Ascension Day

He’d have to make his first punch count and jump Marmont almost in one — otherwise Marmont would have a clear shot with his night-stick or gun, and it would all be over. But if it was Jay-T or Tally, he’d be hard pushed to do much with just one punch. His breath fell fast and shallow, his flank pressed firm against the pillar shielding him as the footsteps moved closer.

And as the torch-beam came to within a few feet, bathing the area just to his side in light, suddenly he was a fresh-faced twenty-two year old contender again, facing his first big fight in Atlanta’s Omni arena — the clapping and stomping of the crowd almost in time with his thudding heartbeat.

His mouth was dry, his skin bathed in sweat — as it had been then — as the adrenalin rush fired up every nerve-end and muscle.

But as the approaching footsteps and the torch-beam’s angle passed the point of no return, and Larry lunged fully into its light with his first punch, he wasn’t sure if it was the roar of approval of his first fights, or the groans and shouts of derision of his last — when only four years later he lay on the canvass for the last time.

Glory or demise? Like so much else in his life, the line between them had been slight, almost impossible to discern.

Jac was running late.

He was fifteen minutes later than planned getting into the office because he’d dozed off again for a while after his alarm sounded; he’d slept fitfully after being awoken in the middle of the night by the slamming doors and voices from next door, which, in turn, meant that he didn’t have time to get Penny Vance to type up Langfranc’s dictation notes on Libreville — he’d simply grabbed a hand-held cassette before rushing out again, and planned to listen to it on the journey.

He caught his train connection with only a minute to spare and it left on time — but then it was held up for twenty-five minutes while the Santa Fe railroad shunted a never-ending stream of freight trucks past them on a dual-track junction.

So now Jac found himself rushing to make up time, pushing his rented Ford Taurus for the most part past sixty on the country roads that made up the last forty-five miles between Baton Rouge and Libreville. Jac anxiously checked his watch as the flatlands and swamps of the Mississippi Delta flashed by.

‘Haveling runs a tight ship at Libreville. Everything by the book and strict routine. And God help anyone who upsets that routine.’ Faint chuckle from Langfranc on tape. ‘So while you and timekeeping might often not be the best of buddies — try and be on time for all your meetings with him and Durrant. Get everything off on the right foot.’

Jac edged his foot down. If he pushed it, he might be no more than five minutes late. He’d started playing Langfranc’s dicta-tape on the train — until a man across the aisle started paying him and the tape too much attention. He’d saved the rest for the car journey.

‘But the upside of that is that Haveling will deliver everything you need — reports and recommendations on Durrant — strictly on time. No delays or hassle. And talking of God, Warden Haveling’s even more devout than our dear Governor Candaret. Stories abound of him taking a bible with him into the execution chamber, and, if the condemned is stuck for an apt last passage to be read by the prison Pastor, Haveling will recommend a few. He even offers to hold the condemned’s hand in the final moments — if they should so require.’ Langfranc paused markedly. ‘Which I suppose raises more awkward questions about Haveling’s character and state of mind than it should — but at least it supports that pushing Durrant’s religious bent as hard as you can is without doubt the main ticket. And in Haveling’s defence, he’s a lot better than his predecessors. Claims of turning a blind eye to, or even supporting, institutionalized violence hung over most of them. Haveling’s immediate predecessor was as straight as they come, but lacked the backbone to push through what he wanted. High levels of violence still continued. A year ago there was a New Orleans magazine piece on Haveling picturing him with a bible in one hand and night-stick in the other, which just about summed him up. “Iron fist, with — he believes — God’s backing and approval”.

‘There are still incidents of violence, but probably no more than most maximum-security penitentiaries. Certainly, things now are a far cry from the dark days of the seventies and eighties when there were regular pitched battles with Cleaver-style radicals and assorted psychos going at each other with machetes sneaked in from the fields. Inmates then regularly slept with steel breastplates to protect them from getting hacked to death in the night.

‘Libreville was in fact originally a slave plantation dating back to the 1830s, and its name came from the West African port where most of the slaves were shipped from, with the change from plantation to penitentiary coming in the early 1900s when…

Jac’s cell-phone rang. He looked at the display: his mother or younger sister. He stopped the tape and answered.

His mother, Catherine, quickly launched into a subject she’d broached at the weekend past when he’d visited.

‘Have you given it much thought yet?’ she pressed.

‘A bit,’ he lied. Even without the Durrant case, he wouldn’t have given it much consideration. Arranged date; he thought that sort of thing had died out a century ago. ‘But I haven’t decided yet.’

‘Well, let me know when you have. She came by the other day with her father to Aunt Camille’s place, and she seems a very nice girl. And attractive, too.’

Jac sighed. ‘Come on, mum. This is more about pleasing Camille than you or, more importantly, me. One more step in her social-climbing ladder.’

‘That’s true. She’s from a very good family, and no doubt that’s what Camille saw first. But now having met the girl, it would be easy for you to forget that this is all about Camille. You could get on very well.’ Catherine sighed. ‘And it has been a while now since Madeleine.’

Madeleine. Madeleine. Thirty-seven months, to be precise, just before they’d left France. Perhaps his mum was right: If she was nice and they got on, what harm could it do? But most of all, he could hear the uncertainty, almost desperation, in his mother’s voice. The need to do this to please Camille. And that part of him made him want to rebel, say no.

His mother and sister stayed in one of Camille’s houses in Hammond at only half rent, and Camille also paid half of Jean-Marie’s college fees. He paid the other half; his was the only family work-visa so far granted, and it was all he could afford while doing criminal law bar exams. Meanwhile his mum and sister lived partly in his aunt’s pocket, part of the legacy left by his father’s early death and disastrous state of affairs at the time — which his aunt took every opportunity to remind them of: ‘What a mess Adam left. All of his wild dreaming. So lucky I was there to help all of you.’

Jac’s aunt was the exact opposite of his father. Maybe that’s why he rebelled and railed so against any of her suggestions: in part, it kept alive his father’s spirit.

‘Okay, I’ll think seriously about it. But if I agree to it, I’m doing it for you or because I feel it’s right — not for Camille.’

‘That’s very noble. But you need to please yourself first and second on this, Jac — not anybody else.’

‘I know.’ With a promise that he’d let her know that weekend when he came over, he rang off.

After the argument through the wall the night before, the only girl he’d given any thought to had been his next door neighbour, starting to wonder what she might look like. He’d purposely listened out for her movements as he got ready that morning: she was still moving around inside when he left, but if he timed it right one morning, hopefully he’d get to see her on the corridor.

He shook his head, smiling. Obsessing over a girl just from a few sound-bites through a wall. His mother was right: he had been too long without a date.

Jac switched on Langfranc’s tape again, and, as he approached Libreville, the details started to mirror what he saw through his car window.

‘Spread over 17,000 acres in total, with the closest towns Libreville, four miles away — which sprung up shortly after the plantation was founded — and St Tereseville, seventeen miles away. The term “plantation” hung on until the mid-sixties, when it was dropped because it smacked too much of the early slave days, and was replaced with ‘ranch’ — possibly due to its sheer size, the fact that they rear their own cattle as well as farm, and have an annual rodeo. The term could easily evoke a laid-back High Chaparral-style atmosphere — but don’t be fooled. This is hard-graft, rock-breaking