by Kathy Reichs
“The woman is ambitious to the point of ruthlessness. She’s everywhere, has a finger in every pie. She’s in the autopsy room at all hours of the night. Teaches a university course. Has a research grant. Plans to present papers at about a zillion scientific conferences. She’s a callous, unfeeling, coldhearted climber.”
“Don’t hold back.”
“It isn’t funny, Tempe. Briel is determined to be a superstar and she doesn’t care who she destroys on her march to glory. Did you know she fired her graduate student today? Had the girl in tears.”
“Duclos?”
Santangelo nodded.
“Why?”
“Probably because the kid has warm blood in her veins.”
“Why doesn’t someone rein Briel in?”
“She has the other pathologists cowed and the chief coroner eating out of her hand.”
Santangelo toyed with her soup using the little china spoon. Set it down. Picked up her chopsticks. Dropped them. Pushed her bowl toward the center of the table.
“You said you watched Briel’s interview Wednesday night?”
“Yes.”
“You heard her plug this Body Find outfit? Corps découvert? It’s her husband’s company.”
“You’re kidding.” I couldn’t keep the shock from my voice.
“I heard her talking about it with Joe Bonnet. She and her husband are going to be the next Mulder and Scully.” Santangelo’s voice was coated with disdain.
“Who’s she married to?”
“Sebastien Raines. An archaeologist.”
That surprised me. I thought I knew all the archaeologists in Montreal, at least by name.
“Is Raines on faculty with one of the universities?”
Santangelo shook her head. “He does cultural resource management.”
Typically, CRM archaeologists work for governments and for businesses that must, by law, save archaeological resources threatened by development. Some do the archaeological portions of environmental impact studies. Some direct salvage digs.
Although many private sector archaeologists are very good surveyors and excavators, academics view them as a whole as second-rate. Why? They work on short contracts and rarely publish. Many are employed by companies that prefer nothing be found that would delay their projects. Rightly or wrongly, those at universities see opportunity for corruption in CRM work.
“Where did Raines train?”
“No clue.”
“How does he figure into Briel’s Mulder-and-Scully scenario?”
“Briel and Raines are starting this company, Body Find. Corps découvert. When everything is in place they plan to hawk it as one-stop shopping for law enforcement. Archaeology, anthropology, pathology, psychology, entomology, botany, geophysics, cadaver dogs, remote sensing. They’ll find your body, ID it, determine PMI, cause of death. You’ll only need a lab for complex testing like mass spectrometry or DNA sequencing. They’ll even provide expertise in underground mine safety, mapping, ingress-egress methods. You name it, Body Find will be there for you! Better, quicker, cheaper!”
“Such companies already exist,” I said. “NecroSearch International, for example. They do fantastic work. Although NecroSearch limits itself largely to victim location.”
“There’s one other big difference. NecroSearch is a nonprofit. Every team member is a volunteer. Body Find’s objective will be to make bucks.”
“Privatized forensics?”
Santangelo nodded. “And Briel is doing everything she can right now to raise her profile. When it’s time to launch the business, she wants to trade on her status as the Canadian Idol of crime solving.”
“Including anthropology,” I said, seeing the implication.
“Yeah. Imagine that.”
I stared at Santangelo. She stared back. Around us, china clinked and conversation hummed.
The waiter approached. Feeling tension, he left the check and quietly slipped away.
“Nail her, Tempe.” Santangelo’s tone was soft, but her words were edged with emotion.
“Why me?”
“Why not? You’ve never been afraid to take a good bite of charlatan.”
* * *
Back home, the dragging fatigue again threatened to flatten me. Nevertheless, I did a Google search on Sebastien Raines. It turned up zilch.
Next I called Jean Tye, a colleague at the Université de Montréal. Tye knew little beyond the fact that Briel’s husband had applied for a position at the U of M in 2007. Since Raines had done zero research, published nothing, and completed only a master’s degree, he’d not been considered a serious candidate. He’d heard that Raines had also submitted an application to the Université du Québec à Montréal. UQAM had also declined to hire him.
