Bateson’s return call came at 7.16 p.m., and thirty-five minutes later Nel-M left his apartment and drove out to just before the start of the Pontchartraine Causeway, made a hasty U-turn in a gap in the traffic and stopped at the first pull-in where he could watch cars coming off the Causeway.
He’d got there early, just in case, and had to wait over half an hour before Ayliss’s steel-blue Dodge Stratus went past him. Nel-M let one more car pass, then pulled out and followed.
Earhart… then Louisiana… LaSalle. As soon as Ayliss took the turn onto Washington Avenue, Nel-M suspected where he was heading; confirmed as Ayliss slowed the other side of St Charles, looking out for Coliseum Street.
Nel-M had spent little time in the area since that night in 1992. Driven past it several times and through it on a few occasions out of necessity — but never stayed for any time there.
He kept straight on as Ayliss turned into Coliseum Street, then took the next turn on Chestnut and again on 2 ndStreet, effectively circling round the block; and, sure enough, as he nosed his car out enough to get a partial view, Ayliss was closing his car door and heading up the path towards the Roche’s old house.
For the first twenty minutes of waiting, Nel-M stayed calm, tried not to think too much about what Ayliss might be doing in there. But as the minutes ticked by, his thoughts started to multiply: maybe some vital clue from the session with Durrant that Ayliss was checking out, or something Ayliss had picked up on that nobody had before; or perhaps he was just familiarizing himself with the crime scene. Standard practice.
The atmosphere of the street also began to close in on Nel-M then: its quietness and isolation from the city close by, the shadows heavier, deeper from the large mansions and more abundant tree cover. The reminders of that night drifting back: Jessica Roche’s eyes staring back pleadingly just before that final shot… the woman walking her dog holding his gaze for a second as he’d looked back.
Nel-M’s pulse was still raised a notch, his hands gently trembling on the steering wheel, when almost an hour later Ayliss left the house. He pulled out again to follow him.
St Charles, Jackson, Simon Bolivar… finally stopping at a hotel two blocks from the main train and Greyhound bus terminals. Again, Nel-M drifted past and then turned around and parked a block away where he had a clear sight of Ayliss’s Dodge in their side car park.
Maybe Ayliss would head out later for dinner or another meeting, Nel-M considered, but after an hour of waiting — 10.43 p.m. by then — Nel-M began to think that Ayliss might be there for the night, had grabbed something to eat in the hotel. He left it another twenty minutes, then went into the hotel. He approached the reception desk.
‘I’ve got a business colleague staying here, Darrell Ayliss, and I promised to drop off some papers for him tomorrow morning. But I don’t want to miss him before he heads off, and he told me he was having an early night — so I didn’t want to disturb him now. But I wondered what time he might have an alarm call or breakfast ordered — might give me a clue as to when he’ll be heading out.’
The desk clerk’s brow furrowed. ‘Mr Ayliss has already left, sir.’
‘But his rental car’s still in the car park.’
‘I know, sir. He left the keys here for the car-rental company to pick up, and got in a cab forty minutes ago.’
Nel-M tried to recall the dozen or so cabs he’d seen pull up in that time, and the people he’d seen get in them. The only possibility had been a man shuffling in with a homburg hat pulled down. But it hadn’t looked like Ayliss — no horn-rimmed glasses, no dark lank hair in sight, different jacket — which Nel-M supposed had been the idea.
A muscle twitched sharply in Nel-M’s jaw. ‘Thanks,’ he said, and as soon as he was outside the hotel, he took out his cell-phone.
Perhaps Ayliss was moving around because of his ex-wife, or possibly Coultaine had whispered in his ear that — given what had happened to McElroy — it was advisable to remain shadowy and elusive.
Nel-M had phoned Melanie Ayliss’s number earlier and been told, ‘Mom won’t be back till late this evening. Shopping and then sociology evening class.’
Nel-M hadn’t planned to try her again until the next day — but if this was going to be the name of the game with Ayliss, Runaround City, the sooner his ex-wife was chasing his ass, the better. With two of them trying to find him, he wouldn’t find it so easy to slip away.
Darrell Ayliss’s cab took him deeper into the city — through the Warehouse District, CBD and French Quarter — to a smaller, more intimate hotel with a quaint Spanish courtyard and pool on the edge of Faubourg Marigny.
He glanced through the cab’s back window a couple of times, nobody following that he could tell — but then he hadn’t noticed anyone following earlier either. Just basic precautions: change his hotel and his rental car every day. Keep on the move.
He’d phoned to book the room under his name four hours back, and, as he checked in, the desk clerk informed him that his guest had already arrived. ‘About half an hour ago.’ The desk clerk handed him his key. ‘Room twenty-nine. First floor.’
Ayliss nodded with a tight smile and, despite it being only one floor, took the elevator. He felt as awkward as hell moving around, felt as if all that clammy heat and stale sweat from Libreville was still trapped against his skin.
Noises from the en-suite as he walked in: running water. He’d knock the door in a minute, but meanwhile he couldn’t wait any longer to get everything off. First his oversized jacket and shirt, then the padding strapped around his shoulders and waist that made him look seventy pounds heavier. He leant forward to shake and blink out the two brown contact lenses into his right palm, then finally, stripped to the waist standing in front of the dressing-table mirror, he started peeling off the skin-coloured prosthetic stuck tight to his cheeks and around his jaw.
The bathroom door opened, and, reflected in the mirror, he saw Alaysha Reyner leaning against the door frame in burgundy-red La Perla panties and matching bra. She smiled slyly.
‘My, my, Mr McElroy. I swear I only recognize you with your clothes off.’
He felt an ache of longing as he looked at her, but as he remembered Gerry’s words ‘… I’ll bet you she hasn’t told you one thing. Our dirty, sordid little secret…’ before he ran off into the night with her gun, it dissolved into something else in his stomach. Something sourer, more uncertain, but equally as painful.
34
As Jac had been about to phone John Langfranc that night out by the Great River Road, he’d suddenly thought of Morvaun Jaspar. He’d stood frozen in the same position for a couple of minutes, turning over in his mind whether the scenario that had just struck him might be at all possible. Yes, it would be one way of disappearing for a while and, yes, he might be able to get into Libreville with a good enough disguise. But some of the practicalities and worrying gaps in the plan he wouldn’t be able to fill until he’d actually spoken with Morvaun.
Morvaun had seen the late news bulletin, ‘‘Spect half of New Orleans has by now,’ and while his initial excitement over the idea outweighed his concerns, he reserved full judgement until they’d talked it over some more. ‘First thing is t’get you picked up. Then we can sit over some hot coffee — an’ maybe somethin’ stronger — while we thrash out if this is actually gonna work, or is jus’ the worst damn-fool plan since the Presiden’ decided to go into Iraq.’
In the half-hour wait, despite hanging in the shadow of some trees until he saw Morvaun’s car turn the corner, again Jac’s nerves bubbled as if being pressure-cooked, worried that the man on the terrace — or someone else seeing him through a window — might have matched him to the news bulletin, and a squad car would get to him before Morvaun.