Ascension Day

Cool-Hand Luke territory all the way.’

Jac approached the main gate of Libreville. Fourteen foot high, matching the perimeter fence, with another three-foot of rolled razor wire on top.

After announcing his meeting with Chief Warden Haveling and handing over his card, Jac checked his watch while the guard phoned through for confirmation. Four minutes late; not too bad. But from the sprawl of the place, it looked like it was going to take him another four or five to actually get to Haveling’s office.

The guard returned, handed him back his card, and pointed along the shale road ahead.

‘Ignore the first three buildings, two one side, one the other — all single storey — and after a lil’ more than a mile, you’ll see the main building. Can’t miss it. Rises up four floors out o’ nowhere. Visitors’ parking on the right.’

‘Thanks.’

‘…Three thousand eight-hundred inmates — forty per cent increase since the late fifties, which led to three new blocks being built in the grounds. All high risk or death row prisoners are held in the main block, with time allowed out of holding cells for them just two hours a day, unless they have allocated duties or privileges — though that never includes field work. Their work assignments are again all within the main block, which is like a fortress.’

Of the half-dozen or so workers that Jac passed that troubled to look his way, at best they were sullenly curious, at worst surly and menacing; no smiles. It was difficult for Jac to believe that these were the best of the bunch.

‘Sixty-one per cent African-American inmates, sixteen per cent mixed race, and twenty-three per cent white. And with the guards, that ratio is reversed. Only nineteen per cent are black or mixed race — though a marked improvement on twenty or thirty years ago. Take the clock back to the early sixties, and there wasn’t a single black guard.’

But as Jac entered deeper into the bowels of Libreville’s main block, he began to appreciate the difference. Here, at best the stares were surly, at worst taunting and disturbingly intense; and there were a few smiles, though invariably leering and slanted, as if fuelled by madness, or challenging, as if viewing him as prey.

Jac felt that the stifling oppression and heat of the block — unless he was imagining it — seemed to be getting more intense as he progressed, pressing heavier on him with each guard check-point and heavy steel gate opened and bolted shut behind him. And as a few sexual taunts were thrown at him as he passed the cells — ‘Like the way you walk, pretty boy’, ‘Sweet ass — I could fuck you right through that Armani’ — he felt his face tingle and burn.

He was probably still flushed, agitated, his shirt sticking to his skin, as he was ushered into the contrasting coolness of Warden Haveling’s wood-panelled office. But he knew immediately — unless Haveling had taken to appearing as surly as his prisoners or was far more upset by his tardiness than he’d envisaged — that something serious was wrong.

It was that time of day.

Leonard Truelle nursed the two fingers of Jim Beam between his hands with due reverence, as if warming his hands through the glass. Then, with a faint gleam of expectation in his eyes, brought it to his lips and felt its warmth and aroma trickle slowly down. He closed his eyes in appreciation. Pure nectar. With a part sigh, part murmur as he felt its after-burn, he set the glass slowly down.

The hand clamping over his came an inch before the tumbler touched the table, and he flicked his eyes open again, startled.

‘What the… oh, oh… it’s you.’

‘Now that’s no way to greet a long-lost friend.’

‘You startled me, that’s all. Probably because it has been so long.’ Nelson Malley, Nel-M, or just plain Nel. Almost five years now, but it wasn’t a face he was ever likely to forget. There was a tinge of grey now in Malley’s tight-knit curls, and it looked as if his mahogany skin tone was becoming greyer each time, as if someone had thrown potash in his face which hadn’t completely washed off.

‘Anyway, nice to see you again.’ Nel-M gave Truelle’s hand a couple more squeezes — though to Truelle they felt threatening rather than reassuring — and as Nel-M felt the trembling there, he smiled. ‘Is that because of me? I’m touched. Or because you haven’t kicked this stuff yet?’ Nel-M flicked his hand towards the whisky tumbler as he lifted it away.

Truelle didn’t want to let Nel-M inside his head, show weakness either way. ‘Expecting Sharon Stone any minute, and, you know, first dates. Always nervous.’ Truelle forced a weak smile. ‘I might need some Dutch courage to actually get to fuck her.’

Nel-M smiled back, but his charcoal eyes fixed steadily on Truelle showed no hint of warmth; as always, icy and bottomless, as if they were independent monitors searching for weak points to signal what his next move should be. They cut Truelle to the core, ran a shiver up his spine.

This drink now was part of a ritual, every Tuesday and Friday night when he left work. One glass of Jim Beam slowly and reverently sipped — then home. Before when he’d been on the wagon, he’d always felt in danger that if he had just one drink, he wouldn’t be able to stop. And on a couple of occasions, that was exactly how he’d started again. This was his way of proving that he was in control, could stop at just one drink — but he was damned if he was going to share his innermost secrets with Nelson Malley. He could feel Nel-M’s eyes still on him as he looked down thoughtfully at his glass, and shrugged to ease his discomfort.

‘Look, if you wanted something, why didn’t you come by my office — like most normal people?’

‘Normal people?’ Nel-M raised one eyebrow and smiled slyly. ‘Bit of a contradiction in terms in your line of work, isn’t it? I wouldn’t want to rob any of your patients of their precious fifty minutes or, God forbid, get seen walking in and confused with all those crazies. I got a reputation to uphold.’ The smile broadened, then died just as quickly. ‘But you’ve probably guessed the reason I’m here now. No doubt you’ve seen or read the news: Durrant’s execution has been set. Only forty-seven days left now, and counting.’

‘Yeah, I know. I’ve read it.’ Truelle kept his eyes on his tumbler, didn’t want to risk what Malley might see in them.

‘And, well, we just wanted to make sure that you were still cool about everything. No last minute stabs of conscience.’

Truelle smiled drolly. ‘We — as in you and Addy Roche?’

‘As in.’

‘Yeah, I’m cool.’ Truelle nodded, still staring at his glass. ‘Resigned to’ or ‘numbed by’ would probably have been more accurate expressions. He’d shed so many tears of conscience over Durrant that now there was nothing left. ‘I got rid of all my demons years ago.’

Though looking at the tumbler now, he could almost still picture it being refilled time and time again, until he’d stagger from the bar in a daze. If he’d had a problem before Durrant, the aftermath was without doubt the main event. He’d drunk half the state dry before resorting to more AA meetings and colleague’s couches than he dared remember. But the problem was that he could never tell them what lay at the root of what was troubling him. Never.

‘You’re sure now that you’re cool about it?’ Nel-M pressed, laying his hand back on Truelle’s. ‘No recriminations?’

Truelle shook his head and looked back at Nel-M. ‘I’m sure. No recriminations. Not any more.’

But Nel-M kept his hand there, squeezing bit by bit harder as he stared into Truelle’s eyes, searching for doubt. He stopped short of a complete crush, and although he couldn’t discern anything from Truelle’s eyes — too lifeless, dulled by the years of drink — he could feel the tell-tale trembling back in his hand.

‘Though nice to know you still have feelings for me,’ Nel-M said, giving the hand one last pat before he lifted his away and, in the same motion — before Truelle could object — waved towards the barman.

‘And another of the same for my friend here.’

Nel-M slapped some money on the counter and slapped Truelle on the shoulder. ‘Remember — stay cool.’ Then, with one last taunting smile, he headed out.

Truelle hardly acknowledged him, his eyes fixed on the second drink as if it was poison. He could feel the trembling in his hands reverberating now through his entire body. Of all the times he could do with a second drink, it was now. But he was damned if he was going to fall off of the wagon just for Nel-M. And the fact that Nel-M had