by John Farrow
Camille! Stop talking and get out of here! I don’t like it here, Camille!
Her hands were all bloody now. She looked at them.
She walked around the body and returned to the bathroom, where she dropped the needle down the drain.
She had blood on her boots now. She’d left a trail back to the living room.
Everything’s fallen apart. Everything!
Shut up!
She washed her hands, and used toilet paper to clean up her boots, flushing the soiled paper down the John. Then she went back to the living room.
Camille Choquette surveyed the damage.
She picked up the pistol and dropped it in her coat pocket.
Stop being such aßtcking idiot!
Shut up, I said! I might need it. You never know.
Everything was perfect!
It’ll be perfect again.
She had a vague feeling that everything was not yet over.
Leaving the house, Camille was struck by a sadness of heart, a heaviness of spirit. She walked quickly down to her car, where Carole stood up on her knees in the driver’s seat, spinning the wheel to one side and the other. The front tires had burrowed a wide shallow hole in the snow. The doors were locked, the keys still in the ignition.
“Open up, sweetie!”
Instead, the girl honked the horn.
“Stop that! Open this door right now!”
Knowing that she was in for it now, the child crawled off into the back seat, but she would not release the door locks.
“Carole! I mean it! Open this door right now!”
She shook her head. Stuck out her tongue.
Camille looked quickly around. She ran up to the house and came charging back with a snow shovel held aloft like an ax. She slammed it down hard on the roof of her Mazda. “Open up! Open up right now!” She looked through the back window at her daughter. “Do you want me to smash your little head like this?”
The girl nodded no.
“Open up, Carole.”
The girl cried.
Beside herself, Camille reared back and smashed the driver’s-side window with the blade of the shovel. The glass shattered but held together like a jigsaw puzzle until she rammed the butt end of the handle against the window and it caved inward. She tossed the shovel away, unlocked the door, opened it, sat down on the glass, and started up the car. Camille spun her tires in the snow getting out of the driveway and never looked in any direction hitting the road. She drove hard, the cold wind blasting her, slowing down only when the house vanished from her rear-view.
“That’s enough,” she told Carole. “I don’t have the energy to punish you so just stop your snivelling.”
The child had not been making a sound. She sat with her head down, staring at the floor, her mouth opening and closing the way a fish breathes through its gills underwater.
“Quit while you’re ahead, that’s my advice.”
She had to make sure the girl stayed quiet. Before long, Cinq-Mars and other cops could be on her doorstep. She had to appear shocked, play the grieved girlfriend whose car, coincidentally, had been vandalized. She had to be the warm, comforting mother. She’d try to farm Carole out for the evening. She had an excuse. Cinq-Mars and Charlie were supposed to be coming over for a serious chat, weren’t they?
“Carole? How would you like to spend the evening at Minnie’s?”
Carole raised her head up. She looked out the window, her mouth still opening and closing, and she was making smacking noises now with her lips.
“Carole! I’m talking to you! Do you want to go to Minnie’s or not?”
“I don’t like Minnie,” the child said.
“She’s your best fucking friend.”
“I don’t like her at all.”
“Are you trying to get on my nerves? Are you trying to get on my nerves?”
“You broke the car, Mommy. It’s cold in here now.”
“You’re going to Minnie’s. That’s that. I don’t want to hear one whiny word out of you.”
“I didn’t say a whiny word.”
“Just look at you. You’re pathetic. Do you think I love you? Stop doing that with your mouth! Do you think I love you? Ask Charlie how much I love you.”
“Mommy!”
“Ask him.” She made eye contact with her daughter in the rear-view, her eyes blazing.
“Mommy—stop! Stop it!”
Maybe she could put a plastic sheet in her car window, pretend to be a victim of vandalism if necessary, but keep the car out of view so no one would ask.
“I’m a guppy,” the child said. “I breathe through my ears. The water goes in my mouth and I breathe through my ears. Look, Mommy. I’m a guppy.”
“That’s right, honey. You’re a fucking guppy.”
“That’s not nice that word. You broke the car, Mommy. You shouldn’t say that not nice word.”
