27 - Interstate Highway 10, Louisiana June 28

Interstate Highway 10, Louisiana June 28

Holly Rudd sat next to him in the car, doing The New York Times Magazine crossword puzzle. Addis kept the speedometer needle on 80. He knew that if he were pulled over in this state he would receive condolences, not a ticket. He tried to focus on what he needed to ask Mickey Burton, the party chair in Alexandria. He wondered how Hynes-Pierce had located him in New Orleans. He kept a watch for cars that might be following him. But he was distracted by Rudd.

So far, she had been a good sport. She had not bolted the previous night when a television camera crew filmed them leaving the restaurant. On the walk home she had pulled him by the arm when they passed a young man wearing a nun’s habit and playing heavy-metal songs on an acoustic guitar. He shared a smile with her at the sight of the street performer, and he noticed that her hand lingered on his arm longer than necessary.

“Have you been happy, Nick?” she had asked. “I mean, well, up until … Sorry, that was stupid.”

“Hard to tell,” he had replied. “And you?”

“Think so. But …”

She didn’t finish the sentence. They walked the rest of the way in silence. Not awkward silence. It had been the silence of memories. He had wondered what she was thinking, but he had not asked. He never liked it when someone posed that question to him, and he long ago resolved not to ask it himself. What’s important is what’s said, he thought. If anything.

Once back in the suite, he had said goodnight. The door between the rooms would not shut tight. He pushed on it and jiggled the knob so the door would stay closed. When he was in bed, the door popped open. A crack of light entered the darkened room. He could hear Rudd rustling the pages of the legal brief she was reading in bed. Soon she turned off the light. Thirty minutes later, he left the bed and peered through the space at the doorway. He could see her, in the glow of a streetlamp, a figure beneath the covers. He was curious if she still thrashed about at night. He watched her for several minutes. Not once did she toss.

The car sped along, and they passed a barn with a faded advertisement for chewing tobacco on its side. Had he asked her here mainly to concoct an alibi? Or was he looking to reconnect with her? To return to a time before a certain discussion in a New Orleans hotel room, a time before a particular execution? If he could win her back, would that blot out what happened between then and now? How damn pathetic can one be? he asked himself.