Historic burials. Every forensic anthropologist handles these cases. Old bones unearthed by dogs, construction workers, spring floods, grave diggers. The coroner?s office is the overseer of death in Quebec Province. If you die inappropriately, not under the care of a physician, not in bed, the coroner wants to know why. If your death threatens to take others along, the coroner wants to know that. The coroner demands an explanation of violent, unexpected, or untimely death, but persons long gone are of little interest. While their passings may once have cried out for justice, or heralded warning of an impending epidemic, the voices have been still for too long. Their antiquity established, these finds are turned over to the archaeologists. This promised to be such a case. Please.
I zigzagged through the logjam of downtown traffic, arriving within fifteen minutes at the address LaManche had given me. Le Grand S #233;minaire. A remnant of the vast holdings of the Catholic Church, Le Grand S #233;minaire occupies a large tract of land in the heart of Montreal. Centre-ville. Downtown. My neighborhood. The small, urban citadel endures as an island of green in a sea of high-rise cement, and stands as mute testimony to a once-powerful institution. Stone walls, complete with watchtowers, surround somber gray castles, carefully tended lawns, and open spaces gone wild.
In the glory days of the church, families sent their sons here by the thousands to train for the priesthood. Some still come, but their numbers are few. The larger buildings are now rented out and house schools and institutions more secular in mission where the Internet and fax machine replace Scripture and theological discourse as the working paradigm. Perhaps it?s a good metaphor for modern society. We?re too absorbed in communicating among ourselves to worry about an almighty architect.
I stopped on a small street opposite the seminary grounds and looked east along Sherbrooke, toward the portion of the property now leased by Le Coll #232;ge de Montr #233;al. Nothing unusual. I dropped an elbow out the window and peered in the opposite direction. The hot, dusty metal seared the skin on my inner arm, and I retracted it quickly, like a crab poked with a stick.
There they were. Juxtaposed incongruously against a medieval stone tower, I could see a blue-and-white patrol unit with POLICE-COMMUNAUT #201; URBAINE DE MONTR #201;AL written on its side. It blocked the western entrance to the compound. A gray Hydro-Quebec truck was parked just ahead of it, ladders and equipment protruding like appendages to a space station. Near the truck a uniformed officer stood talking with two men in work clothes.
I turned left and slid into the westbound traffic on Sherbrooke, relieved to see no reporters. In Montreal an encounter with the press can be a double ordeal, since the media turn out in both French and English. I am not particularly gracious when badgered in one language. Under dual assault I can become downright surly.
LaManche was right. I?d come to these grounds the previous summer. I recalled the case-bones unearthed during the repair of a water main. Church property. Old cemetery. Coffin burials. Call the archaeologist. Case closed. Hopefully, this report would read the same.
As I maneuvered my Mazda ahead of the truck and parked, the three men stopped talking and looked in my direction. When I got out of the car the officer paused, as if thinking it over, then moved toward me. He was not smiling. At 4:15 P.M. it was probably past the end of his shift and he didn?t want to be there. Well, neither did I.
?You?ll have to move on, madame. You may not park here.? As he spoke he gestured with his hand, shooing me in the direction in which I was to depart. I could picture him clearing flies from potato salad with the same movement.
?I?m Dr. Brennan,? I said, slamming the Mazda door. ?Laboratoire de M #233;decine L #233;gale.?
?You?re the one from the coroner?? His tone would have made a KGB interrogator sound trusting.
?Yes. I?m the anthropologiste judiciaire.? Slowly, like a second-grade teacher. ?I do the disinterments and the skeletal cases. I understand this may qualify for both??
I handed him my ID. A small, brass rectangle above his shirt pocket identified him as Const. Groulx.
He looked at the photo, then at me. My appearance was not convincing. I?d planned to work on the skull reconstruction all day, and was dressed for glue. I was wearing faded brown jeans, a denim shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbows, Topsiders, no socks. Most of my hair was bound up in a barrette. The rest, having fought gravity and lost, spiraled limply around my face and down my neck. I was speckled with patches of dried Elmer?s. I must have looked more like a middle-aged mother forced to abandon a wallpaper project than a forensic anthropologist.
He studied the ID for a long time, then returned it without comment. I was obviously not what he wanted.
?Have you seen the remains?? I asked.
?No. I am securing the site.? He used a modified version of the hand flip to indicate the two men who stood watching us, conversation suspended.
?They found it. I called it in. They will lead you.?
I wondered if Constable Groulx was capable of a compound sentence. With another hand gesture, he indicated the workers once again.
?I will watch your car.?
I nodded but he was already turning away. The Hydro workers watched in silence as I approached. Both wore aviator shades, and the late afternoon sun shot orange beams off alternating lenses as one or the other moved his head. Their mustaches looped in identical upside- down U?s around their mouths.
The one on the left was the older of the two, a thin, dark man with the look of a rat terrier. He was glancing around nervously, his gaze bouncing from object to object, person to person, like a bee making sorties in and out of a peony blossom. His eyes kept darting to me, then quickly away, as if he feared contact with other eyes would commit him to something he?d later come to regret. He shifted his weight from foot to foot and hunched and unhunched his shoulders.
His partner was a much larger man with a long, lank ponytail and a weathered face. He smiled as I drew near, displaying gaps that once held teeth. I suspected he?d be the more loquacious of the two.
?Bonjour. Comment #231;a va?? The French equivalent of ?Hi. How are you??
?Bien. Bien.? Simultaneous head nods. Fine. Fine.
I identified myself, asked if they?d reported finding the bones. More nods.
?Tell me about it.? As I spoke I withdrew a small spiral notebook from my backpack, flipped back the cover, and clicked a ballpoint into readiness. I smiled encouragingly.
Ponytail spoke eagerly, his words racing out like children released for recess. He was enjoying the adventure. His French was heavily accented, the words running together and the endings swallowed in the fashion of the upriver Qu #233;becois. I had to listen carefully.
?We were clearing brush, it?s part of our job.? He pointed at overhead power lines, then did a sweep of the ground. ?We must keep the lines clear.?
I nodded.
?When I got down into that trench over there?-he turned and pointed in the direction of a wooded area running the length of the property-?I smelled something funny.? He stopped, his eyes locked in the direction of the trees, arm extended, index finger piercing the air.
?Funny??
He turned back. ?Well, not exactly funny.? He paused, sucking in his lower lip as he searched his personal lexicon for the right word. ?Dead,? he said. ?You know, dead??
I waited for him to go on.
?You know, like an animal that crawls in somewhere and dies?? He gave a slight shrug of the shoulders as he said it, then looked at me for confirmation. I did know. I?m on a first-name basis with the odor of death. I nodded again.