The Bone Code

by Kathy Reichs

  Returning to my desk, I opened the first folder. Skimmed. Moved on to the second.

  Armed with the necessary information, I began my quest. First by computer, then at a number of locations around the building.

  An hour later, I was back, empty-handed. Discouraged and frustrated, I shifted from old business to new and skimmed the first request for an anthropology consult on remains recently arrived at the LSJML.

  Pathologist: M. Morin. Investigating officer: L. Claudel, Service de Police de la Ville de Montréal. SPVM. Formerly known as the Service de Police de la Communauté Urbaine de Montréal, or SPCUM, the SPVM are the city boys. Same force, new handle. Nom: Inconnu. Name: Unknown. Skipping over the LSJML, morgue, and police incident numbers, I went straight to the summary of known facts.

  A homeowner had unearthed bones while digging in his basement in Saint-Leonard. Could I determine if the remains were human? If human, the number of persons? Time since death? If recent, could I ascertain age, sex, race, and height and describe individuating characteristics for each individual? Could I establish cause of death?

  Typical FA stuff.

  The second form listed Pierre LaManche as the pathologist. I read that summary. The situation involved an auto accident and a missing leg bone. I read it again, baffled.

  Unlike Morin’s, LaManche’s case fell to the SQ. The provincial cops.

  One town, two agencies? Sounds complicated. It’s not. And it is.

  Montreal is an island, its southern tip wrapped by the Fleuve Saint-Laurent, its northern side by the Rivière des Prairies. Only fifty kilometers long, the tiny hunk of land varies from five to thirteen kilometers in width, narrowing at its extremities and thickening at its center. Its dominant feature is Mont Royal, an igneous intrusion rising a proud 231 meters above sea level. Les Montréalais call this modest bump la montagne. The mountain.

  For policing purposes, Montreal is parceled out according to these particulars of geology. On the island: SPVM. Off the island: SQ. Assuming there’s no local PD. Though rivalries exist, in general ça marche. It works.

  Dr. Pierre LaManche, the director of the LSJML’s medico-legal section, favors crepe soles and empty pockets and moves so quietly he can appear without a hint of warning.

  He did so at that moment.

  “What a fortunate turn of events.” LaManche’s French is Parisian and precise.

  I looked up.

  Le directeur was standing in my doorway, file folders pressed to his chest. A lot of them. Which was typical for a Monday morning. As in any jurisdiction, les Québécois find limitless ways to off themselves or others on weekends. Following a six-pack or a liter of bourbon, a half gainer into a quarry or a DIY booby trap seems like a brilliant idea.

  “I heard a rumor that you had rejoined us early.”

  “Bonjour. Please come in.” Hiding my surprise. It wasn’t often the boss visited my humble little space.

  LaManche is a big man in a Great-Uncle-Joe-was-a-linebacker sort of way. At well past sixty, his posture is beginning to suggest he should be ringing bells at Notre-Dame. He looked around, hesitant.

  “Sorry.” Circling my desk, I gathered the lab coats, currently heaped on my sole visitor’s chair, and returned them to the hall tree.

  Nodding, LaManche entered and reconfigured himself from a stooped upright to a stooped seated position, brows tightly knit. Clearly, something was on his mind. I waited for him to begin.

  “You know maître Lauzon, of course.”

  In Quebec, coroners are either physicians or attorneys. Odd system, but ça marche. Hélène Lauzon was a lawyer, thus the title maître.

  I nodded.

  “Saturday, while driving home from his weekly bowling game, maître Lauzon’s father, Alfonse Vachon, rear-ended a moving van, pinning one of two workers who were loading a sofa. The force of the impact stood M. Vachon up behind the wheel. His right lower leg and several ribs were fractured, and his face was severely lacerated.”

  “Was he wearing a seat belt?” Clueless where this was going. A common occurrence of late.

  “No. And he had been drinking.”

  “Ouch.”

  LaManche seemed to consider the condition of the cactus. I waited for him to continue.

