KATHY REICHS - 206 BONES

Briel was absent. I learned she’d begun teaching a course at the med school in Laval.

As we dispersed, I pulled Ayers aside to ask why everyone seemed so down. Mumbling about fatigue and overwork, she hurried off to cut a Y in Marilyn Keiser’s chest.

Back at my desk, I called the coroner’s office. A new secretary picked up. I began my request. Stopped. Asked the woman’s name. Adele.

I identified myself. Adele and I exchanged pleasantries. The new me.

“Has the Gouvrard file come in?”

“ Un instant, s’il vous plaît. ”

I heard a clunk. Computer keys. A rush of air as the receiver was raised to an ear.

“ Oui . Dr. Briel has it.”

“What?” Sharp.

Silence.

I took a breath. “Sorry, Adele, but I’m confused. Why was the file sent to Dr. Briel?”

“According to the record she’s handling the case.”

“That is an error.” So very polite. “Please replace Dr. Briel’s name with mine.”

Adele said nothing.

“If you have questions, please speak with Monsieur Hubert.”

Two requests. Two “please’s.”

Adele hesitated, then, “Shall I collect the dossier and deliver it to you?”

“Thank you for offering. That’s not necessary.”

I was disconnecting when Joe stuck his head into my office.

“Anything for me?”

I started to ask for X-rays of the maybe-Gouvrard family. Remembered. Smiled.

Joe waited, face set in neutral.

Southern women are famous for knowing the right things to say. For conjuring words and phrases that put others at ease. It’s a skill I admire but do not possess. That’s being generous. When it comes to small talk, I suck.

At a loss for common conversational ground, I glommed onto a comment from yesterday’s cookie enticement.

“Tell me something.” A good Dixie girl opener. “You said you’ll spend the weekend exploring. I find that intriguing.” I didn’t. My mind was on the Lac Saint-Jean bones. “Exploring what?”

Joe didn’t turn away, but didn’t exactly clamor for eye contact.

“It’s just a hobby.”

It wasn’t really an answer.

“But the weather’s so cold. What do you explore?”

Shoulder shrug. “Just stuff.”

The dolt wasn’t making this easy.

“Caves? Mines? Alternate dimensions?”

“Underground stuff. It’s called drainsploring. It’s no big deal. Do you want that girl poking around in the storage closet?”

The quick-change threw me.

“What girl?”

“Some chick’s rummaging through your old cases.”

So much for bonding.

“X-ray the Lac Saint-Jean vics.”

Shooting to my feet, I crossed the hall to my lab.

The “chick’s” back was to the door as she examined the contents of a box. Its label said LSJML-28723.

“Excuse me?”

When the girl whirled, two margarine braids whipped below a triangular bandana tied at the back of her head. Though easily six feet tall, she weighed about the same as your average middle-schooler.

“You startled me.” Hand to chest.

I crossed my arms. Considered, but didn’t tap a foot.

“And you would be?”

“Solange Duclos.”

The name meant nothing. My face clearly said it.

“Dr. Briel’s research assistant.” Almost a whisper.

The Université de Montréal student. I’d completely forgotten.

“Who let you in here?”

“Dr. Briel gave me a key.” She held it up.

I extended an upturned palm. Duclos dropped the key into it.

“Dr. Briel suggested I familiarize myself with dentition by going through old cases.” Duclos’s was the reddest lipstick I’d ever seen. Probably named Passionate Poppy or Chili Pepper Red.

I gestured Duclos out of the closet. Snatching up a spiral-bound reference, she scurried past me, book flat to her almost nonexistent breasts. After locking the door, I joined her.

Don’t take it out on the kid.

“Did you check in with Dr. Morin?”

Duclos nodded, crimson lips twisted sideways.

“Other than familiarizing , did Dr. Briel leave further instruction for you?”

Duclos shook her head.

Great. Briel had a novice on the floor but wasn’t even in the building.

Duclos held up a battered copy of Bass’s Human Osteology .

“She gave me this. The chapter on dentition is really good. I know the teeth, of course, incisors, canines, molars, premolars, but I need to brush up on details.” Not stammering, but close. “I’m shaky on mandibular versus maxillary, left versus right.”

“Sit.” I pointed at the only surface in the room not covered with bones. “There.”

Duclos rolled a chair to the spot I’d indicated. As she folded into it I returned to the closet. Using a small round key on my personal chain, I unlocked a metal cabinet and withdrew a plastic tub.

Duclos watched my return with Frisbee eyes.

“Practice on these. Divide by categories, then sides, then uppers versus lowers.”

The tub hit the counter with a crack.

After coffeeing up, I tried Schechter again.

Nope.

Next, I went to Briel’s office. A gray envelope lay on her desk, return address SQ, Chicoutimi.

I humped back to my lab.

Psyched.

But not for long.

The Gouvrard records made the Villejoin file look rich in comparison. There wasn’t a single X-ray. The medical and dental data were negligible. The typed reports were faded and smeared, probably the product of carbon copying. The handwritten notes were barely legible.

After three and a half hours of squinting and magnifying and translating from colloquial French, I had nothing more than when I’d started.

Achille, the father, had suffered from hypertension and eczema, conditions for which he’d taken medication. He’d stood five feet nine inches tall. Useless. I had no complete long bones. He’d broken three toes in an industrial accident at age thirty-seven. I had no foot bones.

An absence of dental records suggested Daddy wasn’t into regular checkups.

Vivienne, the mother, had no medical condition that would have affected her skeleton. She’d had trouble with what would now be called acid reflux. She’d suffered from migraines. She’d lost a baby two months into a pregnancy three years prior to her elder son’s birth. No height was recorded.

Mommy had undergone root canals in her first and second lower left molars. Both those teeth had been lost postmortem.

Serge, the elder brother, had fractured his right ulna at age six. That bone had not been recovered. He’d had measles at seven and chicken pox at nine. On his eleventh birthday, he’d suffered a mild concussion by falling from a tree.

Though the boy had visited a dentist and been treated for cavities, I had none of his teeth.

I looked at the clock. One ten.

Across the lab, Solange was still sorting and studying dentition. The neon lips made me think of the print they’d leave on a glass.

I tried Schechter again, left a third message.

Then I headed to lunch.

Natalie Ayers was in the cafeteria. She pointed to an empty chair opposite hers. I sat. Sensitive to the earlier brush-off, I avoided the subject of staff morale.

“Done with Keiser?”

Ayers nodded, teeth embedded in an egg salad sandwich.

“I assume it was Keiser.”

“Yeah. Thanks to decomp and burning, her face and dentition were history. Fortunately, she wore a bridge. That survived. We got the antemorts. The thing was a match.”

“What killed her?”

“Who knows? The internal organs were mush. X-rays showed no fractures, bullets, or foreign objects. I sent samples to tox, but I’m not optimistic.”

“Did you find smoke in the lungs or trachea?”

Ayers waggled a hand. Maybe yes, maybe no. So it was unclear if Keiser was alive when the fire started.