Ascension Day (47 page)

Leonard Truelle was only twenty yards into the dusk light of the side-street, heading towards his car, when the blow came to his lower back, feeling like someone had hit him with a sledgehammer, his legs buckling as the pain shot up his spine and lanced like an ice-pick through his skull.

Then another blow quickly after, sending his pain sensors into overload as the breath left his body in a strangled groan and he fell to his knees. Something was slipped over his head then, some sort of fabric, the smell of cotton pleasant, welcoming; but the darkness he was plunged into, suddenly not being able to see anything, was decidedly unwelcome,
frightening
.

Aware now of sound and movement for the first time, rustling, shuffling – they seemed to have come out of nowhere behind him and he hadn’t heard any approach – one person, no,
two,
he realized, as he felt himself being lifted and carried. But still no voices, nothing said between themselves or to him, which somehow made it all the more terrifying.

No more than eight or ten paces before a car door was opened and he was thrown brusquely into the back – Truelle trying to recall which cars he’d seen close by as it started up and pulled out. He could feel mucus on his chin, or maybe he’d vomited without realizing it, and the pain in his back had now spread like burning oil to his stomach, razor shards shooting up his spine as his body lurched with two sharp turns, one after the other. A long flat stretch for a while, a half mile or more, and a voice finally came from the front.

‘You know, you should never have had those phone bugs cleared, otherwise we wouldn’t have to do this now.’

Nel M. As much as Nel-M’s voice made Truelle’s skin crawl each time, he felt an odd sense of relief hearing it now: a face at least put to one of his abductors. Two faceless abductors would have been more ominous, worrying.
Better the devil you know
.

‘We’ve become concerned about what you might have been saying. Because we simply don’t know any more. And that makes us worry perhaps more than we should.’ Nel-M had got part of the idea when he’d looked in his car mirror the other night and seen the hood being taken off McElroy. The other part had been from an interview with Truelle in a psychiatric journal that Roche had got hold of, in which Truelle had talked about drawing out patient’s fears and phobias, with a brief aside about his own fear of heights. ‘Do you like dancing, Leonard?’

‘
What
? What the hell are yoouuu –’ A cough rose from the back of Truelle’s throat and became a brief coughing fit that he thought for a second would lapse into retching.

‘Nasty cough you got there, Leonard. Maybe some fresh air would help… like somewhere up high.
Way
up high.’ Nel-M smiled to himself as the silence settled deeper; he could almost hear the wheels in Truelle’s mind turning in time with the thrum of the wheels on the road.

‘Where…
where
are we going?’ Hesitant, tremulous, as if afraid of hearing the answer.

Silence. Nel-M purposely let it lengthen, let the unknown, the uncertainties multiply in Truelle’s mind as he motioned Vic Farrelia into the next turn, and then, two hundred yards along, pointed out a good parking spot. No words between them, as had been agreed at the outset: this was stretching Farrelia’s call of duty, and so he wanted to remain as anonymous as possible.

They bundled Truelle out from the back, a dozen or so paces counted by Truelle before the sound of a door opening, closing, four more paces and then another door, mechanical, sliding. An elevator.

Nel-M didn’t speak again until the elevator started rising.

‘Like I said, Leonard… somewhere up high. Way up where you and I can get a good view of the city. A
real
good view.’

But Nel-M knew that Truelle was only half-listening, he was timing and counting in his mind just how far the elevator was rising.

Eighteen floors, Nel-M could have told him, but wasn’t going to; the elevator wasn’t that fast, in Truelle’s mind it probably seemed more.

Out of the elevator, along and through a door, then up the steps to the roof and over to its far side. They stood Truelle up, but Nel-M kept one arm around him, bracing. Again, Nel-M didn’t speak throughout, and he waited a moment now, wanted the air wafting up from eighteen floors below to hit Truelle’s senses.

Nel-M took a deep breath. ‘Real nice up here. And fine view… fine view, indeed. You can see the whole city.’ He knew that his words combined with the heavier breeze on the rooftop had painted enough of a picture for Truelle inside the darkness of the hood. He could feel Truelle’s body trembling in his grip. ‘But you know, we don’t have to do this now… we don’t have to go
dancing
. If only you just told us where you’ve got those insurance policies held.’

‘
What
… dancing?’ Truelle’s mind was scrambled. All he could think about was Nel-M’s last words. That view. ‘I… I can’t tell you. You’d just kill me then.’

‘Possibility that I would, I suppose.’ Nel-M was silent for a moment, thoughtful. ‘But you know, Leonard, if you’d seen some of the things I have in my lifetime, you’d know that there’s actually worse things than death. Like pain. And dancing.’

There it was again, thought Truelle: dancing? Had Nel-M gone completely mad, was looking to book a session on his couch? He was still trying to work it out as with an, ‘Okay…. Huuuup,’ from Nel-M, he felt himself being lifted bodily. He thought for one horrible moment – the intake of breath rising sharply in his throat, making him dizzy as it hit his brain – that he was being thrown straight over the edge. But then he felt something firm again under his feet, and Nel-M close, his breath hot against the cloth covering his face; strangely comforting, given how he’d have normally felt about that.

‘Now you’re going to have to keep real close, Leonard, and hold real tight – like we’re dancing,’ Nel-M said. ‘Because this ledge – it ain’t that wide.’

Oh God
.
Oh God
. And suddenly it all made sense to Truelle, and he clung on to Nel-M as if his life depended on it; because now he knew with certainty that it actually did.

