Bones to Ashes

by Kathy Reichs

  “That was decades ago.”

  “As Hippo says, the Acadian memory goes long and deep. The Landrys weren’t educated people. Maybe they chose to hide her away. Maybe they distrusted government. Like Bastarache.”

  Ryan made one of his noncommittal sounds.

  “Maybe Laurette was frightened of being quarantined in some lazaretto. Maybe she was determined to die at home and begged her family to keep her condition secret.”

  At that moment Ryan’s cell phone sounded.

  “Ryan.”

  My thoughts jumped from Laurette to Hippo’s girl. Had the two actually died of the same disease?

  “Got him.”

  Ryan’s voice snapped me back to the present. I followed his sight line to the prison entrance.

  Bastarache was walking in our direction. Beside him was a dark-haired woman in a dumpy gray suit. The woman carried a briefcase and gestured with one hand as she spoke. I assumed I was looking at local counsel Isabelle Francoeur.

  Crossing the lot, Francoeur and Bastarache climbed into a black Mercedes. Still talking, Francoeur shifted into gear and drove off.

  Ryan waited until the Mercedes had merged into traffic, then followed.

  36

  R YAN AND I DROVE IN SILENCE. RUSH HOUR WAS PUMPING AND I feared that taking my eyes from the Mercedes might allow our quarry to become lost in the sea of bumpers and taillights flowing south toward the city.

  Ryan sensed my nervousness.

  “Relax,” he said. “I won’t lose them.”

  “Maybe we should follow closer.”

  “They might spot us.”

  “We’re in an unmarked car.”

  Ryan almost grinned. “This crate screams cop louder than a light and sound show.”

  “She’s heading into town.”

  “Yes.”

  “Think she’ll take him to Le Passage Noir?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then don’t lose her.”

  “I won’t.”

  We were on the outskirts of centre-ville when the Mercedes flashed a turn signal.

  “She’s going right,” I said.

  Ryan slid into the turning lane several cars back.

  Two more signals. Two more turns. I watched, chewing the cuticle of my right thumb.

  “Safe driver,” I said.

  “Makes my job easier.”

  “Just don’t—”

  “Lose her. I’ve thought of that.”

  The Mercedes made one more turn, then pulled over on Boulevard Lebourgneuf. Ryan continued past and slid to the curb a half block down. I watched in the side mirror while Ryan used the rearview.

  Francoeur placed something on the dashboard, then she and Bastarache got out, crossed the sidewalk, and entered a gray stone building.

  “Probably going to her office,” I said.

  “She stuck some sort of parking pass in the windshield,” Ryan said. “If this is her office, she must have a regular spot. Why not use it?”

  “Maybe it’s a brief stop,” I said.

  Whatever Bastarache and Francoeur were up to, it lasted long enough for me to grow bored with surveillance. I watched office workers hurrying with lidded cups of Starbucks. A mother with a stroller. Two blue-haired punks with arm-tucked skateboards. A spray-painted busker carrying stilts.

  The Impala grew hot and stuffy. I rolled down my window. City smells drifted in. Cement. Garbage. Salt and petrol off the river.

  I was fighting drowsiness when Ryan cranked the ignition.

  I looked toward the building Bastarache and Francoeur had entered. Our boy was coming through the door.

  Bastarache pointed a remote at the Mercedes. The car broop-brooped and the lights flashed. Yanking the door, he threw himself behind the wheel and lurched into traffic. When the Mercedes passed us, Ryan let several cars go by, then followed.

  Bastarache wound through surface streets onto Boulevard Sainte-Anne, seemingly unaware of our presence. His head kept bobbing, and I assumed he was playing with the radio or inserting a CD.

  Several miles out of town, Bastarache turned right onto a bridge spanning the St. Lawrence River.

  “He’s going to Île d’Orléans,” Ryan said.

  “What’s out there?” I asked.

  “Farms, a few summer homes and B and B’s, a handful of tiny towns.”

  Bastarache cut across the island on Route Prévost then turned left onto Chemin Royal, a two-lane blacktop that skimmed the far shore. Out my window, the water glistened blue-gray in the early morning sun.