Tye was aware that Raines was involved in contract archaeology. He remembered that Raines had done some fieldwork in France, and that his MA had been granted by an institution with which Tye was unfamiliar. His specialty was urban archaeology, digging up garbage dumps, abandoned cemeteries, and building ruins.
And one other thing. Sebastien Raines was active in a number of radical fringe separatist groups. According to Tye, Raines’s desire for an independent French-speaking North American nation was so extremist that the guy offended most members of the Bloc Québécois.
Ryan called shortly after eight. He planned to meet Claudel and Otto Keiser at the Édouard-Montpetit apartment at ten the next morning.
Saturday. What the hell. I agreed to ride along.
By nine I was back in bed. New sheets. New nightie. Same old cat.
I was unconscious in minutes.
In sleep, I sifted. Organized. Played with patterns.
I saw Rose Jurmain’s skeleton, gnawed and scattered in piney woods. As I watched, it rose, bones ghostly in the moonlight. Tendrils grew around its perimeter, rippling like seaweed under water. Written on each tendril was a name and identifier.
Edward Allen, the father. Perry Schechter, the attorney. Janice Spitz, the lover. Andre and Bertrand Dubreuil, the discoverers. Red O’Keefe–Bud Keith, the auberge kitchen worker. Chris Corcoran, the Chicago pathologist. ML, the Chicago anthropologist.
No. That’s wrong. ML analyzed Laszlo Tot’s bones.
The ML tendril went dark and drifted to the ground.
The scene morphed to Christelle Villejoin, buried in bra and panties in a shallow grave. Slowly, the old woman sat up. The undies looked zombie white against her earth-stained bones.
Christelle’s tendrils were fewer in number than Rose’s.
Anne-Isabelle, the sister. Yves Renaud, the discoverer of Anne-Isabelle. Sylvain Rayner, the retired physician. Florian Grellier, the tipster. Red O’Keefe–Bud Keith, Grellier’s bar buddy. M. Keith, the handyman.
Bud Keith–Red O’Keefe. A Rose tendril gently overlapped with a Christelle tendril.
A figure appeared, face veiled, hand outstretched. In the palm lay four phalanges. A corner of the veil lifted, revealing features. Marie-Andréa Briel.
Briel’s face darkened, then changed to that of Marilyn Keiser. Keiser’s body was mottled black and purple. Though less luminous, her tendrils were the most numerous of all.
Uri Keiser, Myron Pinsker Sr., Sam Adamski, the husbands. Otto and Mona, the son and daughter. Myron Pinsker Jr., the stepson. Lu and Eddie Castiglioni, the janitors. Natalie Ayers, the pathologist.
The dream toggled to a new scene.
Ryan stood at a lectern, projector shooting a white beam of light into darkness behind him. Three students occupied chairs before him. Ryan fired question after question. The students answered.
If O’Keefe/Keith was guilty, why did he do it?
Money?
The Villejoins had little. Jurmain kept only a few dollars in her room at the auberge.
O’Keefe/Keith was small-time. Maybe a little was enough.
How did O’Keefe/Keith cross paths with Marilyn Keiser?
Might Myron Pinsker be the killer?
Rage? Jealousy? Fear o
f losing his inheritance?
Are there assets we don’t know about?
Did Pinsker’s life intersect those of the other vics?
Were Jurmain and Villejoin random, selected because of their age and gender?
What about the Villejoins’ neighbor, Yves Renaud?
The janitor twins, Lu and Eddie Castiglioni?
Shotgun questions and answers, back and forth.
I kicked at the blankets.
Now Hubert was speaking from the lectern.
Cause of death was unknown for Jurmain. Villejoin was bludgeoned. Keiser was burned.
That’s wrong.
Keiser was shot. Student three was now Chris Corcoran.
Ayers did the autopsy but missed it. Student two had become Marie-Andréa Briel.
Briel found the bullet track, Hubert said. Briel found the phalanges. All hail Briel.
A moth fluttered into the projector beam, wings frenzied in the stark illumination.
I saw its velvety antennae. The layers of silken hair covering its abdomen.
The moth flew directly toward me.
Its jaws opened.
