Bones to Ashes (37 page)

While Laurette was alive, Évangéline lived at home and worked days for David’s father, Hilaire Bastarache. Upon her mother’s death, she assumed the position of resident housekeeper.

At that time Pierre Malo, Hilaire’s illegitimate son, was also living in the Bastarache house. Malo pressed Évangéline into posing for him, threatening her with loss of her job. David Bastarache had fallen in love with Évangéline. Appalled by his half-brother’s activities, he vowed to sack and boot Malo as soon as control fell to him, as Hilaire had told him it would.

Though I’d gained some insight into Bastarache’s character, the man still mystified me.

“Explain it to me, Hippo. How could such thinking exist today?”

Hippo chewed as he gave my question thought.

“Every Acadian kid grows up on tales of ancestors being hunted down and deported. Le Grand Dérangement still haunts us as a people. And it’s not just ancient history. Acadians see their culture as constantly threatened by a hostile, Anglo-dominated world.”

I let him go on.

“How do you keep alive your customs and language while your kids are watching
Seinfeld
and listening to the Stones? While their city cousins can barely
parler
a few words of French?”

I took the questions as rhetorical, and didn’t answer.

“We Acadians have learned to hold on to our identity no matter what life throws at us. How? Partly through sheer obstinacy. Partly by making everything larger than life. Our music. Our food. Our festivals. Even our fears.”

“But it’s not the 1800s,” I said. “Or even the 1960s. How can Bastarache distrust hospitals and government that much?”

“Bastarache is Acadian by nature. He also operates businesses that run close to the line. On top of all that, he’s got personal baggage. Vile father. Deviate brother. Mother shot. Homeschooled.” Hippo shrugged. “The guy seems to genuinely love your pal. Didn’t want her harmed. Did what he thought was best to protect her.”

Malo had been right about one thing. Obéline and Bastarache were living in the dark ages with regard to their attitude toward Évangéline’s disease. Like the nursing nuns of a century before, Obéline had sacrificed for leprosy, committing to a loveless marriage in order to care for her sister. Bastarache had been complicit in hiding Évangéline away.

“Obéline lied about seeing Évangéline murdered,” I said. “To throw me off. She also let everyone believe Bastarache was responsible for the broken arm and the fire.”

“He wasn’t?” Hippo was thumbnailing something from a molar.

I shook my head. “Because of the leprosy, Évangéline had little feeling in her hands and feet. Obéline cracked her ulna attempting to stop Évangéline from falling downstairs. It was also Évangéline who accidentally set the house on fire.

“She also lied about the poetry book. Obéline had it published as a birthday gift for Évangéline. Anonymously, since no one was to know her sister was alive.”

Having achieved success with the molar, Hippo was cream-cheesing a second bagel. I continued talking.

“The great tragedy is that Évangéline could have led a relatively normal life. Multidrug therapies are readily available and patients usually show improvement in two to three months. Fewer than one tenth of one percent of those treated fail to be cured.”

“There still much leprosy around?”

I’d done some research on that.

“The global registered prevalence of leprosy at the beginning of 2006 was almost two hundred and twenty thousand cases. And it’s not just Africa and Southeast Asia. Thirty-two thousand of those cases are right here in the Americas. Over six thousand in the United States. Two hundred to two hundred and fifty new cases are diagnosed each year.”

“I’ll be damned.”

“Bastarache and Obéline did for Évangéline exactly what had been done for her mother, never realizing the enormity of the mistake.”

“One thing I don’t get. Bastarache hated Malo. Why stash her with him?”

“Évangéline had only been at Malo’s house a short time. When Harry and I dropped in on Obéline, Bastarache freaked. Figured if we found the house in Tracadie there was a possibility we could also find the one on Île d’Orléans. When Ryan and I actually did show up there, he panicked and raced back to move her again.”

My eyes drifted to the row of neatly labeled boxes. Geneviève Doucet, left to mummify in her bed by poor deranged Théodore. Anne Girardin, killed by her father.

I thought of others. Ryan’s MP number two, Claudine Cloquet, sold to Malo by her father. Évangéline, locked away by her would-be husband and her sister, though undoubtedly with her own consent.

“You know, Hippo, the bogeyman’s not always hanging out in the school yard or at the bus depot. He can be the guy in your parlor hogging the remote.”

Hippo stared at me as though I’d spoken Swahili.

“Someone right there in your own family. That’s often where the threat is.”

“Yeah,” Hippo said softly.

My eyes settled on the name now attached to the girl from Lac des Deux Montagnes. Maude Waters. Maude had also had movie star dreams. Was dead at sixteen.

My thoughts veered to Malo. He’d claimed no knowledge of Phoebe Quincy. Again, his employee had told a different tale. Sardou stated that he’d seen Phoebe at the house on Rustique. But only briefly.

