to. But then, as so often, he’d been so annoyingly offhand and condescending.
Trophy Wife
. At the time, it had seemed the only way for him to pay her any notice, take her seriously; otherwise, he’d have just rolled straight over her.

She stroked her stomach gently with one hand as she felt it twitch and tighten. Hopefully finally some activity there, rather than just unease. Dr Thallerey, her obstetrician, had said that the next month or so would be the most telling for the treatment.

Perhaps she should back-step with Adelay and try and calm the waters over the next few days. The last thing she wanted –
they
wanted – was any upset that might affect the success of the treatment. After all, they finally had something to look forward to, some hope where before…