  “M. Vachon went into surgery early this morning for repair of the broken leg. Upon dissecting and cleaning the surrounding tissue, the surgeon discovered that a portion of his patient’s tibia was missing.”

  “Gone?” Unsure if I was translating manquant correctly.

  “It wasn’t there.”

  “Where was it?”

  “Precisely his question.”

  I said nothing.

  “The surgeon called maître Lauzon. She phoned me to explain the situation and to request a thorough search of her father’s vehicle. I mentioned that you were currently in Montreal, and she asked that you be present.”

  “Why me?”

  “You know bones.”

  “This sounds very bizarre.”

  LaManche levered a shoulder, executing one of the limitless repertoire of shrugs so perfected by the French. Who knows? Does it matter? I need a smoke.

  “Where is the car?” I asked.

  “Pierrefonds.”

  “When do they want me there?”

  “As quickly as possible. When you phone downstairs, an SQ officer will transport you.” When. Not if. Great.

  “How is the worker who was pinned to the truck?”

  “That gentleman is in our cooler.”

  “I’m on it.” Resigned. It was not how I’d envisioned my first day back.

  LaManche placed both palms on his knees, preparing to rise.

  “If you have a moment, there’s something I’d like to discuss before I head out.”

  “Bien sûr.” Of course. Settling back.

  I’d prepared my pitch and was concise.

  I briefed LaManche on the unidentified container corpses found in 2006. Showed him photos and my old reports. He said he vaguely remembered the case.

  Then I told him about last week’s Charleston vics.

  It’s often hard to read the old man. Not then. The lines in his face shifted into furrows of doubt.

  I pressed on. “There have been advances in DNA since 2006. Improvements in techniques of extraction and amplification. Expansion of databases. The same is true for all forensic protocols. Isotope analysis—”

  “What are you proposing, Temperance?” LaManche always uses my full name, emphasizing the final syllable and rhyming it with sconce.

  “An exhumation.”

  “Did you not take samples back in 2006?”

  “The bone was so degraded the results were inconclusive.”

  “Can you not use those same specimens now?”

  “I can’t find them. I suspect the bone plugs were destroyed during a culling of stored materials back in 2016.” Without my consent. I didn’t add that.

  The furrows rearranged. Not in a good way.

  “I’ll handle all the arrangements.” I forged on. “But I need your approval.”

  LaManche’s shoulders sagged, and his head wagged slowly.

  “I am sorry, Temperance. Right now, I cannot divert personnel or funds for the pursuit of such an old case. Dr. Ayers is away due to the death of her mother. Dr. Santangelo will be in Joliette for an extended period. I hope you understand.”

  “Of course.” Not bothering to hide my disappointment.

  “Should the situation change—” Shrugging, LaManche let the thought hang.

  * * *

  The island of Montreal is shaped like a foot with the toes pointing northeast, the heel southeast, and the ankle angling to the southwest. Hochelaga-Maisonneuve and Centreville are located down by the heel. The borough of Pierrefonds-Roxboro is on the northwest side of the shin, along the Rivière des Prairies. Which is a circuitous way of saying that M. Vachon’s car wasn’t exactly around the corner. By the time I got back to the condo, it was almost seven.

  One o
f life’s joys is the smell of cooking after a long workday. That’s what met me when I opened the front door.

  “Honey, I’m home.” A Father Knows Best trope that always amuses us.

  No response. I hung my jacket in the closet and followed the aroma of rosemary and garlic.

  Ryan was in the kitchen, looking like someone on day release. His face was flushed, his hair pointing in a million directions. His untucked shirt, liberally speckled with grease, was partially covered by an apron looping his neck and tied at his waist. It said Patron du thon. Tuna boss. The wit of the rhyme failed to translate to English.

  “Nice apron,” I said.

  “It belonged to my mother.”

  Keeping my views on Mama’s castoff to myself, I crossed to kiss him. Birdie, ever hopeful, didn’t budge from his vigil by the stove.

  “Smells delicious,” I said.

  “And so it shall be, ma chère. Go.” Shooing me with the hand not holding the spatula. “First seating is at seven thirty.”

  “What—”

  “Go.”

  I went.