Phoebe remained missing.

Ryan’s DOA number two, the girl from the Dorval shoreline, remained unidentified.

Symbolic, I thought, of the many children who are murdered each year, or those who simply vanish, never to be found.

“Back to the streets,” Hippo said, pushing to his feet.

I rose, too. “You did a crack job on these cases, Hippo.”

“Got two more to close.”

“Do you think Phoebe Quincy has been piped into some underground pornography pipeline?”

“I prefer to think she’s alive, but, one way or another, I won’t quit looking until I know. Every day I’ll come to work and every day I’ll keep searching for these kids.”

I managed a smile. “I bet you will, Hippo. I bet you will.”

Hippo’s eyes bore into mine. “Sooner or later I will have answers.”

Friday morning, I boarded a flight to Moncton, rented a car, and drove to Tracadie. This time Bastarache answered the door.

“How is she?” I asked.

Bastarche did a “so-so” waggle of one hand.

“Is she taking her meds?”

“Obéline’s giving her no choice.”

Bastarache led me to the room at the back of the house, excused himself, and withdrew. I thought about him as he walked away. Strip clubs, cat houses, and adultery, but the guy drew the line at child pornography. And loved Évangéline. Go figure human nature.

Évangéline sat in an armchair gazing out at the water.

Crossing to her, I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and drew her close. She resisted at first, then relaxed against me.

I held my old friend as tight as I dared for as long as I dared. Then I released her and looked into her eyes.

“Évangéline, I—”

“Do not speak, Tempe. There is no need. We have met. We have touched. You have read my poems. It is enough. Don’t despair for me. We are all creatures of God, and I am at peace. You have given me a great gift, my dear, dear friend. You have reopened my childhood. Sit with me awhile and then return to your life. I will keep you always in my heart.”

Smiling, I drew graham crackers, peanut butter, and a plastic knife from my purse and laid them on the table. Added two Cokes in six-ounce glass bottles. Then I drew a chair close.

“You can’t really visit Green Gables,” I said.

I owe massive thanks to Andrea and Cléola Léger, without whom this story might never have been written. Andrea and Cléola introduced me to the warm, generous, and effervescent world of the Acadian people.
Merci. Merci. Mille mercis.

I am enormously indebted to all those who welcomed me during my stay in New Brunswick. This list includes, but is hardly limited to, Claude Williams, MLA, Maurice Cormier, Jean-Paul and Dorice Bourque, Estelle Boudreau, Maria Doiron, Laurie Gallant, Aldie and Doris LeBlanc, Paula LeBlanc, Bernadette Léger, Gerard Léger, Normand and Pauline Léger, Darrell and Lynn Marchand, Fernand and Lisa Gaudet, Constable Kevin Demeau (RCMP), George and Jeannie Gaggio, and Joan MacKenzie of Beaverbrook House. Special thanks go to those in Tracadie, especially Claude Landry, MLA, Père Zoël Saulnier, and Raynald Basque and the staff at Cojak Productions. Soeur Dorina Frigault and Soeur Zelica Daigle, RHSJ (Les Hospitalières de Saint-Joseph), generously opened their archives and provided a tour of the museum and cemetery at the former site of the lazaretto.

Robert A. Leonard, PhD, professor of linguistics and director of the Forensic Linguistics Project, Hofstra University, interrupted his busy schedule to provide guidance on forensic linguistics. (You were really a founding member of Sha Na Na? Yes, Kathy. No way. Yes, Kathy. Awesome!)

Ron Harrison, Service de police de la Ville de Montréal, provided information on guns, sirens, and a variety of cop stuff.

Normand Proulx,
Directeur général,
Sûreté du Québec, and
l’inspecteur-chef
Gilles Martin,
adjoint au Directeur général, adjoint à la Grande fonction des enquêtes criminelles,
Sûreté du Québec, provided statistics on homicides and information on cold case investigations in Quebec.

Mike Warns, design engineer, ISR, Inc., fielded endless questions and coached me on techie stuff. A true Renaissance man, Mike is also largely responsible for the poetry.

Dr. William C. Rodriguez, Office of the Armed Forces Medical Examiner, and Dr. Peter Dean, HM Coroner for Greater Suffolk and South East Essex, helped with details of skeletal and soft tissue pathology.

Paul Reichs provided valuable input on the manuscript.

Nan Graham and my Scribner family made the book a lot better than it might otherwise have been. Ditto for Susan Sandon and everyone at Random House UK.

Jennifer Rudolph-Walsh supplied countless intangibles and the usual unflagging support.

A useful resource was
Children of Lazarus: the story of the lazaretto at Tracadie
by M. J. Losier and C. Pinet, Les Éditions Faye, 1999.