“No? Well, I know what I should’ve done. I should’ve had a fucking abortion.”
Camille drove into her town in the dark at a moderate pace. She had a lot to arrange, but she was confident that she could do it now. She’d get through this. Charlie was a dead cop, and murdered cops got all the attention.Whowouldbeinterestedinherexcept sympathetic friends? She had a role to play, and she had to get on with it. She believed that she could do it now. Believed that she was all right. Suturing the lips had been a good idea after all. She’d got what she needed out of that.
Charlie had been a cop. The cops had been no help at all when her brother was killed. No help at all. The bad guys brought money, she got an education, and the cops did nothing. They deserved their punishment, and now she was ready for whatever came next.
15
MISSING MATTER
The same night, Tuesday, February 15th, 1999
Emile Cinq-Mars pulled into the drive at the home of Charles Painchaud only slightly late for their appointment. Most of the lights in the house were on, and two cars, including a squad car, were parked on a snowy clearing. Sharply colder air had moved in with the fall of darkness, and as he walked up the lengthy path the detective’s breath was visible in large billows. He resembled a snorting dragon, but, bone-weary from his long days and fitful nights, he felt considerably less than mythological.
No one answered when he rang the bell. Moments later, he knocked.
Cinq-Mars rang the bell again.
Out of good manners, he initially resisted peering into the house, for he assumed that Painchaud was either on the phone or in the bathroom, but when he did finally glance through the door’s window his intestines clenched. He reached high on the outside door with his gloved hands to open it, in order not to leave prints or disturb those that might be there. The inner door required that he turn the handle, and he did so by placing two fingers on the inside of the knob, where others had not likely touched.
Inside, the chaos proved to be widespread, and just as he was about to call out Charles’s name, he saw him.
All that blood told him that he was too late. He circled the body, and from a distance noticed the bullet wound. Still, he had to confirm the man’s death. The detective picked his way over debris, took off a glove and stretched his hand out to take the man’s pulse. The body was still warmish, but he was dead.
Keeping away, Cinq-Mars circled the corpse, not wanting to step in blood or disturb anything, and for a moment he had to turn away from the evidence of the beating the young man had endured. The phone was off the hook. It looked as if he had made a call, or tried to. Strange, that. Whoever had beaten Painchaud might have left him alone long enough for him to dial, or at least take the phone off the hook, and only then had he fired the bullet. Maybe he had gone to find the gun. Painchaud’s gun-belt was on the living-room floor, but the weapon was not in sight. The attacker could have beaten him, then shot him with his own pistol, and in between the victim might have managed to call someone.
Cinq-Mars closed his eyes. He was being professional. He was examining the scene of the cri
me, collecting first impressions, but he knew this man a little bit, he had liked him, and the savagery that had occurred was unspeakable.
He breathed deeply. His lungs ached with anger and sadness.
Then he opened his eyes again.
He kneeled, trying to see what there was to discern of the man’s face. Cinq-Mars was taking out his cellular when he paused. He’d noticed something. He leaned in toward the man, but it was hard to observe him properly as his body was in shadow cast by the sofa and he couldn’t get close enough. He backed away, stepping aroundtheblood, and looked down one hallway, which appeared to lead to bedrooms, then headed for the other door to the room. This led him into the kitchen. Being careful not to alter anything, he opened drawers and soon found what he needed, a flashlight. He returned to the corpse and assumed his previous position, crouched on the balls of his feet and leaning as far forward as he could, this time shining the light onto the man’s mouth.
Several cuts, and the man’s lips had been stitched shut.
Cinq-Mars made the call to his department and instructed them to inform the SQ that one of their own had been gunned down, murdered in his own home.
Then he stood up. Walked away from the dead man.
He surveyed the room, noticing every detail his eyes would give him. The havoc in the room seemed to him somewhat perfunctory. There was no getting away from the fact that a police squad car was parked outside, that the man was in uniform—whoever had come in and done this knew who they were attacking. If it was professionals—and the ferocity of the beating had Cinq-Mars half persuaded that it was—then the ransacking of the room had been put on as a sign of disrespect, and as a means of mocking the investigators, forcing them to work ten times harder than necessary at the crime scene for no good reason.
