R. Ellory - A Quiet Vendetta

‘He has spoken of things that happened many years ago, in Florida and Havana, things that involved some of the most significant organized crime families in the country during the last fifty years. There has been talk of a man called Antoine Feraud-’

Again the flash of anxiety in Ducane’s eyes.

‘-and the killing of Jimmy Hoffa-’

Hartmann sensed Schaeffer go rigid. Woodroffe stepped forward. ‘Hartmann-’ he began, but Hartmann raised his hand and Woodroffe fell silent.

‘The killing of Jimmy Hoffa-’

Ducane raised his right hand and pointed at Hartmann.

Hartmann went cool and loose inside, like something had suddenly released the tension of every muscle in his body. What if he was wrong? What if everything Perez had told them was a complete fabrication?

‘Don’t you even consider threatening me,’ Ducane said.

Hartmann willed himself to keep it together. Ducane seemed to take another step forward, despite the fact that there was almost no distance between them. ‘I don’t know who you people think you are,’ he hissed, his voice growing more insistent and angered, ‘but-’

‘But nothing,’ Hartmann interjected. His heart was trip-hammering in his chest. A thin film of sweat had broken out along his hairline. He felt nauseous and afraid. ‘We are doing our job, Governor, and our job is to listen to everything this man tells us and see if there isn’t some clue, some thread of something that will lead us to your daughter. And if that means asking questions about Hoffa and Feraud and this Gemini thing-’

Hartmann was still talking, but even he did not register what he was saying, for the change in Ducane’s color and demeanor was startling. The man seemed to step back completely without moving an inch. He stepped down , more accurately, and Hartmann knew that there were going to be no further challenges from this man. Governor Charles Ducane would not be visiting with Ernesto Perez today.

There was silence for some moments after Hartmann had finished talking, and Charles Ducane – his whole body tense, his face pale, his eyes wide like a man in shock – nodded slowly and said, ‘Find my daughter, gentlemen… find her and bring her back to me, and when that is done find some way to kill this animal for what he has done to me.’

Hartmann wanted to say something but no words seemed appropriate. He watched as Ducane turned to look at Schaeffer and Woodroffe in turn, and then he stepped aside as Ducane came towards him.

Ducane left the room. Schaeffer went after him to ensure he did not try to go upstairs.

Hartmann walked forwards and sat down at the desk. His hands were shaking. His whole body was covered in sweat. He looked at Woodroffe. Woodroffe looked back. Neither of them said a word.

Schaeffer returned within moments. He was breathless, red-faced; looked like a man on the verge of collapse. ‘I didn’t know… didn’t have any idea he was going to come down here,’ he started, but Hartmann raised his hand and Schaeffer fell silent.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Hartmann said, the tension and fear audible in his voice. ‘It is what it is.’ He said nothing regarding his additional thoughts about Ducane’s real motive for coming to New Orleans. He didn’t say a word regarding his belief that Ducane seemed less like a grieving and distressed father than any distressed father he’d seen before. Such things were for himself alone, and no purpose would be served by voicing them.

Hartmann looked at both Woodroffe and Schaeffer in turn; neither of them were going to say a word about what had actually happened in that room.

An agent appeared in the doorway and nodded at Schaeffer.

Schaeffer nodded back. ‘He’s gone,’ he said, the relief evident in his tone. ‘Let’s get this done, okay?’

Hartmann rose from where he was seated and left the room. They went upstairs together – all three of them – and there was a moment’s silence when they reached Perez’s room.

Hartmann knocked on the door, identified himself, and the door was unlocked. Hartmann passed inside and waited for the outer door to be locked. He crossed the carpet, and without hesitating, opened the inner door and went inside.

‘Mr Hartmann,’ Perez said. He rose from a chair near the window. The room was hazy with smoke, and Hartmann noticed how tired Perez seemed to be.

‘We are coming to a close,’ Perez said as Hartmann walked towards him. ‘Today I will tell you about New York, tomorrow how I came home to New Orleans, and then we will be done.’

Hartmann did not reply. He merely nodded and sat down at the table facing Perez.

‘It has been a long journey for both of us, no? And we have nearly come to an end that you might not have heard had the attempt on my life been successful. I have upset some people, it seems.’

Hartmann tried to smile. He could barely manage any facial expression. He felt as if everything meaningful had been torn out of him and was being held in suspension somewhere. He might get it back, he might not: no-one had told him yet.

‘It has been a life of sorts,’ Perez said, and he laughed gently. ‘It has not been the life I perhaps imagined for myself, but then I imagine that this is the way it is for most of us, wouldn’t you say, Mr Hartmann?’

‘I guess so,’ Hartmann replied. He reached into his jacket for his cigarettes. He lit one, set the box on the table, and leaned back in his chair. He wanted to tell Perez that Ducane had been downstairs only minutes before, but he did not. Every muscle in his body ached. His head felt like an overripe pumpkin, swollen with acidic fluid, ready to burst at the slightest provocation.

‘You are not well, Mr Hartmann?’ Perez asked.

‘Tired,’ Hartmann said.

‘And this difficulty with your wife and daughter?’

‘In limbo,’ Hartmann replied.

‘It will go well, I am sure,’ Perez said encouragingly.

‘There is always a way through these things, of that I am certain.’

‘I hope you’re right.’

‘So we shall begin,’ Perez stated, and he too lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair.

From the other side of the room they would have looked like two friends sharing old times, perhaps having seen little of each other for years they were reminiscing, nostalgic half-memories creeping back towards the present as they talked through the years of their very different lives. Perhaps, despite everything, they could have been father and son, for their ages were a generation or so apart, and in the dimly-lit hotel room it was difficult to distinguish their features clearly.

The last thing they appeared to be was interrogator and subject, for their manner appeared too relaxed, too friendly, too familiar altogether.

That was it surely. They were old, old friends, and after all this time they had collided in some unknown corner of the world, and for a few hours, no more, they had the chance to share their lives with one another and walk away enriched.

‘Returning to New York after all those years,’ Ernesto Perez said quietly, ‘was like going back in time.’

Everything had changed, and yet everything had stayed the same.

The house on Mulberry, the Blue Flame on Kenmare Street, Salvatore’s Diner on the corner of Elizabeth and Hester. All these places were familiar to me, but the atmosphere was different. I had gained as many years as the city, but the city had lost its spirit.

It was October of 1996. I had left this place in November of 1982, with a wife and two small babies, almost fourteen years before; left this place for another city called Los Angeles believing that what I had found here in New York would always be mine.

Desire and reality could not have been more distant.