  Traffic was light now, forcing Ryan to widen the gap between us and the Mercedes. Past the hamlet of Saint-Jean, Bastarache hooked a right and disappeared from view.

  When Ryan rounded the corner, Bastarache was nowhere to be seen. Instead of commenting, I worked the cuticle. It was now an angry bright red.

  As we rolled down the blacktop, my eyes swept the landscape. A vineyard spread from both shoulders. That was it. Vines for acres, heavy and green.

  In a quarter mile the road ended at a T intersection. The river lay dead ahead, behind a trio of quintessentially Québécois homes. Gray stone walls, wood-beamed porches, high-pitched roofs, dormer windows up, window boxes down. The Mercedes was parked in a driveway beside the easternmost bungalow.

  The river road continued to the left, but died ten yards to the right. Ryan drove to that end, made a one-eighty, and killed the engine.

  “Now what?” I was saying that a lot lately.

  “Now we watch.”

  “We’re not going in?”

  “First we get the lay of the land.”

  “Did you really say lay of the land?”

  “We sit code six on the dirtbag skel.” Ryan responded to my ribbing with even more TV cop lingo.

  “You’re a scream.” I refused to ask what a code six was.

  Forty minutes later, the door opened and the dirtbag skel hurried down the steps and crossed to the Mercedes. His hair was wet and he’d changed to an apricot shirt.

  Glancing neither left nor right, Bastarache blasted backward down the drive, tires grinding up gravel. Ryan and I watched him gun up the blacktop toward Chemin Royal, leaving behind a ripple of dust.

  Reaching into the glove compartment, Ryan withdrew a fanny pack. I knew its contents. Cuffs, extra clips, badge, and a Glock 9mm. Ryan used the thing when not wearing a jacket.

  Yanking free his shirttails, Ryan strapped the pack on his belly and checked the string that would undo the zipper. Then he cranked the engine and we rolled.

  At the bungalow, we got out of the Impala and scanned our surroundings. The only thing moving was a mangy brown spaniel sniffing roadkill twenty yards up the shoulder.

  I looked at Ryan. He nodded. We beelined to the front door.

  Ryan rang the bell with the index finger of his left hand. His right was subtly crooked, positioned over the Glock tucked in the pack.

  Within seconds, a female voice spoke through the door.

  “As-tu oublié quelque chose?” Have you forgotten something? Familiar “you.”

  “Police,” Ryan called out.

  There was a moment of silence, then, “You must wait until later.”

  A burst of adrenaline coursed through me. Though muffled, the voice was familiar.

  “ We want to ask you some questions.”

  The woman didn’t reply.

  Ryan hit the bell. Again. Again.

  “Go away!”

  Ryan opened his mouth to reply. I grabbed his arm. The muscles were taut as tree roots.

  “Wait,” I whispered.

  Ryan’s lips clamped shut, but his elbow stayed cocked.

  “Obéline?” I said. “C’est moi, Tempe. Please let us come in.”

  The woman said something I couldn’t hear. Seconds later, I caught a flicker of movement in my peripheral vision.

  I turned. A pulled window shade was fluttering gently. Had it been raised when we approached the house? I couldn’t remember.

&n
bsp; “Obéline?”

  Silence.

  “Please, Obéline?”

  Locks turned, the door opened, and Obéline’s face appeared in the crack. As before, a scarf covered her head.

  She surprised me by speaking English. “My husband will return soon. He will be angry if he finds you here.”

  “We thought you were dead. I was heartbroken. So was Harry.”

  “Please leave. I’m fine.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  Her lips drew tightly together.

  “Who staged a suicide?”

  “All I want is to be left alone.”

  “I’m not going to do that, Obéline.”

  Her eyes jumped over my shoulder, toward the road leading to Chemin Royal.

  “Detective Ryan and I will help you. We won’t let him hurt you.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “Help me to understand.”

  Color rose in the unscarred skin, grotesquely marbling the right side of her face.

  “I don’t need to be rescued.”

  “I think you do.”

  “My husband is not a bad man.”

  “He may have killed people, Obéline. Young girls.”