After five minutes he returned to the kitchen and replaced the flashlight in its drawer. He would tell the SQ, nothing of what he had discerned, as they’d only resent his opinion and give him grief. Nor would he tell them much about what he and Painchaud had been up to lately. Right now, the last thing he could endure was an intensive, days-long grilling from their officers.
He knew what came next. Muscle-flexing. A cop-killing provoked a show of extraordinary force. That this murder had been especially violent foretold an uprising among cops, a media circus, public outrage, and, possibly, political folly. If the crime was linked to the gangs, wolf packs would burst from their dens. In the midst of the anger and chaos, little time would be allocated for reflection and sorrow.
Cinq-Mars gave Painchaud that now. A prayer. A silent expression of grief.
He then went outside to clear his head in the night air and to think. Had Charles Painchaud been forced to talk? If so, what had he said? He’d been brutalized, which suggested that he had not been cooperative, but despite evidence of the young man’s heroic defiance, every man had his limits. Charlie had probably talked. Either that, or he’d been pummelled for answers beyond his knowledge, his wretched pleas of ignorance, for mercy, proving futile.
The detail that especially nauseated and enraged Cinq-Mars was the sutured lips. Was this some kind of cynical torture he had endured for refusing to talk? What was that about? Suddenly, he stood stock-still, remembering the message that Andrew Stettler had written and underlined on a pad: lips lips lips.
Lips.
The horror of the killing made him shiver. Cinq-Mars walked back to his vehicle to start his engine and wait for the SQ, out of the cold. Now that he knew he was at a crime scene, he was careful where he stepped, walking in light cast by the house. A shovel, which he had noticed coming in, now struck him as significant. Nobody leaves a shovel horizontal on the snow, ready to be buried by the next storm to come through. Very close to his car, twinkling in the light, he saw bits of shattered glass, many of the pieces clinging together the way a smashed car window often does.
Cinq-Mars sat in his Pathfinder, waiting, the engine rumbling. He took out a notepad, not wanting to forget any of the key details.
Lips. Stitches. Stettler was concerned about lips.
Pistol missing maybe. Phone call. Beating, then the call? Then shot?
Who’d he call?
Shovel in yard. Car glass.
Lights on. Happened after dark? Get time of phone call.
He called Mathers and told him the bad news.
From the height of land that Painchaud’s cottage occupied, Cinq-Mars could see the SQ, coming, their red cherries flashing. A cop-killing prompted a general response. The cars were speeding along at different points on the highway, often vanishing from his sight-lines and then reappearing again. He got out of his vehicle before they arrived and had his shield ready to show the first cops on the scene. He shouted his name the instant the driver jumped out of his patrol car, both hands in the air, his gold shield flashing in the headlamps. “I’m police! MUCPD! I called it in. Sergeant-Detective Cinq-Mars!” You couldn’t be too careful around upset, jittery cops.
By the time Bill Mathers arrived, the SQ had the investigation in top gear. He had to park some distance away and walk briskly through the gathering of reporters, television crews and a bevy of police and emergency vehicles to where Cinq-Mars, his chin downcast, leaned against the side of his Pathfinder, his hands deep in his coat pockets and his collar pulled up around his neck.
“I’ve answered the same questions a dozen times over,” his partner told him before the young man could utter a word. “You can spare me.”
They stood side by side, each content to be in the other’s company and out of the way of the SQ, officers. Mathers didn’t speak until Painchaud’s father arrived in a black Lexus. “Shit,” he said.
“Keep your opinions to yourself, Bill.”
“That’s not it, Emile. I have to talk to the SQ. I’m a witness.”
“What do you mean?”
“I just remembered. I drove by here today—after I followed Roland Harvey to the monastery. A white Caddy was parked in the yard. Emile, it could’ve been around the time. I thought it might’ve been his old man, just because, you know, it looked like wealth. But that’s not the car.”
