went into the living room, where John-Joe told Tommy about his tryst with Chantal and waking up to find her dead.
At the end, Tommy said bluntly, “Looks kind of stacked against you, doesn’t it? Any idea who could’ve killed her?”
“Nope,” came the quick response.
“But we have leads,” I added and told Tommy about the disappearing snowshoer, the lost-then-found orange baseball cap, the overly clean room with the missing bottle of scotch, our suspicions that John-Joe was being framed, and a possible biker boyfriend.
“Good,” Tommy said. “I will pass this information on to the police.”
“Can we trust them to do anything with it?” I immediately asked.
“Chief Decontie, yes. He will keep the SQ honest.”
“I thought this investigation was outside his mandate?”
“Because the murder happened on band lands and a band member is a suspect, the provincial police are required to include the First Nations police. And I will make sure it happens.”
“Best news I’ve heard all day.” I hadn’t fancied being the only one searching for the real murderer.
Tommy called the Somerset Police Station to inform them he was bringing in the suspect, while John-Joe changed back into his still-damp clothes. Dry warmth might be nice, but he figured his warrior image would be destroyed if he appeared in pale pink sweats.
Relaxed and more confident now that his future looked surer, John-Joe flashed a last pearly smile as they headed down the drive in Tommy’s familiar old Honda Civic.
I turned back inside, debating whether to call Eric and inform him of what had transpired, but I immediately nixed it at the thought of that woman on the other end of the phone. Petty or not, I’d leave it up to Tommy to keep the Migiskan band chief up to date.
fourteen
Next morning, I dialed the Somerset phone number John Joe had given me for Pierre. I figured I would have enough time before my promised afternoon visit with Yvette to drive into town and talk to Pierre about Chantal and her friends, in particular this yuppie biker.
However, rather than Pierre’s resonant male voice, I heard a high-pitched female voice speaking a guttural French. The recorded words were spewed out so quickly, I only managed to discern that her name was Thérèse, and she wasn’t at home. I assumed the rest told me to leave a message. I dialed the number twice more. Each time this female recording answered. Either I’d copied the number down incorrectly, or John-Joe had given me the wrong number.
The Somerset phone book had two entries for “Pierre Fournier” and one for “P. Fournier”. None of the numbers came close to the one John-Joe had given me. I called them anyway but failed to reach the man I was looking for. I even checked the remaining Fourniers in the phone book in case Pierre was not his official name, and came up empty again.
On the off chance that Pierre lived with this Thérèse, I left a message for him to call me. If he didn’t return my call, I would find myself forced to consider the possibility that John Joe had intentionally given me a false number. And if he’d done that, what else had he lied about?
As I grappled with the prospect of John-Joe’s lying, Yvette called, sounding very upset. She wanted to know if I could visit her now, instead of later that afternoon. She had something to tell me that she thought might be important. It might have something to do with Chantal’s murder.
I sped along the main road towards the Gagnon farm as fast as my pickup would take me on the partially plowed gravel surface and wondered if Yvette’s information was related to her accident. Although she would have been lying unconscious several kilometres away when it happened, she might have seen something or someone before her fall. Perhaps the news of Chantal’s sudden death had finally rekindled her memory. Whatever it was, I hoped it would be something that could help clear John-Joe and not, as I was beginning to fear, be something that might condemn him.
I hurried between the ridges of plowed snow, through a forest cowering under its winter load. Partway there, I almost collided with a skidoo that suddenly launched over a snow bank onto the road. The driver, masked by his helmet, ignored my angry honks and zipped across the road and up and over the opposite bank. He disappeared into the woods, leaving me fuming at the arrogant stupidity of skidooers.
Worried others were coming behind him, I scanned the clearing from where he’d emerged, but the expanse of white was as empty as the vacant barns that occupied it. This farm was another remnant of the area’s settler past. Although the main house had long since disintegrated into a heap of broken logs and rusted metal roofing, the two timber barns had survived the many years of abandonment relatively intact. Once or twice I’d seen lights when driving past, which made me wonder if they, like my own deserted shack, had become a hideout for kids.
I continued on my journey to the Gagnon farm, where my truck almost had another collision. A large fuel truck coming out of the Gagnon’s narrow lane failed to stop, either because the driver hadn’t seen me or because he figured he was bigger. Either way, I was forced to slide to a stop, missing his front bumper by inches. Shouting unladylike insults, I backed up to allow it to pass, then continued driving up the lane to the farmhouse.
Half expecting to see Yves’s Mercedes parked in front, I felt a twinge of disappointment when I didn’t. But Papa Gagnon didn’t disappoint me. He careened around the side of the clapboard house on his snowmobile and jerked it to a stop with such abruptness that I thought he was the snowmobiler who’d cut me off. His lack of helmet, however, told me otherwise.
“Allez-vous-en!” he shouted with his usual snarl. “Go. No come back.”
“Sorry, monsieur. Yvette has invited me,” I replied sweetly and tripped up the verandah stairs to the front door. Although his daughter lived under his roof, she had more right to determine her visitors than he. Behind me, the old man continued to curse in unintelligible joual.
Before I finished knocking, the door sprang open and a stranger faced me. Except she wasn’t really a stranger. I could see the strong Gagnon family resemblance. In fact, she reminded me most of Yves with her slender height and almond-shaped eyes. As for her hair colour, I couldn’t tell. It was hidden by a nun’s starched white wimple.
“Bonjour. You are Madame Harris, non?” she said with a strong French accent in a surprisingly deep voice and invited me in with Yves’s smile.
“I am the sister of Yvette,” she said, before I had a chance to ask. “I am called Soeur Yvonne, or how you say in English, Sister Yvonne.”
Amazed at this family’s penchant for privacy, I asked, “How many more are there of you?”
“Excusez?”
“I mean, does Yvette have other siblings I don’t know about?”
“Malheureusement,” she replied sadly, fingering the large silver cross dangling from a thick silver chain around her neck. “Our heavenly Father did not bless my mother with many children. We are not a big Québécois family. Only Yvette, me, and of course my twin brother, Yves.”
Although it explained her strong likeness to Yves, I still found myself shaking my head at why neither Yvette nor
