Kathy Reichs - Grave Secrets

“Are you autopsying everyone?”

“We’re doing externals on the passengers. This is the driver.”

“Saved him for last?”

“Most of the victims are so badly burned we couldn’t be sure which one he was. Found him yesterday.”

Fereira stripped off mask and gloves, washed her hands, and crossed to the swinging doors, indicating that I should follow. She led me down a dingy corridor into a small, windowless office and closed the door. Unlocking a battered metal cabinet, she withdrew a large brown envelope.

“A radiologist at the Hospital Centro Médico owed me a favor.” She spoke English. “Had to call in the chit for this.”

“Thank you.”

“Sneaked the skull out after Lucas left on Tuesday. Wouldn’t want that getting out.”

“It won’t come from me.”

“Good thing I did.”

“What do you mean?”

Fereira slid one of several films from the envelope. It contained sixteen CT scans, each representing a five-millimeter slice through the skull found in the septic tank. Raising an X ray toward the overhead light, she pointed to a small white blob in the ninth image. Through the next several images the opacity enlarged, changed shape, diminished. By the fourteenth frame it was no longer visible.

“I spotted something in the ethmoid, thought it might be useful. After your call this morning, I went for another peek at the skull. The remains were gone.”

“Gone where?”

“Cremated.”

“After only one week?” I was dumbfounded.

Fereira nodded.

“Is that standard procedure?”

“As you can see, we’re cramped for space. Even under normal circumstances we don’t have the luxury of keeping unknowns for long periods of time. This bus crash has pushed us to the edge.” She lowered her voice. “But two weeks is unusual.”

“Who authorized it?”

“Tried to track that down. No one seems to know.”

“And the paperwork is missing,” I guessed.

“The technician swears he placed the order in the filing basket after carrying out the cremation, but it’s nowhere to be found.”

“Any theories?”

“Yep.”

She returned the film, held out the envelope.

“Vaya con Dios.”

At twelve fifty-seven I was belted into a first-class seat on an American Airlines flight to Miami. Dominique Specter sat beside me, lacquered nails drumming the armrest. Dr. Fereira’s CT scans were locked in a briefcase at my feet. The cat hair samples were tucked beside them.

Mrs. Specter had spoken incessantly during the limo ride and throughout the wait in the airport lounge. She described Chantale, recounted childhood anecdotes, floated theories as to the cause of her daughter’s problems, wove schemes for her rehabilitation. She was like a DJ between records, terrified of silence, nonselective in the banality with which she filled it.

Recognizing the talk as tension release, I made reassuring sounds but said little. Feedback was not necessary. The verbal flow continued unabated.

Mrs. Specter finally fell silent as we thundered down the runway for takeoff. She compressed her lips, leaned her head against the seatback, and closed her eyes. When we leveled off, she pulled a copy of Paris Match from her handbag and began flipping pages.

The wallpaper chatter resumed during our transfer in Miami, died again on the flight to Montreal. Suspecting my companion had a fear of flying, I continued to grant her conversational control.

Traveling with the ambassador’s wife had its advantages. When our plane touched down at ten thirty-eight, we were met by suited men and whisked through customs. By eleven we were in the back of another limo.

Mrs. Specter maintained her cruising altitude silence as we sped toward Centre-ville, exited at Guy, and turned right onto rue Ste-Catherine. Perhaps she had run out of words, or simply talked herself calm. Perhaps being home was soothing her soul. Together we listened to Robert Charlebois.

Je reviendrai à Montréal… I will return to Montreal…

Together we watched the lights of the city go by.

In minutes we pulled up at my condo. The driver got out.

As I gathered my briefcase, Mrs. Specter grabbed my hand. Her fingers felt cold and clammy, like meat from the fridge.

“Thank you,” she said, almost inaudibly.

I heard the trunk squeak, thunk shut.

“I’m glad I can help.”

She drew a deep breath.

“You have no idea how much.”

The door on my side opened.

“Let me know when we can see Chantale. I’ll go with you.”

I laid my hand on Mrs. Specter’s. She squeezed, then kissed it.

“Thank you.” She straightened. “Shall Claude help you inside?”

“I’ll be fine.”

Claude accompanied me up the steps, waited as I located my key to the outer door. I thanked him. He nodded, placed my suitcase beside me, and returned to the limo.

Again, I watched Mrs. Specter glide into the night.

15

BY SEVEN THE NEXT MORNING I WAS RACING THROUGH THEasphalt underbelly of Montreal. Above me, the city yawned and stretched to life. Around me, the Ville-Marie Tunnel looked as gray as my mood.

Quebec was in the grip of a rare spring heat wave. When I’d arrived home near midnight, my patio thermometer still topped eighty, and the temperature inside felt like nine hundred Celsius.

The AC was indifferent to my preference for sleeping cool. Ten minutes of clicking buttons, pounding, and swearing had done nothing to coax it to life. Sweating and angry, I’d finally opened every window and fallen into bed.

The street boys had been equally unconcerned about my comfort and need for sleep. A dozen were en fête on the back stoop of a pizza joint ten yards from my bedroom window. Yelling did not dampen their party mood. Neither did threats. Or curses.

I had slept badly, tossing and turning under limp sheets, awakened repeatedly by laughter, song, and angry outbursts. I had greeted the dawn with a pounding headache.

The Bureau du Coroner and the Laboratoire de Sciences Judiciaires et de Médecine Légale are located in a thirteen-story glass and concrete T in a neighborhood east of Centre-ville. In deference to its principal occupant, the provincial police, or Sûreté du Québec, over the decades the structure has been dubbed the SQ building.

Several years back, the Gouvernement du Québec decided to pump millions into law enforcement and forensic science. The building was refurbished, and the LSJML was expanded and moved from the fifth to the twelfth and thirteenth floors, into space formerly occupied by a short-term jail. In an official ceremony, the tower was reborn as the Édifice Wilfrid-Derome.

Old habits die hard. To most it remains the SQ building.

Exiting the tunnel at the Molson brewery, I passed under the Jacques Cartier Bridge, shot across De Lorimier, turned right, and wound through a neighborhood where neither the streets nor the people are beautiful. Three-flats with postage-stamp yards and metal staircases spiraling up their faces. Gray stone churches with silver spires. Corner dépanneurs. Storefront businesses. The Wilfrid-Derome/SQ looming over all.

After ten minutes of searching, I located a spot that appeared, through some bureaucratic loophole, to be legal, without permit, during the precise period I planned to park. I rechecked the monthly, hourly, and daily restrictions, maneuvered into place, grabbed my laptop and briefcase, and headed up the block.

Children were dribbling toward a nearby school in twos and threes, like ants converging on a melting Popsicle. Early arrivals milled in the playground, kicking balls, jumping ropes, screaming, chasing. A small girl peered through the wrought-iron fence, fingers clutching the uprights like those of the child at Chupan Ya. She watched me pass, face expressionless. I did not envy her the next eight hours, trapped in a hot classroom, summer freedom still a month away.