The Dogs of Winter

by Ann Lambert

  Nicole scraped her chair away from the desk. “As in now?”

  Roméo nodded. “Yes. I think I will go now. And will you hold down the fort here until I get back, Detective Sergeant LaFramboise?”

  “Yes, Chief Inspector Leduc.” She wagged a finger at Roméo. “You’re riding right into the mouth of the enemy. Attention à toi, anh? Just watch your back.”

  Twelve

  JEAN LUC DAVID sipped at his second espresso of the morning and looked out over the frigid St. Lawrence river moving relentlessly downstream to the Atlantic, under the new Samuel de Champlain bridge to his right, and the Jacques Cartier to his left. Off in the perfectly blue winter sky, he could just make out the mountains of the Eastern Townships, and beyond those, the Green Mountains of Vermont. He used to live on the western slope of Mont Royal, the extinct volcano with the giant cross atop it that was the dominant landmark of Montreal, and from which the city took its name. True blue Montrealais just called it The Mountain or La Montagne even though it is really a big hill. He loved its gorgeous park, the slope by Beaver Lake where people could ski or skate in winter, or just lie and laze and smoke pot in the summer. It was all landscape designed by Frederick Law Olmstead himself, including the city cemetery, on the mountain’s northern slope, which was also an arboretum and a haven for an extraordinary number of birds and animals. But he had to admit that he loved the river more, so he had bought this entire building on a cobbled, seventeenth-century street in Vieux Montreal ten years earlier. As he watched the St. Lawrence from his penthouse home office, he sometimes liked to imagine what those early European explorers thought when they first arrived in the sixteenth century—before PCB’s, raw sewage, and tanker oil had contaminated the river. The intoxication of the sheer abundance before them. The exhilaration and terror of what might await them on shore. A country waiting to be owned. The freedom to invent themselves anew. He was himself descended from Jean-Honoré Desjardins, the Marquis of Limoges, who came over in 1664 with a shipload of Filles du Roi—French women whom Louis XIV paid to cross the ocean and marry the settlers of New France. Jean Luc had read somewhere that more than nine percent of the genetic heritage of Quebecois derives directly from these “Daughters of the King” who arrived here 356 years ago. Close to four million Quebecois over fifteen generations were descendants of these women.

  Although the story of les Filles du Roi had been told in many permutations, he’d still love to do a series, the definitive TV series about that time. He would tell it better now—from the points of view of the women who married a total stranger, and who often bore at least ten children, and from the Indigenous people who’d just been “discovered” after living here for millennia. His version would be bolder, more complex. A bit controversial. He’d swing big, as Aaron Sorkin, his idol, always advised writers to do. Jean Luc observed as a massive container ship moved slowly downriver through the huge chunks of pack ice. In 1627, Cardinal Richelieu granted the newly formed Company of 100 Associates all the land between the Arctic Circle to the north, Florida to the south, Lake Superior in the west, and the Atlantic Ocean in the east. Imaginez vous. Sometimes, he felt like the river belonged to him, that all this was his domain, his seigneurie—but his was not given to him by the Sun King’s cardinal. No, Jean Luc had busted his ass for every single acquisition in his growing empire. And he was willing to work harder for even more.

  Gennifer Moran watched her boss as she waited to interrupt his reverie at just the right time. He was sitting in the beaten up armchair from his very first apartment that he kept for both sentimental and superstitious reasons. Watching the river sometimes gave him his most creative moments, so she never disturbed him before the second espresso was done. But Gennifer had two urgent issues on her agenda, and the morning was slipping away. “J.L.? It’s seven forty-five.”

  He gestured for her to join him without taking his eyes off the river. She was already in her chair and clicking away at her laptop by the time he turned around, crossed his hands and leaned his elbows on the desk. That meant he was ready. She began.

  “We need to finalize some details for Margeaux’s birthday bash. The restaurant will close immediately after lunch service and will be at your disposal for the next twenty-four hours. Here’s the finalized menu. Is there anything you’d like to change? Speak now or forever hold your peace.” She turned the computer so he could read it. Jean Luc peered at the screen and frowned.

  “Escargots? Margeaux doesn’t do shellfish. Change it.”