Cinq-Mars nodded toward the SQ. “Go tell,” he said.
That delayed them awhile, and when Mathers was finally released, Cinq-Mars suggested they visit Painchaud’s girlfriend. “She’s not here. I have to figure she hasn’t heard the news. Maybe nobody knows to tell her.”
“Is that our job?” Mathers pondered.
“As far as I can tell, Charlie didn’t have friends in the SQ. It might as well be us. At least we know what he’s been doing for us lately.”
“How much of that do we tell?”
“None of it for now.”
“Émile—”
“It’s unexplainable, Bill. He was trying to save his girlfriend. I think that’s the least we can do for him now, don’t you?”
They left in the Pathfinder, with Cinq-Mars dropping his partner off by his car farther down the road. In tandem they continued on to Camille’s house, where they discovered that the SQ had arrived before them, and in significant numbers. Half a dozen squad cars and a couple of unmarked vehicles filled her driveway and spilled out onto the street. A few neighbours had come out to have a look. Mathers followed Cinq-Mars past the house and parked behind him on another street. Before he had a chance to turn off his car, he spotted Cinq-Mars coming around to climb into the passenger side, so he left the motor running to keep them warm.
“That’s a surprise,” Mathers said.
“How’d they know to come here?” Cinq-Mars asked.
“Any ideas?”
“Two. Somebody in the SQ, knows Camille and Charlie were going out. That’s not hard to believe, he could’ve had a friend who knew about her, but why would they send so many people to deliver bad news?”
“What’s your other idea?”
“Who did Charlie call before he died, if anyone? By now, the SQ, must know. If it was Camille, then yes, they’d be here in force.” Cinq-Mars had take
n out his cellphone and was punching in a number with his thumb. “Is he in?” he asked whoever answered. After a moment, he said, “Yeah, I know. We’re all busy. Could you get him, please? Tell him it’s Jeremiah.”
“Who?” Mathers asked.
Cinq-Mars did not respond, the phone pressed to his right ear. More than a minute passed before he spoke again. “Hi. Yeah. I heard. That’s what I’m working on.” He listened awhile. “Yeah, I’m sure they are. Listen. I need to know if Painchaud got a call through before he died. If so, what time, and to whom. Noqua.” A moment later, he said, “Yeah. I’ll wait.”
“Jeremiah?” Mathers asked, while Cinq-Mars was silent.
“Any prophet will do,” his senior told him. “I’m talking to my contact inside the SQ.”
Mathers nodded. “Noqua, that’s also some kind of code?”
“For ‘no questions asked.’ It could apply to you, too.”
The younger detective had never met any of the famous Cinq-Mars contacts, although he understood the concept. Cops found like-minded and trustworthy colleagues on other forces. When it was necessary to bypass the bureaucracy, they did so, trusting one another to use the information wisely. He wished that he could set up his own pipeline inside these forces, but it wouldn’t be easy. To start with, you had to be an excellent judge of character. As Cinq-Mars had done, he would have to find the right people, then assiduously avoid using them until they all got older and became well placed and trusted within their departments. Patience was the operative word. Bill figured that he would do one thing differently. If he ever put together a similar group, they’d never use the names of prophets to identify themselves. Rock singers, maybe.
“Yeah, I’m here,” Cinq-Mars spoke up. “Yeah. Yeah. Thought so. Yeah. Really? Okay. Listen. I’ll give you something. Tell your people this. According to you, Painchaud made the call during daylight hours, right? When I arrived, the lights were on. A lot of lights is hard to explain. No, no, you don’t get it. He gets the shit kicked out of him. He makes a phone call. That happens in daylight. Somebody else shows up and turns on the lights. Maybe that person kills him. Or maybe that person sews his lips together. Somebody who shows up and runs away scared doesn’t first turn on all the lights. Do you hear what I’m saying? Anyhow, the point is, pay close attention to the time of death and the time of the phone call. When you get the time of death, let me know. Yeah. Right. I got you. Okay. But, listen—find out exactly how long she listened to the tape. Okay. Right. Thanks.”