“
“Actually, the news isn’t so good.”
Hubert slumped back, pushing the pink polyester to its tensile limit. The hand now flapped at a chair.
I sat.
Brushed lint from the knee of my scrubs.
Inhaled deeply.
“Are you familiar with camptodactyly?” I began.
“No.” Coroners in Quebec are either doctors or lawyers. Hubert was among the latter.
I described the condition, then recapped my conversation with Sylvain Rayner.
“Sounds promising.”
“Except for one thing.”
Hubert waited.
“I don’t have the right little finger phalanges.”
“Why not?”
“Either they weren’t collected or they’ve been misplaced.”
“I don’t understand.”
I explained the tally I’d done on-site. And my fruitless search downstairs.
“Only those three are missing?”
“And the distal phalange from the right third digit.”
“An error in recovery, documentation, or processing. An error that could compromise an identification. And you’re uncertain which.”
“Yes.” I could feel my face flame.
“This is very disappointing.”
I said nothing.
“This is a homicide.”
“Yes.”
“If the woman downstairs is Christelle Villejoin, this case will go very high profile. If a third old woman is dead, this Marilyn Keiser, that profile will go into the startosphere.”
Feeling correction would not be appreciated, I held my tongue.
“Maybe these phantom phalanges were never there. Maybe the killer hacked off this woman’s finger.”
“Why would I record a total of fifty-six?”
“Carelessness?”
“I’ll check the fifth right metacarpal for cut marks.” I didn’t believe I’d find any. I’d have noticed while sorting.
English speakers profane by reference to body functions and parts. Don’t need to elaborate. French Canadians rely on liturgical reference.
“
“I’m still working on that.”
There was a beat of silence.
“Actually, there could be four,” I said.
“Four what?” Hubert looked at me as though I’d been sniffing glue.
“Elderly women murdered in the Montreal area.
“Who’s the fourth?”
“Rose Jurmain.”
“Who?”
“Last March a female skeleton was found near Sainte-Marguerite. Turned out to be a woman missing two and a half years.”
Hubert shot forward. Rolls large enough to hide squirrels tumbled his torso.
“Of course.” A finger jabbed the air. “Jurmain was a wealthy American. The father had connections. How could I forget? The old man was a pain in my shorts. You and Ryan just transported the bones to Chicago. But that woman wasn’t so old.”
“Fifty-nine.” I explained Rose’s prematurely aged appearance.
“
Hubert’s face was now the color of his shirt. I decided to delay querying about my problem with Edward Allen.
“I could cut bone samples from the skeleton downstairs. Submit them for DNA testing.” I knew it was dumb as soon I said it.
“Christelle Villejoin had one relative, a sister, now dead. You tell me she never had surgery, so we won’t get lucky with hospital-stored gallstones or tissue samples. It’s been two and a half years. The house has undoubtedly been cleaned of toothbrushes, combs, tissues, chewing gum. To what would we compare this DNA?”
“I thought there was family in the Beauce. Have attempts been made to locate those relatives?”
Hubert didn’t bother to answer. Then I remembered. Ryan said that had been done. But done well? I made a note to ask him to double-check.
“Marilyn Keiser has offspring somewhere out west,” I said. “We could at least establish that the skeleton is or is not hers.”
“And if it’s not we’re still up shit creek.”
“We could exhume Anne-Isabelle.”
“Cremated.” Hubert packed an encyclopedia of disdain into one little word.
“I’m happy to go back out to Oka.”
Now the hand flapped at me.
The small office filled with tense silence.
What the hell? I was already on Hubert’s list.
“This may not be the time, but I’d like to discuss an issue arising from the Jurmain case.”
Hubert’s stare was beyond stony and out the back door. Ignoring it, I began to explain my dilemma concerning Edward Allen’s informant.
The phone chose precisely that moment to ring.
Hubert answered, listened, the scowl never leaving his face. Then, palming the mouthpiece, he spoke to me.
“I want your trauma report as quickly as possible.”
A not so subtle kiss-off.