   Nel-M could have found buildings higher, thirty floors or more, but this was the only one he knew with such a wide ledge running around, just over two foot. Enough for them to move around on, as long as they kept in close. At each corner and in the middle of each side were large Roman urns with squat fan palms. Probably the main reason for the width of the ledge. But there was still a good thirty-foot between each urn for their dance run, Nel-M observed.

Nel-M started moving then, swinging Truelle out for a second to feel the drop – heard him gasp and felt the trembling in his body run deeper – then swung him sharply back in again.

‘So, shall we try again… where have you left those insurance policies?’

‘I… I can’t. It’s… it’s my only pro.. protection.’ Truelle was trembling so hard, he had trouble forming the words, his mind half gone. All he could think of was where he was putting his feet and that drop only inches away.

Nel-M reached deeper behind Truelle’s back as they moved, two steps forward, two steps back, gently swaying. ‘Now, where was it I punched you? There…
there
, I think.’

Truelle felt the pain rocket through his brain. Nel-M eased off for a second, then dug even harder with two fingers into Truelle’s kidney, heard him groan as the shudder ran through his body, his legs buckling. Nel-M held him upright.

‘Now, don’t you go giving up on me, Leonard. Just as we’re starting to get into the rhythm.’ Nel-M smiled. The only thing missing from making this little scenario a hundred-and-ten per cent perfect, rather than just a hundred per cent: with the hood, Truelle couldn’t see him gloating, his eyes dancing; see how much Nel-M was enjoying it. ‘See what I mean about pain being worse than death, Leonard. Keep that up for a while, and you’d be begging me to kill you. But we’d have to be in a dark basement somewhere for that, where half the neighbourhood couldn’t hear your screams. And I’m a real softy for mood, atmosphere. Much better up here with the city spread below us,
dancing
.’ Nel-M leant in closer, his mouth only inches from Truelle’s ear, his smile widening as he swore he could all but feel the shudder of revulsion run through Truelle’s body with his next words. ‘Don’t you think, Lenny,
baby
?’

Nel-M started moving again, more fluidly, dramatically, swaying and leaning Truelle even further over the drop at times.

Truelle exclaimed breathlessly, ‘Please…
please
don’t do this.’

‘You’re not crapping out on our romantic date already, are you, Lenny? You know, I used to know this chick down at a club on Toulouse Street. Half pure Congo-African, half Spanish Creole… and boy, could she tango.’ Nel-M started moving again. ‘Man, we’d swing up and down so hard and fast we’d clear half the dance floor.’ More elaborate swaying and swinging now, relishing Truelle’s gasps as he hung him over the drop at almost a ninety-degree angle at points. ‘Not like you. All stiff and formal, stumbling on your step. Something worryin’ you, Lenny?’ Nel-M chuckled.

‘
Please
… I’m begging you.’

‘Wanna die yet, Lenny? Think that’s suddenly more appealing?’ Nel-M chuckled again, lower, more menacing. ‘Or have you worked out yet which you prefer: dancing or
pain
?’

On the last word, Nel-M dug his fingers again into Truelle’s bruised kidney, felt his body jolt as the pain shot through it.

Truelle spluttered breathlessly, ‘I can’t… I
can’t
tell you.’

Nel-M wondered whether to give Truelle a few more swaying steps, probably his first taste ever of real rhythm, then just drop him over the edge.
Last Tango in New Orleans
. But the fall-out might not be containable, and there were other things he wanted to know.

‘Okay.
Okay
. If we can’t do that – then tell me what happened when McElroy came to see you? He’s making out that he stopped doing anything on the Durrant case soon after he saw you. But I’ve got my doubts. Strong doubts. So, what did he say to you, Lenny?’

‘Not much, really.’

‘I mean, did he tell you that he was going to stop digging? Was going to leave everything just with the Governor’s plea?’

‘No – he didn’t say that. But… but also, there didn’t seem much he knew.’

‘And
you
didn’t tell him anything, did you, Lenny?’

‘No…
no
. Of course not.’

They started moving again then, but slowly, less flamboyantly. But Truelle was still petrified, fearful that with the slightest false half-step, he’d fall over the edge.

‘So, what
did
happen in that meeting, Lenny?’

‘Not that much. Not that I can think of.’

That didn’t seem to please Nel-M. The step increased, the swaying bolder. ‘Think, Lenny.
Think
. It’s important.’

‘Well, he… he seemed concerned about hearing that Doctor Thallerey, Jessica Roche’s obstetrician, had died in a car accident. And an accident too that he’d had himself… thought they might be linked.’

‘You see… you
see
. You can do it when you try.’ The swaying subsided a little. ‘What else?’

‘I don’t know… not much else, really.’

The step and swaying picked up again. ‘Think harder, Lenny. Like I say, it’s important.’

‘He… he left in such a rush. That’s why there wasn’t… wasn’t much else.’ Truelle was having trouble talking and concentrating on his step at the same time. ‘He nev… never told me what had troubled him so just before he left.’

The step steadied again. ‘Okay. I buy that. Anything else?’

‘With… with what had happened with himself and Thallerey, almost like… like a warning I might be next.’

‘You might be, Leonard.’ Another quick looping sway with Truelle held dramatically over the drop before quickly righting again. Nel-M’s gloat slid into a brief chuckle. ‘You might be.’

‘And he…’ Truelle suddenly stopped himself, worried that this part might bring back questions about his insurance policies.