If Jac’s fake caller claimed to have something juicy on the Durrant case, without doubt his snoopers would make sure to be there watching. Bob Stratton, in turn, would then watch them, note their registration number and take photos. More spy stuff, but at least Jac would hopefully, finally, discover who wasn’t keen on him digging too deep into the Durrant case.
The next few days went by in a whirlwind.
As Stratton suggested, Jac waited in the cafe twenty-five minutes past the appointment time before finally leaving. Stratton said that he’d wait no more than fifteen minutes; by then he should have been able to observe all he needed and take more than enough photos. Jac spoke briefly with Stratton on his cell phone shortly after leaving the cafe.
‘It was a dark maroon Pontiac Bonneville, as you suspected,’ Stratton confirmed. ‘I got the registration, should have the results back on that tomorrow. And enough photos of the guy in it to fill a walclass="underline" black, mid-forties, salt and pepper hair. Tall, well-built, but not heavy or stocky. Wiry-muscly, if you know what I mean.’
Now a description slightly the other way from Durrant than his anonymous e-mailer: less stocky, slightly older.
That night, Jac had another bogus date with Jennifer Bromwell. She was dropped off by her father Tobias, a squat bear of a man who beamed broadly and shook hands with Jac through the open window of his Mercedes S600. Perhaps he suspected something and feared she might be meeting Kelvin, or wanted to check Jac out in person. Blue-blood lawyer, okay, but did he have one eye, one leg or half his face tattooed?
Jac felt slightly guilty at the subterfuge, now having met Mr Bromwell. He sat with Jennifer for fifteen minutes in a bar, talking about the club where Kelvin was gigging that night and his own accident, so sorry about that, she said as she gingerly touched his forehead, as if afraid he might still be delicate enough to crumble, and then for the umpteenth time she thanked him for doing this just before heading off to see Kelvin. Jac headed back to his apartment to hit the phones.
Six more T or E. Levereaux to go.
Two numbers constantly rang with no answer, and another was on answer-phone the three times he’d tried; he’d left a message on his second call.
The same routine every time: ‘I’m trying to locate a Ted Levereaux that used to live in New Orleans and worked at the Bayou Brew bar in the Ninth Ward between nineteen-ninety and ninety-four.’
And variations on the same answers each time: We’ve never lived anywhere but St Louis. Never worked in a bar. My husband’s an Edward, always known as Eddy. I was only thirteen in ninety, couldn’t work anywhere, let alone a bar. Or just: Sorry, got the wrong person.
Jac felt numbed, worn down by it all, the questions, and now the answers too, starting to become mechanical.
And so when a teen boy’s voice said, ‘One minute — I’ll get my pa,’ Jac took a second to snap his concentration back. He checked on his pad to see which number it was: one of the two that before had rung with no answer.
‘Ted Levereaux.’
Jac felt immediately more anxious, a faint edge and tremor now in his voice, when, with the number of times he’d been through the same introduction, it should have come across as plain and matter-of-fact.
‘God in a bucket, Bayou Brew — that takes me back a ways,’ Levereaux exclaimed. Then, realizing he perhaps should have done it the other way round — question before commitment — a wariness crept into his voice as he asked, ‘And why, pray, might you be enquirin’… Mr McElvey, was it?’
‘McElroy. Jac McElroy.’ And Jac went into the rest of his prepared speech that he’d rarely had a chance to use: Larry Durrant. Jessica Roche’s murder. Possible alibi from the regular pool games he used to have. ‘If you could remember which night they might have played the week of her murder?’
‘Jeez. Hardly remember which nights I was there myself, now. You spoke to any of the others worked there then?’ As Jac went through the names and outlined what he’d gained so far, Levereaux commented, ‘Didn’t know Harlenson had died, and my goodness… good ol’ Mack, he still aroun’? Still livin’ in the Ninth, you say?’ Levereaux went off at a tangent for a moment about how nice it would be to see Mack again and catch up, before bringing his focus back. ‘I’m sorry, Mr McElroy. Don’ think I can be much help to yer. Too far back.’
‘I wondered if you could try one thing for me. Try, if you can, to remember where you were when you heard Jessica Roche had been shot? I mean, was Durrant’s pool game of that week before or after you heard the news? Because, if you remember the news coming straight after the pool game the night before — there’s a high chance they coincided.’
Put the person in the moment. Jac had read somewhere that they’d remember more. It wasn’t quite the same as everyone recalling where they were when Kennedy was shot. But for New Orleans, Jessica Roche’s murder had been big news, so the chances were reasonable. He’d done the same with Mack Elliott, Nat Hadley and Bill Saunders. Elliott and Saunders had said straight away that it didn’t help, they still couldn’t recall anything — but Hadley had said he’d call him back in twenty-four hours when he’d had a chance to think it over.
‘Yeah, yeah. Know what you mean,’ Levereaux said, and lapsed into thought.
Muted sound of a TV in the background, a women’s voice talking above it for a moment. Snapshot of life at 9.17 p.m. in St Louis; another to add to the brief sound-bite snapshots Jac had gained across half the South the past few nights.
‘Sorry. Still can’ place much from that far back. Not straight off, anyhow.’
‘Do you maybe want to think on it a bit?’ Jac prompted. ‘Call me back?’
‘Yeah, yeah. Okay,’ Levereaux said after a brief pause.
Jac left his number and Levereaux promised to call back the next night.
Jac eased out his breath as he hung up and looked at his notepad on the table.
Four names with lines through them, two names blank, two with question marks; now three, as Jac put a question mark by Levereaux’ name.
Jac had felt each line he’d had to put through a name like a hammer-blow to his chest. And he wondered if that’s why he’d opted so quickly to delay Levereaux rather than pushing him there and then? One more bit of hope left, however slim, rather than another strike against.
But that was how Jac had come to measure everything over the past days: strikes against, another chance gone of being able to save Larry Durrant, balanced against hope remaining.
Another strike against came the following day when Nat Hadley phoned him just before lunch to say that, sorry, he just couldn’t fix in his mind which night the pool game had been in relationship to Jessica’s Roche’s murder.
Then another name added to Jac’s notepad and as quickly crossed off again when at lunch-time he’d gone out again to the Ninth Ward to see the new owner of what used to be the ‘Ain’t Showin’ Mariner’, now a short-order and burger restaurant. Jac was wary of visiting the Ninth at night after the incident with Rillet, but at least the timing had been fortuitous because the proprietor had the previous owner’s number and had been able to raise him straight away on his phone.
But, taking the first bites of a prawn and sliced avocado on rye back on home ground on Felicity Street, a part of Jac wondered whether he wouldn’t have preferred some delay again: two more strikes against in just an hour gave him the uneasy feeling that the few names left on his pad would go the same way, leads evaporating in no time, and then there’d be no hope remaining; nothing left but to sit back and count the days until Durrant died.
Maybe he was kidding himself either way — whether slowly treading water or a quick free-fall, the result would be the same: every name on his pad would end up with a line through it. Coultaine had followed part of the same route at appeal only three years after the murder, and could hardly get anyone to remember anything then. What chance was there, as Larry had aired doubtfully, after twelve years?