Jac swallowed hard. Didn’t say anything, couldn’t say anything, as he felt the guilt weigh him down. Here he was shielding truths or only dealing half-truths with Durrant, while meanwhile Larry was baring his soul to the bone. Almost a complete reversal of their first meeting together. But at least it perhaps answered why, on the key tape from Truelle, Larry never actually described pulling the trigger; even then, his mind was self-protecting, pushing away that he’d done it. Or, the other explanation: he hadn’t done it.
Hadn’t done it? Jac wondered whether he should mention Roche’s henchman, Nelson Malley, trailing him the other day and the photos they’d gained. But, like the mystery e-mailer, it would just torment Durrant all the more, putting substance and a face to someone else who might have been the murderer when they were still a million miles from proving that. The cruellest fate of all, knowing that someone else might well have done what you were about to be executed for, yet with nothing left to stop it. Jac bit at his lip; another secret buried.
There was a gentle thrum in the background, maybe the prison boilers — but Jac could feel its rhythm coursing through him now, along with the dull pounding of his heart, like a distant drumbeat driving him on after all the madness and fallen hurdles of the past days, as if saying, You can’t give up now. You can’t. You’ve gone too far. But Jac felt tired, worn down from it all, and now the few options left appeared even more remote; as hazy and out of reach as the images in Larry Durrant’s fractured mind from twelve years ago.
As the silence became uneasy, Jac said, ‘But, while I’m here…’ And with a fresh, expectant breath, he reached into his briefcase. He’d picked everything up before heading out to the prison, and now probably needed more than ever: clear the air of stale half-truths and half-memories hanging over them. Jac pulled out the two bottles and balloon glasses with a magician’s flourish. ‘Voila! Choose your poison: twelve-year-old malt whisky, or twenty-year-old cognac. Symbols of my two past cultures.’
Larry beamed, shaking his head. ‘Jeezus… you’re a man of many surprises, Jac McElroy. Most people would try and sneak in a file or a gun. You turn up with two bottles of liquor.’ Larry applied brief thought and pointed to the cognac. ‘I hear that’s the new black yuppie drink of choice. Been out of touch for twelve years — might as well be in vogue now.’
‘And I’ll join you in that.’ Jac poured the two glasses and passed Larry’s across. He wanted to feel as close to and in harmony with Durrant as possible; at this moment of all moments.
Jac watched, as with eyes half-closed, Larry took the first sip. Jac remembered as a child going out on a hot day in the woods around the Rochefort farmhouse and getting lost. He’d been gone almost six hours in the hot sun without a drink, and his lips were dry and blistered as he lifted the glass his mother handed him. He remembered still vividly that feeling when the water first touched his lips and trickled down, and knew that it was akin to what Larry Durrant was feeling now.
The first real drink after twelve years. And mellow, twenty-year-old cognac. Pure nectar.
They drank in silence for a moment. A long moment, Larry alternating between closing his eyes as the cognac trickled down and its warmth hit his stomach, as if it was just another dream and not really happening, and smacking his lips, relishing its taste. ‘Man, that’s good… that’s sooooo good.’ Larry leant forward after a moment, peering at the label. ‘What’s this stuff called?’
‘Frapin. It’s one of the best.’
‘Man oooohhh man… I can taste that for myself. Even if you hadn’t told me.’ Larry took another sip, closing his eyes for a second in reverie, then sank back into silence again, smiling.
Jac smiled back. Twelve years without a drink, and suddenly Larry was acting like a connoisseur.
This was one of those moments when they were meant to be silent; after all, they’d done nothing but rake over the coals of old ghosts and old memories the past forty minutes, said everything that needed to be said. But as Larry’s eyes narrowed after a moment, it looked like there was something else on his mind. He took another slug, as if clearing his throat for the words; or perhaps, now they were drinking, that final bit of Dutch courage, licence to become more maudlin.
‘One thing I never did work out about you, Jac. Why you went out on such a limb for me? I mean, it got to the point where your life was in danger, man. Maybe still is.’
‘My girlfriend asked just the same the other day.’
‘Don’t blame her.’ Larry smiled crookedly. ‘She likes you, maybe she’s keen on keeping your ass around a while longer.’
Jac mirrored the smile, took another sip of cognac. ‘I think the first thing was, big case, and wanting to prove myself. But a lot of that was also wrapped up with what happened with my father. He died young, well, not exactly old: he was only fifty-four when he died.’
Larry slanted one eyebrow. ‘So, you got a thing about people dying young? Is that what you’re telling me?’
Jac shrugged. ‘No, well, I suppose that’s a pretty natural instinct for a lot of people. But it had more to do with the circumstances surrounding his death.’ Jac explained about his father’s business collapse and disastrous financial situation when he died, with a lot of people, including Jac’s rich aunt, as a result labelling him a failure. ‘So when anyone gets close to suggesting that I too might fail on something, it’s like a red rag to a bull. I’ll go to all sorts of lengths to prove them wrong. It’s almost like I’m batting too on my father’s behalf, setting the record straight on how people remember him.’ Jac took another slug. ‘That’s how they were painting this case originally at Payne, Beaton and Sawyer: little hope, bound to fail. That’s why they gave it to a young blood like me, rather than one of the senior partners. But what they didn’t know was, because of that fear of failure, how hard I’d fight it.’
‘Looks like I got the right man, then.’ Larry raised his glass, smiling tightly, his expression faintly quizzical as he thought about the skewed logic of what Jac had just said. ‘I think.’
A bit more truth, Jac thought, but again he still held back. He’d come here intending to be brutally honest, lay every possible card on the table, because it might be his very last chance. But once he was actually in front of Durrant, his resolve had melted and he’d only told half the truth. The real reason he’d gone out on such a limb for Durrant had hit him in the dead of night the day after Alaysha had asked him, awoken him in a cold, shivering sweat. At the same time it was strangely calming, settling: at least now I know. Now I know. And there’d been a moment now, a natural conversational lead-on, when he could have said it. Dying young? Lived before he died. But as he looked at Durrant, saw the eleven years of pain and loneliness in his eyes, he’d once again balked; felt it might be too harsh for Durrant to take with only days left now until his execution.
Jac shrugged. ‘Or maybe it’s just that I don’t agree with the state killing people. Anti-capitalist punishment thing.’ Jac took a quick slug, grimacing. ‘Almost required thinking for a European.’
Larry nodded thoughtfully. ‘Yeah, I know. You don’t have it over there.’
Jac nodded back. Easy to forget at times that Durrant wasn’t just another homey, how well-read he was. ‘There hasn’t been anyone executed in over thirty years in most of Europe. And it doesn’t seem to have affected the murder rate. Still a quarter of that in the States.’