Death Du Jour (49 page)

I was about to respond when I heard the snarling and yapping of dogs. The sound was coming from deep inside the lodge.

I yanked desperately, but the ropes only tightened. My breathing turned to frenzied gasping. It was reflex, unthinking struggle.

I couldn’t do it! I couldn’t get free! And what if I did? I was there among them.

“Please,” I begged.

Elle stared, her eyes unfeeling.

A sob escaped me as the barking grew louder. I continued to thrash. I would not submit passively, however hopeless my resistance.

What had the others done? I saw the torn flesh and punctured skulls. The barking turned to growls. The dogs were very near. Fear beyond control overcame me.

I twisted to see and my eyes swept across the bay window. My heart froze. Had I seen figures moving outside?

Don’t draw attention to the window!

I dropped my gaze and rotated back to Elle, still straining, but my thoughts now on the outside. Was there still hope of rescue?

Elle watched me wordlessly. One second passed. Two. Five. I spun myself to the right and stole another peek.

Through the ice and condensation I saw a shadow slide from left to right.

Distract her!

I pivoted back and fixed my eyes on Elle. The window was to her left.

The barking grew louder. Closer.

Say anything!

“Harry doesn’t believe in—”

The door burst inward, then I heard deep voices.

“Police!”

Boots chocked on hardwood.

“
Haut les mains!
” Hands up!

Snarling and yelping. Shouts. A scream.

Elle’s mouth turned to an oval, then to a thin, dark line. She drew a gun from the folds of her dress and aimed it at something behind me.

The instant her eyes left me I wrapped my fingers around the ropes, threw my hips forward, kicked out with my feet, and arched toward her. Pain screamed through my shoulders and wrists as my body swung out, my arms in full extension. I flexed my hips and brought my boots up, hitting her arm with the full force of my weight. The gun flew across the room and out of my field of vision.

My feet slammed to the floor and I scrabbled backward to relieve the pressure on my upper limbs. When I looked up, Elle stood frozen, an SQ muzzle trained on her chest. One dark braid had fallen and looped her forehead like a brocade sash.

I felt hands on my back and heard voices speak to me. Then I was free and strong arms half dragged, half carried me to a couch. I smelled wintry air and wet wool. English Leather.

“
Calmez-vous, madame. Tout va bien.
”

My arms were lead, my knees were jelly. I wanted to sink back and sleep forever but I struggled to stand.

“
Ma soeur!
I have to find my sister!”

“
Tout est bien, madame.
” Hands pressed me back into the cushions.

More boots. Doors. Shouted commands. I saw Elle and Daniel Jeannotte handcuffed and led away.

“Where’s Ryan? Do you know Andrew Ryan?”

“Take it easy, you’re going to be fine.” English.

I tried to pry myself loose.

“Is Ryan all right?”

“Relax.”

Then Harry was beside me, eyes enormous in the dreamlike gloom.

“I’m scared,” she murmured in a thick, slurry voice.

“It’s O.K.” I wrapped my deadened arms around her. “I’m taking you home.”

Her head dropped onto my shoulder, and I rested mine against it. I held her a moment, then released her. Summoning up memories of religious education from my childhood, I closed my eyes, clasped my hands in front of my chest, and wept quietly as I prayed to God for the life of Andrew Ryan.

O
NE WEEK LATER
I
WAS SITTING ON MY PATIO IN
Charlotte, thirty-six exam booklets stacked to my right, the thirty-seventh on a lap table in front of me. The sky was Carolina blue, the yard a deep, rich green. In the adjacent magnolia, a mockingbird strove for a personal best.

“Brilliantly average job,” I said, marking a C+ on the blue cover and circling it several times. Birdie looked up, stretched, and slithered from the chaise.

My knee was healing well. The small hairline fracture in my left patella had been nothing compared with the injuries to my psyche. After the terror in Ange Gardien I’d spent two days in Quebec, recoiling at every sound and every shadow, barking dogs in particular. Then I returned to Charlotte to hobble through the remainder of the semester. I filled the days with relentless activity, but the nights were difficult. In the dark my mind loosened, releasing visions the daytime had locked away. Some nights I slept with the lamp on.

The phone rang and I reached for the handset. It was the call I’d been expecting.

“
Bonjour,
Dr
.
Brennan.
Comment ça va
?”

“
Ça va bien,
Sister Julienne. More important, how is Anna?”

“I think the medication is helping.” Her voice went low. “I don’t know anything about bipolar disorder, but the doctor gave me a great deal of material and I am learning. I had never understood her depression. I thought Anna was moody because that’s what her mother said. Sometimes she’d be down, then suddenly she’d be full of energy and feeling good about herself. I didn’t know that was, what is it called . . . ?”

“A manic phase?”

“
C’est ça.
She seemed to go up and down so quickly.”

“I’m so glad she’s better.”

“Yes, God be praised. Professor Jeannotte’s death hit her hard. Please, Dr. Brennan, for Anna’s sake, I must know what went on with that woman.”

I took a deep breath. What to say?

“Professor Jeannotte’s troubles stemmed from her love for her brother. Daniel Jeannotte spent his life organizing one cult group after another. Daisy believed he was well intentioned and wrongly scorned by mainstream society. Her career in American academia was compromised following complaints to her university by parents of students she had steered to Daniel’s conferences and workshops. She took a leave from teaching to do research and write, and resurfaced in Canada. For years she continued to be supportive of her brother.

“When Daniel hooked up with Elle, Daisy began to lose confidence. She thought Elle was a psychopath, and a struggle developed between the two women for Daniel’s allegiance. Daisy wanted to protect her brother, but was afraid of something catastrophic.

“Jeannotte knew that Daniel and Elle’s group was active on campus, though the university had tried to drive them off. So when Anna had her encounter with them, Daisy wanted to monitor them through Anna.