  Gennifer hesitated. “Escargots aren’t exactly shellfish. I’ve had them at Toqué. They are prepared exquisitely. Better than sex.”

  “Change it.”

  Gennifer smiled at the thought of Margeaux’s tastes, which definitely ran towards the more proletarian. She’d probably be happiest with a poutine appetizer followed by a few all-dressed hot dogs stimés. But she was turning forty, and so Jean Luc was pulling out all the gastronomical stops. Gennifer was also very appreciative of the many lucrative kickbacks that she got in her arrangements from the chosen ones who catered Jean Luc’s many parties. He was a sucker for le grand geste, so it was easy to urge him on to even greater ostentation.

  “Okay. Item two: Suzanne will be able to be here in time for the surprise, as her flight gets in from Paris at five in the afternoon. Monique is not able to attend, as she’s at an ashram in New Mexico, and she’s not allowed to speak for another twenty-one days.”

  Jean Luc rubbed his forehead like Marlon Brando in The Godfather. “Merde. Margeaux would really want her here. They go way back—to kindergarten together.”

  Gennifer hesitated before the next one. “And. Her friend Cyndy? She’s five months pregnant and forty years old, so her doctor is not letting her fly. She won’t be coming.” Gennifer braced herself for his reaction.

  “Are you kidding me? Women are such precious flowers now they can’t get on a plane anymore?” He thought of les Filles du Roi, having fifteen kids by the time they were forty. “Fuck. Fuck Fuck. That is so going to disappoint her.”

  Gennifer was pretty certain Margeaux would be way more dismayed by the fact that her girlfriend was pregnant at forty, than her not attending her party. Margeaux had been pressuring, actually begging Jean Luc to have a baby with her, and her biological window of opportunity was closing fast. Jean Luc had three grown kids, and Gennifer knew he had no intention of ever having another one if he could help it. Not even for Margeaux, whom he loved, in his fashion. Jean Luc got up from his chair and began to pace. Gennifer needed to distract him. They were looking to cast a new role in their hit series, a kind of Canadian version of Gilmore Girls meets Girls. It was wildly popular with the under-forty female demographic—and was translated into about twenty languages. They wanted a fresh face, someone really out of the box. Preferably brown, Black, or Asian.

  “Item three: The casting cocktail party this weekend. We’ve invited about a hundred and twenty-five people—the usual suspects from the casting agencies. The usual local actors are being rounded up, as well as a few freshly minted ones from the theater schools.” Jean Luc was always on the lookout for that diamond in the rough.

  “Can you make sure that some of the girls who attended last week’s party are invited? There were a few I met who might fit the bill.”

  Gennifer made a quick note. “Done.” She couldn’t resist. “Anyone particular in mind?”

  Her question was interrupted by the buzzing of Jean Luc’s cell phone. He checked the caller ID and gestured at her to leave him alone. Surprised, she grabbed her laptop and stepped out, closing the door softly behind her. She of course pressed her ear to his door to listen, but she couldn’t make anything out. It sounded serious.

  A few minutes later, Jean Luc opened his door with such force that if Gennifer had not just retreated from her eavesdropping she would have fallen face first into his lap. Instead, he wrapped his arms around her thin shoulders and squeezed the breath out
of her.

  “That was Pierre Boucher. The decision came in a few days early. They’ve dropped the lawsuit. All of it. Every charge. It’s OVER!” He yelled the last words at such volume that Gennifer had to block her ears. Then he grabbed her again and kissed her hard on each cheek with a comical smacking sound. “Where do you want to go? I’m feeling on top of the world, and I’m offering you a trip—anywhere in the world you want to go. Name it!” Jean Luc stared at her with those laser blue eyes of his, lit up with relief and joy. “I offer you the world!”

  Gennifer extricated herself from his arms. “Let’s get the birthday party over with, cast the next girl, and trust me, I am going somewhere really far and stupidly expensive.” But Jean Luc had already turned away from her and was on his phone, excitedly sharing the good news.

  Thirteen

  Thursday afternoon

  January 31, 2019

  THE DETECTIVE ROSE from behind his desk and shook Roméo’s hand a bit too firmly.

  “Bienvenue à Montréal, Chief Inspector.”

