‘Are you…’ He brought out the piece of paper the Chief Inspector had given him with the names of everyone who was at the seance. He looked down at it, drawing the performance out slightly. He wanted her full attention. He knew perfectly well what her name was, of course. He just wanted to mess with her mind. Get her off balance. Now he looked up only to see her looking down at the red notebook under her hand. She’d escaped in the moment he’d taken to pause. Her mind, far from being messed with, had actually wandered back to her own business.
‘Are you Odile Montmagny?’ he asked loudly.
‘Yes.’ She smiled pleasantly, almost vacuously.
‘My name is Inspector Beauvoir. I’m with the Surete du Quebec. Homicide.’
‘Not Gilles?’ She was transformed. Her body went rigid, her face focused and frightened. Her hand moved from the notebook to the wooden counter and her fingers tried to dig into the surface.
‘Gilles?’ he repeated. He knew immediately what she was thinking and didn’t yet want to ease her mind.
‘What’s happened?’ she pleaded.
Odile thought she was going to pass out. Her head had gone numb and her heart was throwing itself against her ribcage as though desperate to break out, to find Gilles.
‘I’m here about Madeleine Favreau.’
He watched her closely. Her flaccid, empty face had come alive. Her eyes shone, her brain was focused. She looked brilliant. And terrified. And gorgeous. Then it all dissolved. Her head, thrust forward toward him in desperation, sagged. All the muscles collapsed. In a blink the old Odile had returned. Pretty, dull, eager. But he’d seen what was under there. He’d seen what he suspected few knew existed, perhaps even Odile herself. He’d seen the brilliant, gorgeous, dynamic woman who lived trapped beneath the safe layer of dullness and smiles, of dye and sensible goals.
‘Madeleine was murdered? But she had a heart attack, I’m sure of it.’
‘
‘A drug?’
Had no one called Odile from Three Pines? Everyone had converged on Olivier’s Bistro to get the latest news. It was their broadcast center, with Gabri as the anchor. Beauvoir had found himself interviewing the only person in the area no one thought to call. Beauvoir felt suddenly very sorry for this woman and her eager, searching face. He felt sorry for her and slightly repulsed. Losers always repulsed him which was one of the reasons he’d never liked Agent Nichol. From the moment he’d met her a few years earlier he’d known she wasn’t just trouble, but worse than that. She was a loser. And in Beauvoir’s experience losers were the most dangerous people. Because eventually they got to the stage where they had nothing more to lose.
‘It’s called ephedra,’ he said.
She seemed to consider the word. ‘And it stopped her heart? Why would someone kill her that way?’
Not ‘why would someone kill her?’ but ‘why do it that way?’ It was the way, not the woman, that seemed to surprise Odile.
‘How well did you know Madame Favreau?’
‘She was a customer. Used to buy her fruit and vegetables here. There were some vitamins she’d pick up too.’
‘A good customer?’
‘Regular. She’d come about once a week.’
‘Did you see each other socially?’
‘Never. Why?’ Did she seem defensive?
‘Well, you had dinner together Sunday night.’
‘That’s true, but it wasn’t our idea. Clara invited us over before the seance. We didn’t even know Madeleine would be there.’
‘Would you have gone had you known?’ Beauvoir knew he was on to something. Could feel it. Could see the defensiveness in her face, could hear it in her tone.
Odile hesitated. ‘Probably. I didn’t have anything against Madeleine. As I said, she was a customer.’
‘But you didn’t like her.’
‘I didn’t know her.’
Beauvoir let the silence stretch. Then he looked around the shop more closely. It was a jumble of items. Food and produce seemed to be on one side and clothing and furniture on the other. On the food side he could see clay pots with wooden lids and scoops hanging from them. He could see coarse sacks and on the wooden shelves climbing the walls were hundreds of glass jars filled with what looked like grass. Could they be dope? He walked closer, noticing Odile staring at him, and peered at the jars. They had names like ‘Bee Balm’ and ‘Ma Huang’ and ‘Beggar’s Button’ and his favorite, ‘Cardinal Monkeyflower’. He took it down and opening the lid he sniffed tentatively. It smelled sweet. He couldn’t believe the Pope had ordained a Cardinal Monkeyflower. He wondered if there was a village named after him near Notre-Dame-de-Roof Trusses.
A bookcase held volumes on how to run a small organic farm, how to build an off-grid home, how to do your own weaving. Why would anyone want to do that?
Jean Guy Beauvoir wasn’t completely insensitive to the environmentalist movement, and had even contributed to a few fundraisers on the ozone layer or global warming or something. But to choose to live a primitive life, thinking that would save the world, was ridiculous. However, one thing did attract him. A simple wooden chair. Its wood was burled and polished and smooth to the touch. Beauvoir caressed it and didn’t want to lift his hand. He looked at it for a long while.
‘Try it,’ said Odile, still stationed behind the counter.
