Tawny’s skin gleamed like alabaster. One hand covered her mouth. The other clutched a long, flat object.
What?
She jerked convulsively. A blade flashed firelight.
A knife!
Tawny’s knuckles looked white and bloodless. For a moment she stared at her hand, as if trying to figure why the knife might be there.
Then she pounced and rolled me so my face mashed the carpet.
I felt breath on my neck, weight on my back.
My God, she’s going to stab me. “Q” still controls her.
I waited for the blade.
Instead I felt pressure at my wrists. Sawing.
Tawny was cutting my bindings!
Wrenching my head sideways, I gulped for air.
“Faster, Tawny. Hurry!”
I strained the ropes outward as Tawny slashed back and forth across them. Though my arms were numb, I sensed a loosening as fiber after fiber yielded.
An eon later my hands flew apart. Driving my feet downward, I rolled to my back.
Pain roared up my spine and across my shoulders and hips. My vision blurred.
“The knife,” I gasped.
Two Tawnys reached out, then fell back coughing. I grabbed the knife, dropped it.
I clapped my hands, shook them, banged them on the floor. When I tried again, I had enough feeling to grasp the handle.
Within seconds I’d freed my ankles.
I tried to rise, toppled. Beside me, Tawny hacked and gagged.
Groping with one hand, I found a cushion. In two thrusts, I hacked off and bisected the outer covering, placed one half over Tawny’s nose and mouth, and pressed her palm to it. The other half I slapped to my face.
An icy tingle was moving from my toes to my feet. I pushed up, slid one knee forward. Moved a hand. Advanced another knee. My limbs were working.
Hooking Tawny’s arm, I tugged her to all fours. Together we crawled three-legged from the parlor toward the front of the house where there was less flame.
Six feet up the hall a tendril of night air tantalized my nostrils. Rising to a low crouch, I made a mad scramble to the foyer, threw open the door, stumbled over my parka, kicked it aside, shot outside, and flew down the walk, Tawny in tow.
The night smelled frosty and horsey and sweetly alive. Wind cooled my sweat-slicked face. Pellets of ice stung my cheeks and ricocheted off my shoulders and head.
I wiped tears from my eyes and looked down at Tawny. She sat cross-legged on the ice, naked, weeping and rocking like a frightened child.
I gazed back at the house.
Smoke seeped from some windows, and billowed in a column from the newly opened front door. Fueled by the influx of air, flames were rising rapidly. Otherwise, not a hint of the nightmare inside.
My chest froze in midheave.
I listened.
No sirens.
No one was coming! Anne hadn’t phoned! No one had!
A hand flew to my mouth.
Anne. Could she be alive? “Q” had talked of three bodies in the ashes. Was Anne inside!
Darting to the stoop, I grabbed my jacket, rushed back, squatted, and wrapped Tawny. Sleet ticked and bounced off the nylon.
“Did you see another woman in the house?”
Tawny continued rocking and sobbing.
I gripped her shoulders and repeated my question.
Tawny nodded.
“Where?”
The bony shoulders trembled.
“Where?” I screamed.
“F-floor.”
“What room?”
She looked up, mute.
“The room, Tawny. What room?”
I shook her, repeated my question.
“B-b-back. Basement. I don’t kn-know.” Ash speckled her face. Sweat soaked her hair.
As I stood motionless, undecided, the acrid smell of burning slammed my nostrils, and the size of the orange glow increased.
Anne didn’t have time for 911! I had to go back!
But I was soaked in gasoline.
With shaking fingers, I unlaced and yanked off my boots, stripped to my undies, then shoved my feet back into the boots. After wetting my cushion cover with snow, I dashed back to the house, head a vortex of pain. At the open door, I dropped to a squat and duck-walked into the smoke.
Stumbling to the armchair, I snatched Tawny’s blanket, draped my shoulders, and groped my way toward the back of the house.
Again, I tried to recall the layout of the back hall. This time my tortured brain warped up a floor plan. Kitchen to the left. Parlor to the right, study or bedroom beyond. Basement stairs descending from a bedroom straight ahead.