  Forty minutes later, we were in the window-facing chairs, sipping espressos and digesting the garlic rosemary chicken breasts, mashed potatoes, and broiled asparagus. Ryan hadn’t exaggerated. The meal had been superb.

  “The vehicle was in an impound lot,” I said, continuing our discussion of the day’s events.

  “Did the lot have a dog?”

  “A big brown one.”

  “Auto-yard dogs can be prickly.”

  “His name was Merle. He kept a very close eye on us. Anyway, the car had mats, you know, for snowy boots or whatever.”

  “It’s Quebec. Even Merle has mats.”

  I gave Ryan “the look.” “The only thing evident on the driver’s side was dried blood. But when I removed the mat, down by the pedals, I could see a little puckered hole in the carpeting below. After cutting out that segment of carpet, I spotted a small triangular puncture in the floorboard. Damned if there wasn’t a chunk of tibia embedded in there.”

  “The guy’s bone was driven through the mat, the carpet, and the metal floor of the car? Is that even possible?”

  “The cortical portion of a tibia is thick, giving the bone impressive tensile strength. Vachon was doing forty, and the truck was at a dead stop, so the impact was powerful.”

  “I imagine the first responders were focusing on extracting Vachon, not worrying about leaving part of him behind.”

  “And the leg was an open fracture, so there would have been lots of blood.” I took a sip of my coffee. “After more than forty-eight hours, the soft tissue was toast. But you could still see carpet fibers stuck to the bone.”

  “The guy’s foot must have been flopping like a rag doll.”

  Now I shot Ryan a look of feigned disapproval.

  “What happens with the chunk you found?” he asked.

  “Bagged and tagged. Not sure what the lab will do with it.”

  “Can it go back into Monsieur Vachon?”

  “Not a chance. What’s the story on your accident vic?” Earlier, Ryan and I had commented on the irony of us both working auto mishaps.

  “Not much to tell. The guy who contacted me is an insurance adjuster in Montpelier. In a nutshell, the decedent’s wife insists her husband’s death was a workplace accident. If true, she’ll be due a hefty chunk of change.”

  “Sounds rather mundane.”

  “The weird thing is the crash happened four years ago.”

  “Why did the claim sit around for so long?”

  “My client’s question exactly.”

  “You think it’s a scam?”

  “I intend to find out.”

  I was about to ask a follow-up when my mobile rang. I checked caller ID.

  “LaManche,” I said to Ryan.

  “Does he often call on your cell?”

  “Never.”

  I clicked on.

  LaManche said the last thing I expected to hear.

  11

  WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13

  Stretching for more than nineteen miles, rue Sherbrooke is a major east-west artery and the second-longest street on the island of Montreal. Our Centreville condo sits toward one end. Le Repos Saint-François d’Assise lies toward the other.

  At seven Wednesday morning, I was motoring east. As I had done on Tuesday.

  As I had done one bleak fall day in 2010.

  LaManche’s call had sent me scrambling. With no explanation for the stunning reversal, he said he’d decided to greenlight the exhumation. He suggested that I contact Rémi Arbour, manager of Le Repos.

  I did that. A nanosecond past Tuesday morning’s opening bell. Though unenthused, Arbour had agreed to see me. Suggested we meet at his office at noon.

  I’d arrived a half hour early. Arbour had rolled in ten minutes late. In his forties, wheezy, and obese, the guy had heart attack written all over him.

  A recent hire, Arbour possessed no knowledge of burials older than two years. And zero interest in learning about them.

  With much urging on my part, he’d agreed to help me search the archives. Then we’d set out across the grounds in Arbour’s pickup. A few landmarks looked familiar to me. A statue of St. Frank. A dragon.

  Eventually, we’d located the section used for the interment of unknowns back in 2010, the year LSJML-41207 and LSJML-41208 were finally laid to rest. Alighting from the truck, we’d walked the rows until we’d found their graves.

  I’d checked the scene against the photos I’d brought. An old maple was gone, a stand of shrubbery greatly expanded. Otherwise, the backdrop was a match to the one from a decade earlier.

