Kathy Reichs - Bones to Ashes

“Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But how did they nail the skank?”

“In the mid-nineties, Kaczynski mailed letters, some to his former victims, demanding that his manifesto be printed by a major newspaper. All thirty-five thousand words. Verbatim. If not, he threatened to kill more people. After a lot of debate, the Justice Department recommended publication. Both the New York Times and the Washington Post ran the thing, hoping something would break.”

“And?” Harry turned her palm up.

“Kaczynski’s brother recognized the writing style and notified authorities. Forensic linguists compared text samples provided by Kaczynski’s brother and mother with the Unabomber’s manifesto, and determined they’d been authored by the same person.”

“There you go.” Harry added a second upturned palm.

“What?” I was lost.

“That’s what we do. In Obéline’s memory. And Évangéline’s, of course. We get a linguist to compare the poems in Bones to Ashes to poems Évangéline wrote as a kid. Then we make Évangéline an official poet.”

“I don’t know, Harry. A lot of her early stuff was just adolescent angst.”

“You think young Kaczynski was William Friggin’ Shakespeare?”

I tried not to look dubious.

“You talked to Obéline about Évangéline’s murder. I don’t speak French, but I listened. I know what I heard in her voice. Guilt. Terrible, horrible, gut-wrenching guilt. The woman’s whole life was one giant guilt trip because she hid the fact that she knew about her sister’s killing. Wouldn’t she want this?”

“Yes, but—”

“Do you know a forensic linguist?”

“Yes, but—”

“Well enough to ask him to do a comparison?”

“I suppose.”

Dropping both hands to the table, Harry leaned forward onto her forearms. “Évangéline and Obéline are both gone. That book is all we have left. Don’t you want to know if Évangéline wrote it?”

“Of course I do, but—”

“And get Évangéline’s name on record? Make her the published poet she always wanted to be?”

“But wait. This makes no sense. You’re suggesting Évangéline wrote the poems and that Obéline had them printed by O’Connor House. But why would Obéline use the name Virginie LeBlanc? And why wouldn’t she cite Évangéline as the author of the collection?”

“Maybe she had to hide the project from her creepozoic husband.”

“Why?”

“Hell, Tempe, I don’t know. Maybe he didn’t want old dirt stirred up.”

“Évangéline’s murder?”

Harry nodded. “We know Bastarache used to beat the crap out of Obéline. He probably scared her.” Harry’s voice went hushed. “Tempe, do you think he’s now killed her?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you think she’s even dead? I mean, where’s the body?”

Indeed, I thought. Where is the body?

The check arrived. I did the math and signed.

“There’s a problem, Harry. If I still have any of Évangéline’s poems, and that’s a big ‘if,’ they’d be in Charlotte. I have nothing here in Montreal.”

A smile crawled Harry’s lips.

24

WHEN HARRY PLAYS COY, THERE’S NO CRACKING HER. THOUGH I asked repeatedly, she’d tell me nothing. My sister loves being on the giving end of surprises. I knew I was in for one.

Twenty minutes later we were in my bedroom, the odd samplings of my past staring up at us. The arm-in-arm friends. The ticket. The napkin.

But Harry didn’t linger on that page of the scrapbook. On the next she’d pasted three items: a tiny Acadian flag, that being the French tricolor with one yellow star; a quill pen sticker; a cream-colored envelope with metallic lining and Évangéline stenciled on the outside.

Raising the flap, Harry extracted several pastel sheets and handed them to me.

The room fell away. I was twelve. Or eleven. Or nine. Standing by the mailbox. Oblivious to everything but the letter in my hand.

By reflex, I sniffed the stationery. Friendship Garden. Sweet Jesus, how could I remember the name of a childhood cologne?

“Where did you find these?”

“When I decided to put my house on the market, I started gophering through boxes. First thing I hit was our old Nancy Drew collection. Found them stuck in The Password to Larkspur Lane . That’s what sparked the scrapbook idea. I like the pink one. Read it.”

I did.

And stared into the unfinished country of Évangéline’s dream.

The poem was untitled.

Late in the morning I’m walking in sunshine, awake and aware like

I have not been before. A warm glow envelops me and tells all around,

“Now I am love!” I can laugh at the univers for he is all mine.

“Now listen to this.”

Opening the purloined copy of Bones to Ashes, Harry read,

“ Laughing, three maidens walk carelessly, making their way to the river.

Hiding behind a great hemlock, one smiles as others pass unknowing Then with a jump and a cry and a laugh and a hug the girls put their Surprise behind them. The party moves on through the forest primeval

In a bright summer they think lasts forever. But not the one ailing.

She travels alone and glides through the shadows; others can not see her.

Her hair the amber of late autumn oak leaves, eyes the pale purple of dayclean.

Mouth a red cherry. Cheeks ruby roses. Young bones going to ashes. ”

Harry and I sat in silence, lost in memories of four little girls, smiling toward life and what it would bring.

Harry swallowed. “The two poems kinda ring the same, don’t you think?”

I felt an ache so deep I couldn’t imagine it ever ending. I couldn’t answer.

Harry hugged me. I felt her chest heave, heard a tiny, hiccupping intake of air. Releasing me, she slipped from the room. I knew my sister was as devastated by Obéline’s death as I.

I couldn’t bear to read the other poems right then. I tried to sleep. Tried to put everything from my mind. I failed. The day kept replaying in flashpoint fragments. Cormier’s thumb drive. Hippo’s anger. Obéline’s suicide. Évangéline’s poetry. The skeleton. Île-aux-Becs-Scies.

Bec scie . Duck. Far away, in my head, a whisper. Faint, unintelligible.

Most distressing, try as I would, I could summon only a watercolor impression of Évangéline’s face. A blurry countenance at the bottom of a lake.

Had my memory run out, used up by countless visits over the years? Or was it the opposite? In medicine we talk of atrophy, the shriveling of bone or tissue due to disuse. Had Évangéline’s face evaporated because of neglect?

I sat up, intending to study the scrapbook snapshot. While I reached for the lamp, a disturbing thought struck me.

Had recall of my friend grown dependent upon photographic feeding? Were my recollections of Évangéline being shaped by the vagaries of light and shadow at frozen moments in time?

Settling back, I cleared my mind, and dug deep.

Unruly dark curls. A tilt to the chin. A careless tossing of the head.

Again, the nagging pssst! from my unconscious…

Honey skin. Ginger freckles sprinkling a sunburned nose.

A comment…

Luminous green eyes.

A link I was missing…

A slightly too-square jaw.

An idea. Bothering me…

Willowy limbs. A tender suggestion of breasts.

Something about a duck…

And then I fell asleep.

Eight A.M. found me in my office at Wilfrid-Derome. It was to be a day of interruptions.

My phone was blinking like a railroad crossing signal. I reviewed the messages, but returned only one call. Frances Suskind, the marine biologist at McGill.