  Roméo nodded silently and sat down in the chair opposite Detective Louis Cauchon who just sat and took him in for a moment, perhaps trying to place Roméo’s name. He was very well known to most in the police forces as the cop who caught William Fyfe, the serial rapist and murderer.

  “Well, if it isn’t the maple syrup man.” Cauchon declared with a sardonic smirk.

  Roméo’s most recent high-profile arrest was the “Maple Gang,” who broke into a maple syrup warehouse and stole millions of dollars worth of Quebec’s sweetest export. Their crime trespassed into Roméo’s territory when they murdered one of the two guards on duty that night. His network of informants, cultivated over his many years of police work, finally led him to the killers’ hideout. Because of the somewhat comical nature of the crime, it went viral, and Roméo had become an internet star: SEXY SQ COP IN SYRUP STAKEOUT! It was all very embarrassing and, given that he had almost lost one of his officers in that raid, infuriating as well.

  Roméo waited for the requisite offer of coffee from Detective Cauchon but none came, so he studied the man for a moment. He was a burly man—costaud—as they say in French, his barrel chest straining the seams of his suit jacket. He had fingers the size of sausages, a wedding ring embedded in one of them. He’d obviously been in the sun recently (Mexico? Cuba?)—a deep mahogany tan camouflaged the acne pockmarks on his cheeks and neck. He had a full head of cropped hair that crested into what they used to call a brush cut in Roméo’s day—a classic military style. Roméo looked straight into his gray eyes, but they revealed absolutely nothing. Cauchon blinked first. He pulled a blue file from his drawer and removed several photographs from it. He pushed one in front of Roméo. “Do you know this woman?”

  Roméo took a few moments to examine the image. “No. I have never seen her before.”

  Cauchon leaned back into his chair and folded his hands behind his head. “Then why would she have your name and phone number in her pocket?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Cauchon smiled. “Is she one of your girls who got away?” Cauchon was referring to the systematic abuse and sexual assault of Indigenous women by Sûreté du Québec officers in Val-d’Or. Women who were taken into custody by the SQ were particularly targeted. It had scandalized the country.

  Roméo ignored the question and responded with his own. “How are you enjoying your new police chief?”

  The Montreal police force had been in such crisis a couple of years earlier, over scandals like spying on journalists, punishing whistle blowers, and rampant corruption, that the government appointed the former head of the Sûreté du Québec to replace the suspended and disgraced Montreal chief of police. The Greens of the SQ had infiltrated the Blues of the SPVM, and the long rivalry between the two forces had seriously ramped up. Cauchon rose to his feet. “We may need to talk to you again. Hopefully not.”

  Roméo didn’t move. “Why did you wait four days to contact me?” He picked up the photo. “This was taken on Monday. I am clearly a person of interest in your inquiry.”

  Cauchon shrugged, “She was found frozen on the side of the road, with enough booze in her blood to pickle her. Do you know how often we see these? I didn’t even want to bother you, but we have to ID her.” He returned the photo to the file.

  “I’d like to see the body.”

  Cauchon snorted. “I don’t think so. She was very cold, but I mean, not cold enough for your new job.”

  So, he knew about the Cold Case squad. “I want to see the body now. I want to see the preliminary police report, and the medical examiner’s report.”

  Cauchon laughed. “And I want to retire at fifty and move to Tahiti.”

  Roméo stood up and placed his huge hands on the desk. “Écoute, mon ami. Your new chief and I go way back. I strongly suggest that if you want to even have a job at fifty, you alert the medical examiner that I will be arriving shortly.” Cauchon blinked again. And then he picked up the phone and made a call.

  The autopsy report put her at about twenty-five years old, but Roméo was shocked by how tiny she was, like a child. He examined her face carefully and was certain he had never seen her before. They had yet to identify her, as no one has filed a missing person’s report, and she had no ID on her whatsoever. There was considerable trauma to the body. The medical examiner believed she was probably hit by a car travelling about forty to fifty kilometers an hour. She had a fractured right femur, several broken ribs, a ruptured spleen, and many deep contusions. How could someone have done this and just left her there? If he were a religious man, Roméo would like a special circle of hell reserved for hit-and-run drivers. The medical examiner was gone for the day, so Roméo was being “supervised” by a morgue technician who looked to be about fifteen years old. He was working at his computer, but Roméo had glanced at it and clearly saw him on his Instagram account. He flipped through the report again. The cause of death was listed as a combination of exposure and traumatic force.