  Ditto the cold hollowness filling my chest.

  So. Here I was behind the wheel as I had been the day before, squinting into a saffron dawn, pulse hammering way too fast.

  To allay my anxiety, I reviewed the knowledge I’d gleaned via one quick late-night Google search.

  Established in 1724, Le Repos Saint-François d’Assise is one of the oldest burial grounds in Montreal. Having undergone several name changes and relocations over the years, the current cemetery offers both burial and cremation, along with three options for long-term storage: columbarium, mausoleum, or old-fashioned grave. No matter your vision for the hereafter, Saint Francis of Assisi has you covered. No pun intended.

  Another fact, one not touted online. Back in the day, Le Repos was under government contract to provide plots for those making the poor decision to die penniless or nameless.

  Just past rue Saint-Germain, the SUV in front of me stopped suddenly. I hit the brakes.

  Work on a pipeline had half the street torn up, and traffic was at a standstill in both directions. A woman with a neon-orange vest, a rotating pole sign, and a Napoleon complex was controlling the flow. The little general was in no hurry.

  I sat finger-drumming the wheel, listening to a twenty-four-hour all-talk station, CJAD, for possible mention of our little exhumation party. Heard none. The twenty-minute delay, and the day’s news, did nothing to calm my agitation.

  The sun was well above the horizon when I pulled through le cimitière’s main entrance near boulevard Langelier. After much winding among headstones and roller-coastering up and down knolls and depressions, I drew close to the gravesites that Arbour and I had ID’d.

  And cursed. I was late to the dance.

  Parked beside the narrow lane were an SQ cruiser, an SIJ crime-scene truck, a coroner’s van, a golf cart, and Arbour’s pickup. After adding my Mazda to the back of the line, I got out and hurried toward the group, mentally logging details.

  No precautions had been taken to safeguard confidentiality. No temporary fencing. No plastic tenting. No sawhorses strung with yellow tape.

  A backhoe stood ready, operator at the controls, drinking from the cap of his thermos. Plywood panels covered the ground to either side of each grave.

  Nine people stood chatting in clumps of two or three. Two SQ uniforms, the van driver and h
is partner, two SIJ techs, Arbour. Off to one side, a pair in matching boots, jeans, windbreakers, and scowls leaned on long-handled spades.

  Good call on the privacy issue. No protection was needed. Not a single journalist had turned up. Perhaps the media hadn’t heard. Perhaps, as in the past, they didn’t care.

  “Sorry I’m late,” I tossed out to no one in particular.

  One of the coroner’s transporters crossed to me. Gaston something. I’d done other recoveries with him.

  “Bonjour, doc.” Gaston proffered a Styrofoam cup.

  “Thanks.” The cup’s contents weren’t quite tepid. Gaston had been here a while. The others also, I presumed.

  Radiating impatience from inside his shiny polyester coat, Arbour asked, “Nous sommes prêt? Enfin?” Are we ready? Finally?

  Christ on a cracker.

  “Let’s do it,” I said, cool but smiling.

  Arbour raised and circled one finger, fast and hard.

  “Asshole probably has a stiff needs planting,” Gaston mumbled. Or some Quebecois equivalent.

  The backhoe operator recapped and set down his thermos. Seconds later, the big yellow brute roared to life. After much maneuvering, the machine stopped, and the front-end loader bucket dropped into position at one end of the northernmost grave.

  Arbour repeated the finger thing.

  The bucket’s claws dragged backward, scoring the winter-brown lawn. The scent of dead grass and moist soil filled the air.

  The boom rose and swung right. The bucket dropped its load, swung back, and repeated the action. Again, and again.

  As the wound in the earth deepened, I observed closely, eventually spotted a handful of soggy splinters mixing with the fill.

  “Stop!” Raising a hand and shouting to be heard over the grinding.

  The boom froze in mid-swing.

  To confirm, I squatted at the side of the pit.

  “Time for shovels,” I said.

  “That will slow us down greatly.” Arbour’s annoyance was evident from ten yards off.

  “I’m beginning to see fragments.”