Though flame-free, the hallway was dense with smoke. I felt my way blindly, chest and throat tormented.
My hamstrings screamed in protest. Now and then I winged an elbow or banged a shin. I blundered on, one hand extended, the other clamped to my mouth. I thought only of Anne.
Then my outstretched hand slammed something hard. My stomach lurched. I tasted bile.
I flattened my palm on the door. The wood felt warm. I moved it up. Warmer.
Please! No!
I touched the knob. Hot. I turned it, inched open a peephole.
Flames twisted from the bed and curled the drapes at the back of the room. In the dancing shadows, I saw a shape on the floor.
I flung the door wide.
“Anne!”
The shape didn’t move.
“Annie!”
Nothing.
Tossing aside my swatch of fabric, I crawled to Anne, pulled the blanket from my shoulders, and folded it lengthwise in layers beside her.
When I sat back, pain exploded in my head. I forced the throbbing to the basement of my skull.
Mustering my dwindling reserves, I rolled Anne onto the blanket, dug beneath her, and pulled an edge. The blanket unfolded and slid between Anne’s body and the floor. I felt my way to an end, wrapped one corner around each hand, and began backing out of the room and down the hall.
Anne weighed a thousand pounds. I tried to reassure her, gagged.
I hadn’t taken time to check for a pulse. Was she alive?
Please, God!
I tugged at my homemade travois, gaining inches with each burst. My arms and legs turned to rubber.
I heaved and heaved, coughing and panting, every cell shrieking for air. Now and then I flinched as something exploded or crashed in the house. Backing into the parlor, I twisted my head up and around for a quick assessment. Through the smoke I could see flames working up the walls. Only a narrow path down the center remained fire-free.
Hours after setting out, I made the turn into the front hall. My eyes burned. My chest burned. My stomach burned.
Leaning a hand on the doorframe, I bent and vomited more bile. I wanted to sit down, to curl into a ball and sleep.
When my stomach settled, I regripped the blanket. My arms and legs trembled as I lurched backward, blindly pulling with all my strength.
The parlor was now an inferno. Flames crawled the woodwork, devoured the secretary, engulfed the couch. Things popped and spit, sending sparks toward the front hall and foyer. I was past feeling. Past thinking. I knew only to pull, back up a foot or two, and pull again.
The front entrance lay five yards behind me.
Three.
Two.
My mind chanted a mantra, urging my body not to fail.
Get through the foyer.
Over the jamb.
Onto the stoop.
When Anne’s legs cleared the doorway, I dropped to the ground and placed my fingertips on her throat.
No palpable pulse.
I collapsed onto Anne.
“You’ll be fine, old friend.”
Black dots swirled behind my eyelids.
Sleet pelted my back. The ground felt icy against my knees.
Around me, a cacophony of noise. I struggled to make sense of it.
Sobbing.
Was that Anne? Katy?
The
yawing and spitting of flames.
Ticking.
Rain on the magnolia? No. Montreal. De Sébastopol. Sleet on the tankers in the rail yard.
What rail yard?
The rumble of distant engines.
Muted honking.
Coyotes wailing far off in the desert.
Not coyotes. Sirens.
The dots congealed into solid black.
38
I AM OF THE OPINION THAT HOSPITALS ARE TO BE avoided. People die there.
Ten hours after arriving by ambulance, I rose, pulled on the sweats Charbonneau had given me at Catts’s house the previous night, and left General.
How? I walked out. Like McGee and Pomerleau. Piece of cake.
Unlike McGee and Pomerleau, I scribbled a farewell note absolving my care providers from any responsibility. Tough duty with both hands greased and bandaged.
A taxi had me home in ten minutes.
Ryan was on the line in twenty.
“Are you crazy?”
“I’ve suffered a few burns and a minor bump. Canadians going south have, on occasion, been more severely blistered by the sun.”
“You need rest.”
“I’ll sleep better here.”
“Did your accomplice make a run for it, too?”
