My thoughts meandered to the upcoming weekend. I had a trip to Quebec City in mind, but my plans were vague. I thought of visiting the Plains of Abraham, eating mussels and crepes, and buying trinkets from the street vendors. Escape in tourism. I?d been in Montreal a full year, working as forensic anthropologist for the province, but I hadn?t been up there yet, so it seemed like a good program. I needed a couple of days without skeletons, decomposed bodies, or corpses freshly dragged from the river.

Ideas come easily to me, enacting them comes harder. I usually let things go. Perhaps it?s an escape hatch, my way of allowing myself to double back and ease out the side door on a lot of my schemes. Irresolute about my social life, obsessive in my work.

I knew he was standing there before the knock. Though he moved quietly for a man of his bulk, the smell of old pipe tobacco gave him away. Pierre LaManche had been director of the Laboratoire de M #233;decine L #233;gale for almost two decades. His visits to my office were never social, and I suspected that his news wouldn?t be good. LaManche tapped the door softly with his knuckles.

?Temperance?? It rhymed with France. He would not use the shortened version. Perhaps to his ear it just didn?t translate. Perhaps he?d had a bad experience in Arizona. He, alone, did not call me Tempe.

?Oui?? After months, it was automatic. I had arrived in Montreal thinking myself fluent in French, but I hadn?t counted on Le Fran #231;ais Qu #233;becois. I was learning, but slowly.

?I have just had a call.? He glanced at a pink telephone slip he was holding. Everything about his face was vertical, the lines and folds moving from high to low, paralleling the long, straight nose and ears. The plan was pure basset hound. It was a face that had probably looked old in youth, its arrangement only deepening with time. I couldn?t have guessed his age.