  “It’s not what you think.”

  “That’s exactly what he said.”

  “Please go.”

  “Who broke your arm? Who torched your house?”

  Her eyes darkened. “Why this obsession with me? You show up at my home. You reawaken pain best left dormant. Now you want to destroy my marriage. Why can’t you just leave me in peace?”

  I tried a Ryan quick-switch. “I know about Laurette.”

  “What?”

  “The lazaretto. The leprosy.”

  Obéline looked as if I’d struck her. “Who told you this?”

  “Who killed Évangéline?”

  “I don’t know.” Almost desperate.

  “Was it your husband?”

  “No!” Her eyes darted like those of a hunted dove.

  “He probably killed two little girls.”

  “Please. Please. Everything you think is wrong.”

  Relentless, I kept my glare aimed at her. Kept hammering. “Claudine Cloquet? Phoebe Quincy? Have you heard those names?”

  Reaching into my purse, I grabbed the envelope, yanked out the photos of Quincy and Cloquet, and thrust them at her.

  “Look,” I said. “Look at these faces. Their parents are in pain that never goes dormant.”

  She turned her head, but I forced the photos through the crack, keeping them in her field of vision.

  Her eyes closed, then her shoulders seemed to turtle in on themselves. When she spoke again, her voice carried a tone of defeat.

  “Wait.” The door closed, a chain rattled, then the door reopened. “Come in.”

  Ryan and I entered a hallway lined on both sides with pictures of saints. Jude. Rose of Lima. Francis of Assisi. A guy with a staff and a dog.

  Obéline led us past a dining room and library to a parlor with a wide-plank floor, heavy oak tables, a scuffed leather sofa, and overstuffed armchairs. One wall was floor-to-ceiling glass. A stone fireplace rose among the windows, partially blocking a spectacular view of the river.

  “Please.” Obéline gestured at the sofa.

  Ryan and I sat.

  Obéline remained standing, eyes on us, one gnarled hand to her mouth. I couldn’t read her expression. Seconds passed. A solitary drop of sweat slid down her temple. The tactile input seemed to nudge her to action.

  “Wait here.” Whirling, she strode through the same archway we’d entered.

  Ryan and I exchanged glances. I could tell he was wired.

  Morning sun beat down on the glass. Though it was barely eleven, the room was cloyingly warm. I felt my shirt start to wilt.

  A door opened, then footsteps clicked up the hall. Obéline reappeared leading a girl of about seventeen.

  The pair crossed the room and stood before us.

  I felt something balloon in my chest.

  The girl stood less than five feet tall. She had pale skin, blue eyes, and thick black hair bobbed at her jawline. It was her smile that snagged and held my gaze. A smile flawed by a single imperfection.

  Beside me, I felt Ryan go rigid.

  The day had taken a radical turn.

  37

  I WAS STILL HOLDING THE PHOTO OF CLAUDINE CLOQUET. RYAN’S MP number two. The twelve-year-old who had disappeared in 2002 while riding her bicycle in Saint-Lazare-Sud.

  I looked from the girl to the image. Winter white skin. Black hair. Blue eyes. Narrow, pointed chin.

  A row of white teeth marred by one rotated canine.

  “This is Cecile,” Obéline said, placing a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Cecile, say hello to our guests.”

  Ryan and I rose.

  Cecile regarded me with open curiosity. “Are those earrings authentiques?”

  “Real glass,” I said, smiling.

  “They’re very sparkly. Sparkly-o.”

  “Would you like them?”

  “No way!”

  I removed the earrings and handed them to her. She turned them in her palm, as awed as if they were the crown jewels.

  “Cecile has been living with us for almost three years.” Obéline’s eyes were steady on mine.

  “Je fais la lessive,” Cecile said. “Et le ménage.”

  “You do laundry and cleaning. That must be a tremendous help.”

  She nodded too vigorously. “And I’m really good with plants. Good. Good-o.”

  “Are you?” I asked.

  Cecile beamed a blinding smile. “My Christmas cactus got a thousand blooms.” Her hands carved a large circle in the air.