“Daisy was never a recruiter for the group. She learned that cult members had infiltrated the counseling center, looking for students to befriend. My sister was recruited that way at a community college in Texas. This agitated Daisy all the more because she feared being blamed because of the episode in her past.”

“Who is this Elle?”

“Her real name is Sylvie Boudrais. What we know is patchy. She’s forty-four, born in Baie Comeau of an Inuit mother and québécois father. Her mother died when she was fourteen, her father was an alcoholic. The old man beat her regularly and forced her into prostitution when she was fourteen. Sylvie never finished high school, but she tests in the stratosphere for IQ.

“Boudrais disappeared after dropping out of school, then showed up in Quebec City sometime in the mid-seventies offering psychic healing for a moderate fee. She acquired a small following, and eventually became the leader of a group that took up residence in a hunting lodge near Ste-Anne-de-Beaupré. There was constant money pressure, and problems developed because of underaged members. A fourteen-year-old turned up pregnant, and the parents went to the authorities.

“The group disbanded and Boudrais moved on. She did a brief stint with a sect called the Celestial Pathway in Montreal, but left. Like Daniel Jeannotte, she wandered from group to group, turning up in Belgium around 1980, where she preached a combination of shamanism and New Age spiritualism. She established a band of followers, including a very wealthy man named Jacques Guillion.

“Boudrais had met Guillion early through the Celestial Pathway, and saw him as the answer to a group’s cash flow problems. Guillion fell under her
spell, and was eventually persuaded to sell his properties and turn over his assets.”

“No one objected?”

“The taxes were paid and Guillion had no family, so no questions arose.”

“
Mon Dieu.
”

“In the mid-eighties the group left Belgium for the U.S. They established a commune in Fort Bend County, Texas, and Guillion shuttled back and forth to Europe for several years, probably transferring money. He last entered the U.S. two years ago.”

“What happened to him?” Her voice was small and tremulous.

“The police think he’s buried somewhere on the ranch.”

I heard the swish of fabric.

“Jeannotte’s brother met Boudrais in Texas and was captivated. By then she was calling herself Elle. That’s also where Dom Owens came into the picture.”

“He is the man from South Carolina?”

“Yes. Owens was a small-time dabbler in mysticism and organic healing. He visited the Fort Bend ranch and was infatuated with Elle. He invited her to the South Carolina compound on Saint Helena, and she seized control of his group.”

“But it all sounds so harmless. Herbs and spells and holistic medicine. How did it come to violence and death?”

How does one explain madness? I didn’t want to discuss the psychiatric evaluation lying on my desk, or the rambling suicide notes found at Ange Gardien.

“Boudrais read extensively, especially philosophy and ecology. She was convinced the earth would be
destroyed, and before that happened she would take her followers away. She believed herself to be the guardian angel of those devoted to her, and the lodge at Ange Gardien was the jumping-off point.”

There was a long pause. Then,

“Did they really believe it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think Elle was willing to trust entirely to the power of her oratory. She relied in part on drugs.”

Another pause.

“Do you think they believed enough to be willing to die?”

I thought of Kathryn. And Harry.

“Not all of them.”

“It is mortal sin to orchestrate the loss of life, or even to hold another living soul as a captive.”

A perfect bridge.

“Sister, did you read the information I sent regarding Élisabeth Nicolet?”

The pause at her end was longer. It ended with a deep sigh.

“Yes.”

“I’ve done a lot of research on Abo Gabassa. He was a well-respected philosopher and public speaker, known all over Europe, Africa, and North America for his efforts to end the slave trade.”

“I understand that.”

“He and Eugénie Nicolet sailed for France on the same ship. Eugénie returned to Canada with an infant daughter.” I took a breath. “The bones don’t lie, Sister Julienne. And they are not judgmental. From the moment I looked at Élisabeth’s skull, I knew she was a person of mixed race.”

“That doesn’t mean she was a prisoner.”

“No, it does not.”

Another pause. Then she spoke slowly.

“I agree that an illegitimate child would not have been well received in the Nicolet circle. And in those days a mixed-race black baby might have been impossible. Perhaps Eugénie viewed the convent as the most humane solution.”

“Perhaps. Élisabeth may not have chosen her own fate, but that doesn’t diminish her contribution. According to all accounts, her work during the smallpox epidemic was heroic. Thousands may have been spared by her efforts.

“Sister, are there any saints from North America whose bloodlines included Native American, African, or Asian ancestry?”

“Why, I’m not sure.” I heard something new in her voice.

“What an extraordinary role model Élisabeth could be to people of faith who suffer prejudices because they were not born Caucasian.”

“Yes. Yes, I must speak to Father Ménard.”

“May I ask you a question, Sister?”

“
Bien sûr.
”

“Élisabeth appeared to me in a dream and spoke a line I cannot place. When I asked who she was she said, ‘All in robe of darkest grain.’”

“‘Come pensive nun devout and pure; Sober steadfast and demure; All in robe of darkest grain; Flowing with majestic train.’ John Milton’s
Il Penseroso.
”

“The brain is an amazing archive,” I said, laughing. “It’s been years since I read that.”

“Would you like to hear my favorite?”

“Of course.”

It was a lovely thought.

*   *   *

When we hung up I looked at my watch. Time to go.

During the drive I turned the radio on and off, tried to identify a rattle in the dashboard, and just drummed my fingers.

The traffic signal at Woodlawn and the Billy Graham Parkway took a lifetime.

This was your idea, Brennan.

Right. But does that make it a good one?

I arrived at the airport and went directly to baggage claim.

Ryan was draping a garment bag over his left shoulder. His right arm was in a sling and he moved with an uncharacteristic stiffness. But he looked good. Very good.