30
RYAN WAS PROMPT. AS USUAL.
By nine fifty we were pulling to the curb in front of a U-shaped redbrick building in a neighborhood bordering the U of M campus. Crossing the front courtyard, I noted details.
Grounds litter free. Walks shoveled with square-edged precision. Bushes wrapped with burlap and tied.
Lu Castiglioni was at the door, looking like he’d rather be elsewhere. I suspected he’d just been grilled by Claudel.
As we followed Castiglioni inside, I continued my survey.
Twelve mailboxes, each with a button and speaker plate to announce arrivals. No camera. The security system relied on voice alone.
Claudel had assumed an Armani pose in the lobby. Leather gloves. Tan cashmere coat. Impatient frown. Beside him was a moose of a man bundled like a hunter just in from the Yukon.
Claudel introduced his companion as Otto Keiser. Ryan and I offered condolences to Otto on the loss of his mother.
Otto shook our hands, studied our faces.
Castiglioni led us to an elevator and pushed a lighted brass button. We rode to the third floor in silence.
Keiser’s unit was at the far end of a newly carpeted hallway that smelled of fresh paint. We passed only one other door.
Castiglioni used a master key.
Abandoned homes develop a certain smell. Old food. Dirty laundry. Dead plants. Stale air. The shades were drawn and the heat was lowered, but Keiser’s apartment was wearing that perfume.
We entered directly into the living room. Down a hall shooting right I could see two bedrooms joined by a bath, all entered through doors on the left. Past the bedrooms, straight ahead, the hall ended at a dining room. Beyond that was a kitchen. Through a back-door window, I could see wooden stairs joining a porch.
Ryan and I went left, Claudel and Otto right. Castiglioni stayed in the corridor.
The living room had a bay of wraparound windows at one end. Strung beads covered the glass, annihilating what must have been the architect’s intent.
The room was trimmed with crown moldings, chair rails, and baseboards painted a lime green that couldn’t even have looked good in the can. The floors were wood, covered with rugs that were escapees from an LSD trip. Amateur landscapes and still lifes shared wall space with opera posters and low-quality prints. I recognized Picasso. Modigliani. Chagall. Pollock.
Figurines, vases, photos, snow domes, music boxes, and carved nudes crammed the mantel and shelves to either side of a fireplace whose brick had been painted the same unfortunate green as the trim. All paintings and bric-a-brac were evenly spaced in perfectly straight rows.
I glanced at the framed photos. Otto was recognizable in some older ones, as a toddler, then in scenes reflecting a typical childhood age progression. In many he was with a girl a few years younger, arm draped protectively around her shoulders. I assumed this was the sister, Mona.
The two also appeared repeatedly as teens. Yearbook portraits. Proms. Otto on the hood of an old Chevrolet. Graduation shots of Mona, high school and college.
Obviously Keiser loved her children. I wondered. Was she loved by them? By anyone? Saddened by the thought, I continued my survey.
The assemblage included one formal wedding picture showing a very young Keiser with a very thin man. Clothing and hairstyles suggested the fifties. Was the groom Uri?
A snapshot showed an older Keiser wearing a peasant dress and holding a small bouquet. Beside her was a short, dark man in a boutonnièred brown suit. The two stood outside the Hôtel de Ville, Montreal’s old City Hall.
Ryan came up beside me.
“Think this is Pinsker Senior?” I asked.
“That scans. The guy’s ’burns and lapels scream early eighties. Keiser and Pinsker tied the knot in ’eighty-four. Any Kodak moments of the Adamski nuptials?”
I shook my head. “What’s your take on Otto’s age?”
“Mid- to late thirties.” Ryan did some mental calculation. “Uri and Marilyn were married a long time before they had kids. Interesting.”
I waved an arm at the photo collection. “Another interesting observation. Beaucoup kiddie, teenage, and young adult shots. Nowhere does Otto or his sister look older than twenty-five.”
“You’re guessing an estrangement dating back ten years?” Ryan said.
“That, or every picture from the last decade was lost or destroyed.”
“Seems unlikely. Keiser was a hoarder.”
