There were excellent close-ups of the skull, rib cage, pelvis, and all four limbs. In the grave. Beside the grave, lying on plastic.

Sixty-two pictures. Not a single tight shot of the hands or feet.

I sat back, dismayed.

Had I failed to recover key bones? I’m always painstakingly careful when working a scene. Some call me anal. But I had to admit to the possibility. It was hot in the tent. Cramped. Lighting was poor.

Then why the full count on the inventory sheet?

Had I lost the phalanges here at the lab? I’d been tired on Saturday. Awash in self-pity. Pinky phalanges are tiny little buggers. Had I rinsed them down a drain while cleaning my hands? Carried them off on a hem or cuff? Crushed them under a heel or gurney wheel?

Did it really matter? The bones were clearly not present. The question was, now what?

Hubert would be miffed if I’d left the phalanges in the grave. A return to Oka would involve additional expense and effort. The tent. The heater. The van. The personnel.

If I’d lost them after recovery, forget miffed. Hubert would be furious.

Bury the camptodactyly? After all, the crooked finger had been a long shot for an ID. The condition wasn’t entered in Villejoin’s chart. Simply tell Hubert my lead had not panned out? That was true. Sort of.

A zillion cells in my brain tossed a flag on the field.

Foul.

Ethics.

Crap.

Knowing it was futile, I tore the autopsy room apart, rifling drawers, emptying cabinets, running my fingers along baseboards and under counter ledges. Finding only detritus I don’t want to describe, I gave up and walked every inch of the corridor, eyes to the tile.

No phalanges.

Hubert would want me to proceed with trauma analysis before reporting to him.

Delay of game.

Crap.

Moving slowly, I covered the bones. Removed my gloves. Washed my hands, carefully cleaning under the nails. Combed my hair. Recombed it into a ponytail.

Unable to stall any longer, I took the elevator up to ten.

The chief coroner was at his desk, jacketless now. His shirt was a coffee-stained pink that clashed badly with his red and green tie. Christmas trees with tiny banners screaming Joyeux Noël!

I tapped my knuckles on the door frame.

Hubert looked up. A cascade of chins disconnected.

“Ah, excellent.”

A pudgy hand flapped me into the office.

Flashback. Perry Schechter. I made a note to inquire about Rose Jurmain. Kill two birds and all.

“Bonnes nouvelles?” Hubert asked.

“Actually, the news isn’t so good.”

Hubert slumped back, pushing the pink polyester to its tensile limit. The hand now flapped at a chair.

I sat.

Brushed lint from the knee of my scrubs.

Inhaled deeply.

“Are you familiar with camptodactyly?” I began.

“No.” Coroners in Quebec are either doctors or lawyers. Hubert was among the latter.

I described the condition, then recapped my conversation with Sylvain Rayner.

“Sounds promising.”

“Except for one thing.”

Hubert waited.

“I don’t have the right little finger phalanges.”

“Why not?”

“Either they weren’t collected or they’ve been misplaced.”

“I don’t understand.”

I explained the tally I’d done on-site. And my fruitless search downstairs.

“Only those three are missing?”

“And the distal phalange from the right third digit.”

“An error in recovery, documentation, or processing. An error that could compromise an identification. And you’re uncertain which.”

“Yes.” I could feel my face flame.

“This is very disappointing.”

I said nothing.

“This is a homicide.”

“Yes.”

“If the woman downstairs is Christelle Villejoin, this case will go very high profile. If a third old woman is dead, this Marilyn Keiser, that profile will go into the startosphere.”

Feeling correction would not be appreciated, I held my tongue.

“Maybe these phantom phalanges were never there. Maybe the killer hacked off this woman’s finger.”

“Why would I record a total of fifty-six?”

“Carelessness?”

“I’ll check the fifth right metacarpal for cut marks.” I didn’t believe I’d find any. I’d have noticed while sorting.

English speakers profane by reference to body functions and parts. Don’t need to elaborate. French Canadians rely on liturgical reference. Ostie: host. Câlice: chalice. Tabarnac and tabarnouche: tabernacle.

“Ostie.” Hubert pooched air through his lips. “What about trauma?”

“I’m still working on that.”

There was a beat of silence.

“Actually, there could be four,” I said.

“Four what?” Hubert looked at me as though I’d been sniffing glue.

“Elderly women murdered in the Montreal area. If Marilyn Keiser has been murdered. And we don’t know that, of course-”

“Who’s the fourth?”

“Rose Jurmain.”

“Who?”

“Last March a female skeleton was found near Sainte-Marguerite. Turned out to be a woman missing two and a half years.”

Hubert shot forward. Rolls large enough to hide squirrels tumbled his torso.

“Of course.” A finger jabbed the air. “Jurmain was a wealthy American. The father had connections. How could I forget? The old man was a pain in my shorts. You and Ryan just transported the bones to Chicago. But that woman wasn’t so old.”

“Fifty-nine.” I explained Rose’s prematurely aged appearance.

“Tabarnac.”

Hubert’s face was now the color of his shirt. I decided to delay querying about my problem with Edward Allen.

“I could cut bone samples from the skeleton downstairs. Submit them for DNA testing.” I knew it was dumb as soon I said it.

“Christelle Villejoin had one relative, a sister, now dead. You tell me she never had surgery, so we won’t get lucky with hospital-stored gallstones or tissue samples. It’s been two and a half years. The house has undoubtedly been cleaned of toothbrushes, combs, tissues, chewing gum. To what would we compare this DNA?”

“I thought there was family in the Beauce. Have attempts been made to locate those relatives?”

Hubert didn’t bother to answer. Then I remembered. Ryan said that had been done. But done well? I made a note to ask him to double-check.

“Marilyn Keiser has offspring somewhere out west,” I said. “We could at least establish that the skeleton is or is not hers.”

“And if it’s not we’re still up shit creek.”

“We could exhume Anne-Isabelle.”

“Cremated.” Hubert packed an encyclopedia of disdain into one little word.

“I’m happy to go back out to Oka.”

Now the hand flapped at me.

The small office filled with tense silence.

What the hell? I was already on Hubert’s list.

“This may not be the time, but I’d like to discuss an issue arising from the Jurmain case.”

Hubert’s stare was beyond stony and out the back door. Ignoring it, I began to explain my dilemma concerning Edward Allen’s informant.

The phone chose precisely that moment to ring.

Hubert answered, listened, the scowl never leaving his face. Then, palming the mouthpiece, he spoke to me.

“I want your trauma report as quickly as possible.”

A not so subtle kiss-off.