Cruelest Month

Isabelle Lacoste really wanted a coffee. Their home smelled of fresh brew and toasted bagel and a warm fire on this chilly spring morning. She wanted to sit and talk to these welcoming people, warming her hands on a mug. And not go back to the house. And she could, she knew. No one on the homicide team knew she was there. Her purpose was deeply personal, a private little ritual.

‘I need your help,’ she said to Clara, who raised her eyebrows in surprise. And lowered them when she heard what Isabelle Lacoste wanted.

Myrna Landers was humming to herself and grinding coffee to press into her Bodum. Bacon was frying and two brown eggs sat on her wooden kitchen counter, ready to be broken into the frying pan. She didn’t often have more than toast and coffee but every now and then she set her face for a full breakfast. She’d heard someone say once that all the English secretly crave is breakfast three times a day. And for herself she knew it to be true. She could live on a diet of bacon, eggs, croissants, sausages, pancakes and maple syrup, porridge and rich, brown sugar. Fresh-squeezed orange juice and strong coffee. Of course, she’d be dead in a month.

Dead.

Myrna’s spatula hovered over the bacon she’d been prodding. It spat at her hand but she didn’t react. She was back in that dreadful room on that dreadful night. Turning Madeleine over.

‘God, that smells good,’ came a familiar voice from the other end of the loft. Myrna brought herself back and turned to see Clara and another woman standing there, taking off their muddy boots. The other woman was looking around in amazement.

‘C’est magnifique,’ said Lacoste, wide-eyed. Now all she wanted was to sit at the long refectory table, eat bacon and eggs and never leave. She took in the whole room. Exposed wood beams, darkened with age, ran above their heads. The four walls were brick, almost a rose color, with bold, striking abstracts on the walls, broken only by bookcases stuffed full and large mullioned windows. Worn armchairs sat on either side of the wood stove in the center of the room, with a large sofa facing it. The floors were wide-plank honey pine. Two doors led, Lacoste suspected, into a bedroom and a bathroom.

She was at home. Lacoste suddenly wanted to take Clara’s hand. Her home was here. In this loft. But it was also with these women.

‘Bonjour.’ The large, black woman in a caftan was walking toward her, arms outstretched and a smile on her lovely face. ‘C’est Agent Lacoste, n’est-ce pas?’

‘Oui.’ Lacoste gave and received kisses on each cheek. Then Myrna turned and exchanged hugs and kisses with Clara.

‘Come for breakfast? There’s plenty. I can put on more. What is it?’

She could see the strain in Clara’s face.

‘Agent Lacoste needs our help.’

‘What can I do?’ Myrna looked at the young woman, simply and elegantly dressed, like most young Québécoises. Myrna felt like a house next to her. A comfortable and happy home.

Lacoste told her, feeling as though her very words were soiling this wonderful place. When she’d finished Myrna stood very still and closed her eyes, and when she opened them she spoke.

‘Of course we’ll help, child.’

* * *

Ten minutes later, the bacon off the element, the kettle unplugged and Myrna fully dressed, the three women walked slowly through the gently stirring village. A slight mist hung over the pond and clung to the hills.

‘I remember when your neighbor died,’ Lacoste said to Clara, ‘you did a ritual.’

Myrna nodded. She remembered walking through Three Pines with a stick of smoking sage and sweetgrass. It was meant to invite joy back into a place burned by the brutal act of murder. It had worked.

‘An old pagan ritual from a time when pagan meant peasant and peasant meant worker and being a worker was a significant thing,’ said Myrna.

Agent Isabelle Lacoste was silent. She hung her head, looking down at her rubber boots as they squelched into the muddy road. She loved it here. Nowhere else could she walk in the very middle of a road and trust no one would run her down. She could smell the earth and the sweet pine forest on either side of them.

‘Was Madeleine murdered?’ Clara asked. ‘Is that why you want to do this?’

‘Yes, she was.’

Myrna and Clara stopped.

‘I don’t believe it,’ said Myrna.

‘Poor Madeleine,’ said Clara. ‘Poor Hazel. She does so much for others and now this.’

If kind acts could protect us from tragedy, thought Lacoste, the world would be a kinder place. Enlightened self-interest, perhaps, but at least enlightened. Is that what I’m about now? Trying to buy favor? Trying to prove how kind I am to whatever power decides life and death and hands out rewards?

The three women looked once more at their destination, rising over the village. Goddamned Hadley house, thought Clara as they trudged forward. Taken another life.

She hoped it was satisfied, hoped it was full. She was glad she hadn’t had breakfast yet and hoped she didn’t smell of bacon and eggs.