“A very neat hoarder. Check out the shelves. The stuff’s arranged with the precision of a Presbyterian choir.”
“Ten years.” Ryan was thinking out loud.
“About the time Keiser married Adamski.” I pointed out the obvious.
Two killer blue eyes swung my way. “Dr. Brennan. Perhaps you should apply for the detective’s exam.”
“Perhaps I should.”
“I wouldn’t feel threatened.”
“Claudel might. Shall we join him?”
In the hall, I noted the security panel, a simple speaker with a buzzer button. Hardly state of the art.
I also noted a wall cabinet with a tiny gold key. I looked inside. Books.
Claudel and Otto were in the kitchen. While Ryan spoke to them, I slipped into the bedroom.
Another overdose of color. More paintings, knickknacks, curios, and photos. I checked the images but found no Adamski candidate.
A Chinese lacquered box was centered on the bureau. I lifted the lid. Jewelry sealed in individual plastic bags.
I opened the closet. Dresses, skirts, and slacks in eye-watering colors, all hanging from the rod at two-inch intervals.
Keiser’s approach to storage was the polar opposite of mine. Shelved boxes were stacked by descending size. Clothing was separated by category, then color. Shoes were snugged into racks, again organized by shade and style.
Marilyn Keiser was one tidy lady.
The bathroom and guest bedroom showed similar attention to order and placement.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder? Making a mental note to inquire, I moved on to the kitchen.
Ryan was querying Otto on his mother’s third husband. Otto’s eyes were on his shoes.
“What did Adamski do?”
“Beats me.”
“You never asked?”
“Yeah, I asked. You couldn’t pin the guy down.”
“Did he have his own income?”
“Who knows?”
I looked around. The kitchen was turquoise and tangerine, another victim of stuff overload. Baskets, ceramic pots, china plates, cookie molds, glass containers, silk flowers, framed cross-stitch masterpieces. You name the kitsch, Keiser hung it or placed it on a counter or shelf.
“You didn’t like him, did you?” Ryan.
Otto looked up, face filled with disgust. “He was forty-seven. My mother was sixty-one. Would you?”
“That was it? The age difference?”
“The guy was smooth, always with an answer, you know? But underneath, there was this . . .” Otto spread his fingers, grasping for a descriptor. The palms were tough and calloused. “. . . hardness. I can’t describe it. I’m a mechanic, good with engines, not words.”
“Did Adamski take advantage of your mother financially?”
“Who knows?”
“Did she complain?”
“No.”
“Were they happy?”
“Mona and I live out West.” Shoulder shrug. “You go where the jobs are, you know? After marrying Adamski, Mom pretty much quit writing and phoning.” Otto sighed deeply. “Look, my mother was flaky as piecrust. Thought of herself as bohemian. Do you know what she named us?”
Ryan and I waited.
“Othello and Desdemona. Can you imagine growing up with names like that? And a mother who wore tights and braids and sang opera to your friends? One time I brought a kid home, Mom’s posing nude for some wack-job artist.” Otto snorted mirthlessly. “As soon as I moved West I changed my name. Added a t and got the ‘hell’ out.” Otto finger-hooked quotation marks. “Get it? Othello? Got the”—more hooked fingers—“hell out?”
I could only guess the number of times he’d told that joke.
“Mona did the same.”
“Did you and your sister try contacting your mother?”
“When we called, she was always busy. I assumed she didn’t need us anymore. She was happy and had a new life.”
Claudel cleared his throat.
Ryan forged on. “What about Pinsker? You like him?”
“He was a nerd, but an OK guy.”
I peeked inside a cabinet. The plates sat in evenly spaced stacks. The cups hung at identical angles on equidistant hooks.
“You know his son?”
“Not really. I was a kid when Mom married his father. Myron was already off on his own.”
I closed the cabinet, opened another. Shipshape.
“He’s in your mother’s will.”
“That’s cool. Mom was married to Pinsker for twelve years. Besides”—Otto snorted again—“she didn’t leave much.”
“That strike you as odd?”
I noticed a subtle tensing of Otto’s jaw. Quick, then gone. “What do you mean?” he asked.