The smile felt like shrapnel scoring my face. “Anne has a concussion. She’s not a flight risk.”
“Anne’s obviously the brains of the outfit.”
“She’ll be released tomorrow. Friday we fly to Charlotte.”
“Where winter is viewed as a passing unpleasantry.”
“No mittens. No shovels.”
“Did she actually do the ‘get thee to a nunnery’ bit?”
“Anne wanted solitude. Cheap. The convent offers clean rooms, decent meals, and all the solitude one could wish.”
Memory rewind.
Sleet on my back. Ice under my belly. Fire. Charbonneau barking orders. Claudel covering me with something warm and soft.
“Any word on Pomerleau?” I asked.
“She won’t get far.”
“She could be in Ontario by now, or over the border.”
“We found an old scooter in Catts’s shed. That was probably her main means of transportation.”
“How do you suppose she got McGee from General to the Point?”
“Taxi. Bus. Metro. Thumb.”
“Where’s McGee now?”
“Back at General.”
“What’s happening on de Sébastopol?”
“SIJ found a second false wall in the cellar.”
“Where Pomerleau hid McGee during the follow-up search.”
“Probably. Anne’s laptop and camera were stashed there.”
“Pomerleau trashed my condo.”
“Looks that way. Maybe Catts helped.”
“To scare me off the pizza basement case?”
“That would be my guess. She may have spotted the computer and camera while creeping your place, thought they were yours, and figured they held evidence pertaining to the skeletons. She’ll roll on the story when we net her.”
“How could she have known where I live?”
“Thanks to La Presse, it’s no secret what you look like or where you work. Pomerleau had the scooter. She could have waited outside Wilfrid-Derome, followed you to your building, and watched to see which lights went on.”
“I think Pomerleau has a mirror phobia.”
“The lady has issues more serious than glass.”
“Pretty cunning the way she misdirected us.”
“Buckle on a collar, strip, and play the victim.”
“I believed it, Ryan. When I saw her in that dungeon, I wanted to cry.”
“We all fell for it. Did you get the bouquet?”
I turned and looked at my dining room table. The “bouquet” was the size of Laramie, Wyoming.
“It’s beautiful. I’m having the city run an extra water-line.”
I felt my reserves dwindling. Ryan heard the fatigue in my voice.
“Claudel and Charbonneau have a lot to tell you when you’re feeling up to it. For now, eat something, kill the phone, and hit the rack, hot stuff.”
I did. And slept until midafternoon.
Waking was like crossing an event horizon. I felt zest-ful. Invigorated. Charged with water-walking, omnipotent vitality.
Until I looked in the mirror.
My face was scraped and blotchy. My hair was singed.
What remained of my brows and lashes were crinkly little sprigs.
Showering helped little, makeup even less.
I imagined Katy’s reaction on Friday. I pictured Claudel with his razor-sharp styling and advert-perfect creases.
“Bloody hell.”
Rebandaging my hands, I headed to CUM headquarters.
“Sergent-détective Charbonneau ou Claudel, s’il vous plaît,” I requested of the lobby receptionist.
“Busy night,” the receptionist said in English, poker-faced.
“A real pip.”
I pictured myself panty-mooning the sky. Great. Word was out. My PC-challenged male colleagues would have a field day.
Charbonneau came down to escort me through security. He asked how I was, then he led me to the squad room, eyes straight ahead.
I entered to whistling and applause.
Sergeant-détective Alain Tibo dug a bag from his desk, popped to his feet, and crossed to me. He looked the type that would play the bulldog in a Disney flick.
“This ain’t Dixie, Doc. It gets real cold in Quebec.” I knew Tibo’s sense of humor. If the squad needed a clown, he’d be elected. “We chipped in and got you some proper gear.”
Tibo offered the bag with solemn ceremony.
The sweatshirt was blue, the wording bright red.
There’s no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothing.
—Old Scottish fisherman’s proverb
Below the proverb, a woman built a snowman in a blizzard of flakes. Her hair was orange, her skin pink. The snowman wore a hat. The woman wore nothing but stilettos, bra, and panties.
