“This whole Internet angle may be a dead end,” Slidell said.

“Or she may have met someone in that chat room.”

“It’s a site for people whining about cramps.”

Seriously? “Gee. You think some of those whiners could be adolescent girls?”

“You’re saying our target visits this chat room hoping to hook up with kids? Maybe pretends to be a doctor or something?”

“A doctor, a teacher, another kid having difficult periods. People lie on the Internet.”

“No shit.”

“No shit. Have Pastori stay on it. If someone walked Leal through the process of wiping her browser history, it was for a reason.”

Slidell gave a long dramatic sigh. But he didn’t disagree.

“And talk to the mother. See if she has suggestions about passwords or IDs Leal might have used. Find out how much freedom she allowed Shelly online. And ask why her daughter was interested in dysmenorrhea.”

“Eeyuh.”

“Maybe revisit Leal’s bedroom? See what she was reading. What dolls or animals she had. Anyway, get what you can for Pastori.”

“You know the guy is an Olympic-class gasbag. Runs on and on, I’m guessing to fluff his geeky little ego. Every time I call him, it’s half my day.”

I imagined the exchanges between Slidell and Pastori. My sympathies were definitely with the latter. “Is the media still clamoring?”

“Some asshole videoed us working Leal’s body at the underpass, can you believe that? Wanted their fifteen fucking minutes of fame.”

I changed the subject. “What about the age progression on Anique Pomerleau?”

“Yeah. I got that.”

“Did you plan to tell me?”

“I am telling you.”

“How does it look?”

“Like she got older.”

“Send it to my iPhone. Please.”

I briefed Slidell about events on my end. The unsatisfying interviews. My subliminal breakthrough after studying the dossiers from 2004 and talking with Sabine Pomerleau. The property in Vermont.

“Not bad, Doc.”

“If she did use the Corneau home as a hidey-hole, she’s long gone now.”

“When will you toss the place?”

“When Rodas gives the word.”

“He ask for a warrant?”

I hadn’t thought of that. “Gotta go.” I disconnected.

9:46.

I cleaned the coffee off the kitchen tile, then unpacked the carry-on I’d brought from Charlotte. Took a shower and dried my hair. Dressed in jeans, wool socks, and a sweater.

10:38.

I checked my phone, hoping a text had landed while I was engaged in toilette. Nope.

I paced, too wired to sit still. Why such angst? I felt what? Stunned that I’d been right? Maybe right. Thrilled that we might have found the spot Pomerleau first went to ground? Might have. Outraged that Rodas and Ryan had sidelined me? Definitely.

The phone finally rang at ten past eleven. Area code 802.

“Brennan.” Cool as snow in Vermont.

“Ryan’s on his way to pick you up.”

“Is he.”

“You need to get down here. Fast.”

CHAPTER 21

THE SNOW STARTED as we crossed the Champlain Bridge. Turned to sleet as we hit Stanstead, just north of the border.

I watched the wipers chase fat flabby flakes, later slush, from the windshield. Now and then a wind-tossed leaf hit the glass and was whipped free, brittle and shiny with moisture.

The car’s interior smelled of wet leather and wool. Stale cigarette smoke.

“Look for the Passumpsic Cemetery.”

The first words Ryan had spoken in almost two hours. I was good with it. After he’d relayed what he knew, which was virtually nothing, we’d both burrowed deep into our own thoughts.

Occasionally, I’d check my iPhone. An email with an attachment arrived from Slidell just past noon. I downloaded and enlarged the image.

You’ve seen pictures of Charles Manson. No matter what his age is, his eyes send a frigid wind knifing straight through your soul. His hair may be shaggy or shaved, his cheeks full or gaunt. You feel like you’re gazing straight into the heart of evil.

That’s how it was with Pomerleau. She was in her teens when the sole existing photo was taken. Now she would be thirty-nine.

The computer had softened the jawline, drooped the lids, and broadened the lips and facial contours, transforming the child face into that of a woman. Still the eyes looked stony cold, reptilian, and unfeeling.

As they had on our last encounter. When she’d doused me with accelerant, then coolly lit a match.

I did as Ryan asked. We’d just passed through St. Johnsbury, were now seeing mostly farm fields, trees, a few clusters of homes.

“There.” I pointed to the cemetery. It was old, with headstones and pillars, rather than ground-level plaques for the convenience of mowers. A perfect Poe tableau in the wintry gloom.

Maybe a quarter mile more, then Ryan slowed, signaled, and made a left from Highway 5 onto Bridge Street. We passed a church, a general store and post office combo, a gray building with an old red auto seat on the porch and a red plastic kayak affixed to the top of the front overhang. Passumpsic was written in white on the kayak’s side. A wooden sign above the door identified the Passumpsic River Outfitter, LLC.

Just beyond the outfitter was a bridge, a narrow latticework of metal girders and wooden beams painted green. Not the covered New Englander I’d envisioned. The Passumpsic River looked dark and menacing as we crossed over. On one bank, an ancient brick power station.

Soon the road’s name changed to Hale. Forest took over on both sides. Lofty pine, less lofty spruce. Hardwoods, their branches nude, their bark black and sparkly wet.

Then there were no homes, no barns. Just the Hundred Acre Wood.

Seven minutes of silence, I kept checking my watch. Then Ryan made a right beside a battered post that at one time may have held a mailbox. A sign nailed to a tree said ORNE in letters sun-bleached to the color of old denim. Below the truncated name, an equally faded fleur-de-lis.

The track was little more than an absence of trees and two ruts undecided between mud and ice. As the Jeep bounced and swayed, I braced myself with palms to the dash. My fillings were loosening when Ryan finally braked to a stop.

Across a clearing, maybe ten yards distant, sat a small frame house that had seen better days. Single-story, once probably yellow with white trim. But, as with the mailbox, the paint was long gone.

The front door, accessed by one concrete step, was propped open with a rock. The windows visible on the front and right were boarded on the inside with plywood. To the left, up a slight rise and nestled under a stand of tall pines, stood three sheds, one large, two small. Dirt paths connected the trio to one another and to the house.

Parked in front of the house was a Hardwick PD cruiser. I assumed it belonged to Umpie Rodas. Beside the cruiser was a crime scene truck. Beside the truck was a black van with double doors in back. My gut told me the vehicle had ties to a morgue.

“Tabernac!”

I swiveled toward Ryan, ready to be livid for what he’d held back. He looked as surprised as I felt.

“What’s the deal?” I asked.

“Damned if I know.”

“Rodas didn’t tell you?”

“He just said they’d found something we needed to see. Sounded distracted.”

“No doubt. He was busy making a whole lot of calls.”

I raised the hood of my parka to cover my head. Pulled on gloves. Got out and started toward the house. The wind was gusting hard, blasting sleet at my face like fiery little pellets. My mind was racing, running possibilities. Senseless. I’d know in seconds. Behind me, Ryan’s boots made swishing sounds in the slippery leaves and grass. Mimicking my own.

A uniformed cop stood inside the front door, thumbs hooked in a belt half hidden by a substantial roll of fat. His hat and jacket bore insignia patches saying Hardwick PD.