  “That’s amazing,” I said.

  “Oui.” She giggled a little girl giggle. “Obéline’s got none. Can I really keep the earrings?”

  “Of course,” I said.

  “Please excuse us now,” Obéline said.

  Cecile shrugged one shoulder. “OK. I’m watching The Simpsons, but it keeps going fuzzy. Can you fix it?” She turned to me. “Homer is so funny.” She gave the “so” several o’s. “Drôle. Drôle-o.”

  Obéline held up a finger to say her absence would be brief. Then she and Cecile hurried from the room.

  “Claudine Cloquet,” I said, keeping my voice low and steady. Ryan only nodded. His attention was focused on punching his cell.

  “How the hell do you suppo—”

  Ryan raised a silencing hand.

  “Ryan here.” He spoke into the phone. “Bastarache has Cloquet at a residence on Île d’Orléans.” There was a brief pause. “The kid’s fine for now. But Bastarache is on the move.”

  Ryan provided a color, model, year, and plate number for the Mercedes. Then he gave the address and location of Obéline’s house. His jaw muscles bunched as he listened to the party on the other end. “Let me know when he’s netted. If he shows here, his ass is mine.”

  Ryan clicked off and began pacing the room.

  “You think he’ll come back?” I asked.

  “She’s expecting—”

  Ryan froze. Our eyes met as, simultaneously, we became aware of a low droning, more a vibration of air than a sound. The droning built. Became the hum of a motor.

  Ryan darted down the hall and into the dining room. I followed. Together, we stood to one side and peeked out a window.

  A mirage car was cresting the blacktop running from Chemin Royal.

  “Is it him?” I asked, whispering pointlessly.

  Ryan pulled the fanny pack’s zip string. Together we watched the hazy shape congeal into a black Mercedes.

  Sudden realization.

  “We parked at the curb,” I hissed.

  “Tabarnac!”

  Ten football fields out, the Mercedes stopped, then abruptly reversed in a ragged U-turn.

  Ryan sprinted into the hall, through the door, and down the drive. In seconds the Impala shot forward, back tires grinding up ground.
I watched until it disappeared over the horizon.

  “What is happening? Where has he gone?”

  I swallowed and turned. Obéline was in the doorway.

  “That girl’s name isn’t Cecile,” I said. “It’s Claudine. Claudine Cloquet.”

  She stared at me, fingers twisting her scarf as they had at the Tracadie gazebo.

  “Your husband stole Claudine from her family. Probably forced her to get naked for his sordid little films. She was twelve, Obéline. Twelve years old.”

  “That’s not how it was.”

  “I’m tired of hearing that,” I snapped.

  “Cecile is happy with us.”

  “Her name is Claudine.”

  “She’s safe here.”

  “She was safe with her family.”

  “No. She wasn’t.”

  “How could you know that?”

  “Her father was a monster.”

  “Your husband is a monster.”

  “Please.” Her voice was trembling. “Come in and sit down.”

  “So you can tell me that things aren’t what they appear?” I was angry now, no longer trying to be nice.

  “Claudine’s father sold her into child pornography for five thousand dollars.”

  That brought me up short.

  “To whom?”

  “An evil man.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “I don’t know.” Her eyes dropped, came back. I suspected she was lying.

  “When did this take place?”

  “Five years ago.”

  The year Claudine went missing from Saint-Lazare-Sud. Five years after Kelly Sicard. Five years before Phoebe Jane Quincy.

  Kelly Sicard. A sudden thought.

  “Was this man’s name Pierre?”

  “I never knew.”

  I turned and looked out the window. The road was empty. The spaniel was now peeing on a post by the T intersection.

  Time dragged by. Behind me, I heard Obéline take a chair at the table. The muffled voices of Homer and Marge Simpson floated from a TV somewhere deep in the house.

  Finally, I turned back to her.

  “How was your husband acquainted with this man who ‘bought’ Claudine?” I finger-hooked quotation marks around the word.

  “He worked for David’s father. A long time ago. Before we married.”

  “So strip joints weren’t enough. Your husband partnered up with this sleaze to make kiddie porn.”