Rolling my eyes, I jammed the shirt back into the bag. Charbonneau and I crossed to Claudel, weaving through desks and dodging wastebaskets and outthrust feet.
“Claudel bills you for the overcoat,” said a voice behind us. “Slide it by the captain as a business chit.”
“The leopard skin a Tuesday motif, Doc?” Tibo asked.
“I hear Wednesdays it’s circus day,” another voice answered.
I cocked what remained of one eyebrow at Charbonneau.
He started to speak, but Tibo cut him off.
“Don’t worry, Doc. Claudel’s got a whole set of boxers with them little smiley-face things. Keeps his ass beaming while the rest of him sulks.”
Scooping a file from his in-basket, Claudel rose, and the three of us trooped to an interview room.
“I see my panties have been entered as evidence.” My voice could have kept ice cream solid for a week.
“Word spreads,” said Claudel.
“Indeed.”
“It didn’t come from us, Doc,” added Charbonneau. “Honest to God.”
Somehow, I believed that.
We took chairs around a battered government-issue table.
“I trust you are feeling better,” Claudel said.
“Yes.” Claudel had sacrificed his pricey cashmere to warm me? “Thank you for the use of your coat.”
Claudel nodded.
A beat went by.
“Menard is dead?” I asked.
Claudel nodded again.
“How can you be certain?”
Claudel opened his file and slid a photo across the table. “We discovered this in Menard’s house in Vermont.”
The picture was black-and-white, the image off angle on the page, like an amateur, homemade print. Despite some fading, the subject was clear. A tall, thin man in a shallow grave, knees flexed, wrists tethered to ankles. Though distorted in death, Menard
’s face was unmistakable.
I flipped the print. On the back someone had written the initials S.M., and the date 9/26/85.
“Catts killed Menard in California in September 1985? And kept a photo of the body?”
“The sheriff’s going to do some digging around Catts’s old trailer,” Claudel said.
“Angela Robinson disappeared in October eighty-five,” I said. “According to neighbors, Menard returned to Vermont the following January.”
“Only it wasn’t Menard.” Charbonneau placed both forearms on the table and leaned forward. “We’re thinking Catts got the idea for his little horror show by following the Cameron Hooker–Colleen Stan media coverage. The shithead was in Yuba City, right down the road from Red Bluff. The press was hemorrhaging stories on ‘the Girl in the Box.’”
“About that same time Catts was getting chummy with Stephen Menard,” Claudel cut in. “Catts didn’t want to repeat Hooker’s mistake of remaining close to the scene of the abduction, so Menard’s farm was the perfect solution for playing out his fantasies. Catts killed Menard, then waited for his prey.”
“Angie Robinson,” I said.
“Catts abducted Robinson and transported her to Vermont,” Claudel continued. “Once there, he exploited his resemblance to the Menard kid.”
“Grew flaming orange dreadlocks and beard and stayed clear of the locals,” I said.
“You’ve got it.” Charbonneau jabbed the air with a finger, then slouched back in his chair.
“Why leave Vermont?” I asked.
“Maybe Catts was getting jumpy. Must have been a few people around who actually knew Menard,” Claudel suggested. “Maybe Angie died.”
“According to my estimate, Angie lived until she was around eighteen. That would bring us up to 1988, the year Grandma and Grandpa Corneau were killed.”
“Yeah,” Charbonneau snorted. “We’re gonna look into that wreck.”
“Maybe Catts liked the idea of a country without capital punishment. Maybe he thought a border would make him harder to track. Probably figured no one in Montreal knew Menard. For whatever reason, he pulled up stakes and headed north.” Claudel.
“With Angie or her body,” I said.
“The squirrel fools the probate people with his impostor act, goes French, becomes Stéphane Ménard, rents from Cyr, and opens a shop like the one in Yuba City.” Charbonneau.
“Collectibles,” I said.
“The perverted bastard was a collector all right.”
Claudel slid a second picture across the table.