  But as Roméo looked more closely at the details of the autopsy and the body, there were signs that she might have died of some kind of traumatic asphyxiation. This suggested she did not die from being hit by the car, but something or someone had suffocated her in a way that was consistent with something Roméo remembered from police academy. Two nineteenth-century “entrepreneurs,” Burke and Hare, had a little business excavating graveyard bodies to sell to medical schools. Eventually, they decided preying upon live alcoholics would make their job a lot easier. Burke would sit on the victim’s chest and use one hand to cover the victim’s nose and mouth and the other to close the victim’s jaws, resulting in traumatic asphyxia. This way they acquired a body without the digging. This kind of homicidal smothering was actually still called “Burking.” The medical examiner’s cause of death was uncertain, but foul play wasn’t mentioned anywhere, and Roméo was shocked that it wasn’t in the report. There was no way given the state the body was in that homicide by asphyxiation could absolutely be ruled out. Could they be so negligent as to omit this possibility entirely? Or was it more a question of criminal indifference? Glancing at the technician to make sure he was completely absorbed in social media, Roméo took out his phone, and snapped a photo of the critical page of the report. The boy didn’t even look up. Then Roméo cleared his throat to get his attention.

  “Could I see what effects were with the body, please?”

  The boy looked up at Roméo but was clearly struggling to pull his eyes away the screen. “Are you allowed to see those?”

  Roméo smiled. “Yes, son, I am.”

  The boy handed him the clear plastic effects bag. Roméo spilled the contents out on the table, and there it was. His name and cell phone number were written on the back of a 3- by 5-inch photograph. Roméo peered at it closely. A woman, probably in her forties or fifties, her arms outstretched and palms open, as though announcing her possession
of this landscape—which looked a lot like Beaver Lake. The photo was not perfectly focused, and a bit creased, but Roméo knew it was her. Was it possible? It was clearly a picture of Hélène Cousineau. Hélène de Troie as they all called her, as she was so unusually, ethereally beautiful, and the object of almost every boy’s desire in Outremont High where Roméo, Hélène, and her younger brother, Jean-Michel, a.k.a. “Ti-Coune” attended. Hélène, who had run away from a violent home, and then several abusive foster families. Hélène, who lived in a Hells Angels bunker with Ti-Coune when they were teenagers, and whom no one messed with. She had headed out west before she was eighteen and had been living out there for years, thousands of miles from Montreal. Roméo found out she went missing in 2016. But the trail had gone cold. He examined the photo again. There was no mistaking that expression. And the place. The chalet next to Beaver Lake where people went for hot chocolate after skating, or for snacks in the summer, was clear and recognizable. A well-known tourist destination, and beloved by Montrealers as well. Roméo took a photo of the picture with his phone. But when was this taken? And by whom? How did this dead woman know Hélène Cousineau? Was Hélène still alive?

  Fourteen

  THE YELLOW LILIES caressed the canoe as it slid silently through the water, dappled with light where the sun penetrated the trees in full summer leaf. The breeze was so warm and gentle it was like Mother Nature herself was conspiring to create a perfect moment. Just for them. He took in the lovely shape of her head and neck, her black hair pulled up in a careless ponytail, the rise and fall of her shoulders as she paddled, stopping to point out the frogs and the enormous heron stalking them. He loved everything about the way she moved though the world. Just as he reached out to touch her, to show her the kingfisher that was warning them away, she dropped her paddle in the water and turned around to face him. But it wasn’t her. It was someone else. The Man. He was pointing and laughing at him, shrieking, “You’re up shit creek without a paddle, my boy!” When he looked at his hands his paddle was gone, too, and his hands were bleeding. He tried to staunch the blood and plunged them into the water. The whole lake began to turn red. When he pulled them out again, his hands were gone. And she was, too. He had no hands, and no paddle in a lake of blood. As he slowly returned to this world, it took him a few moments to remember he was in his bathtub and had fallen asleep again. The water was freezing now, and his fingers had gone wrinkled and pruny. His heart was beating faster than he liked—it always happened when he dreamed of her. But this was a variation on the nightmare he’d had now for years and years. It always began so beautifully and ended so horribly.