The warden’s secretary took the morning off, giving Émile Cinq-Mars the opportunity to use her office to interview Corrections Officer Isaure Dabrezil. Arriving, the woman’s walk was heavy, augmented by her large steel-toed work boots, although she countermanded that abrasive presence with a full, bright smile upon entering the room. The boots were a choice, not part of any uniform, for as the inmates at Joliette wore street clothes, most guards did too. At a glance, they were indistinguishable. The guards, though, always chose jeans or pants, never skirts or dresses. The Haitian woman held out her hand across the desk and Cinq-Mars returned a gentle smile of his own. He gave her muscular mitt a solid shake.
‘Have a seat. How’s everything going?’ he asked.
‘Good. How goes it with you, Sergeant-Detective Cinq-Mars?’
He did not reply, not being inclined to answer questions, even though his mood this morning was buoyant. He had wanted to interview Isaure Dabrezil in a different room than the one where he sequestered inmates. The interrogation room’s atmosphere felt automatically adversarial, judgmental, and by virtue of her job, the corrections officer deserved differential treatment. He wanted her to feel relaxed, despite an intention to challenge her.
‘I’m glad we could pull you away from your duties, Officer Dabrezil. It took some finagling, as I found out.’
‘Visitors’ Day today. Inmates, we move back and forth. Busy-busy. Not like in a regular girl-jail, these ladies, they have their privileges. They need time to do their make-up, you know, fix their hair. Look tidy. They do it, then at the last minute go look in the mirror again. A big to-do.’
‘Yes, if loved ones are showing up, it must be a big to-do.’
‘A bigger to-do when they don’t show up. Then comes the sadness, you know. Sometimes trouble follows after that. The lashing out. Things have turned that way.’
Cinq-Mars took that in. He spoke thoughtfully. ‘Not hard to see how that could damage an inmate’s morale. In your group, we’ve had a murder. How are your ladies coping in the aftermath? I can’t imagine it’s business as usual.’
‘Oh, on edge, on edge,’ Dabrezil confirmed. ‘Nasty work. I don’t think anyone was so sorry to see Flo go, not deep in their heart, but the way it happened is bad. Under their noses like that, a murder, and by who? Difficult for everybody. Then comes the investigation, you know, everybody questioned, that makes them tense, too. Nobody knows who done it, for sure everybody’s jittery.’
‘Is it difficult for you?’
‘Sorry?’
Corrections Officer Isaure Dabrezil was a thick-shouldered woman, broad through the hips and thighs, with a ponderous bosom. If a female prisoner guard was needed in a tough prison she’d be handpicked first. Cinq-Mars pegged her to be equally capable among rough men. Few would try anything. He had been a breeder and trainer of horses, and within that field was known for feats of natural strength, but he wouldn’t want to tangle with her.
‘The murder occurred under your nose, Officer Dabrezil.’
‘Please, call me Isaure.’
He did so, and said, ‘Keeping the peace is your responsibility. A murder violates the trust the institution has placed in you.’
She crossed her heavy arms, as a way to fortify an implicit barrier between them.
‘Who can be everywhere at once? Tell me that. It’s obvious the killer picked her spot when I was someplace else. Nothing I could do. No one knew it was happening. Even when it was over no one knew. That came later.’
‘We presume so. In any case, tell me about the day’s events. Any clues or suspicions, now would be the time to share.’
The woman sighed and mulled it over. ‘Clues, I have none. Florence was a big rough woman, her. Tough as nails. Do you know why she was inside? Throws acid straight in a person’s face. She looks another woman in the eye then throws acid. That’s a mean one, in her heart, who does something like that. That’s Flo. Not your average alley cat. I think you have to be almost crazy to take on Flo. Almost fearless, I would say. You make a mistake, it goes the other way.’
‘The other way?’
‘Flo would kill you if you tried killing her but failed.’
‘I understand. No one wanted to mess with Florence.’
‘Who would dare? For me, that’s the one question. The bigger women might stand a chance, so that would be Temple, of course, or Malka. Doi is like a housewife, but she’s not small, and we know what she did to her own daughter. She can fool anybody with that way she has, like a little old housewife. Like I said, Temple is strong enough. Also, she comes from a hard background. Malka is big, not necessarily so strong. It’s not like she worked at hard labor in her life. She was a mayor in her town, she’d didn’t mix concrete, you know. Still, big enough. And like I said, Doi. Now, if you’re looking at crazy enough, that would be the kids, Jodi and Courtney. But they’re so small. Hard to imagine. They were with me most of the time anyway. Not all the time. It’s possible it’s them. It’s possible it’s anybody.’
‘What about Abigail?’
‘That’s who the police think, isn’t it? I mean the police who came here first. I don’t see it in her personality, do you? I don’t see her strong enough neither.’
‘That leaves only one woman you haven’t mentioned.’
‘I know. The best to last.’
‘Best?’
‘My best guess. Only a guess. Who knows what goes on in her head. Rozlynn, I’m talking about. She murdered her dad. She could do anything. If I was marking the odds, it’s her. But I don’t know why I say that. I could be dead wrong.’
Cinq-Mars leaned to one side in his chair. The backrest yielded to him. He intertwined his fingers, then separated his hands and with the thumb and forefinger of one outlined his lower lip repeatedly. An attitude of concentration. He looked across at Isaure Dabrezil and kept his gaze on her a while, then asked, ‘How did you get along with the dead woman?’
The officer crossed her thick arms again, erecting that barrier.
‘Me? You mean with Flo? Nobody got along with Flo.’
‘No reason why you should. She was a prisoner. You were her principal guard during the day. Still, you packed her off to solitary a few times. You had those interactions.’
Isaure Dabrezil raised her eyebrows – they jerked upward suddenly, scrunching her brow and seemingly pushing back her hairline, as if she’d suddenly been struck by a bolt of insight as swift and as bright as lightning. ‘You’re thinking of me for this? Because don’t. Just because I do my job that don’t mean nothing. I didn’t have it in for Flo.’
‘She gave you a hard time?’
‘Me and most of the universe, so what? Why would I strangle her with a wire when any day I want I can stick her back in solitary? It’s not hard to get her out of my sight.’
‘Is that why you put her there? To make her disappear?’
‘For her violence, I put her there. What she deserved. For her threats, you know. Refusing to cooperate, to get along, to stay calm. She could be one huge aggravation on a person but I can deal with that. She pissed me off, but I never felt the need to terminate her existence. That’s going too far. That would not be very Christian of me. One thing I am, it’s Christian. I go by that.’
‘Good. We have that in common.’
The remark brought her up short again, only this time her brow unfurled, and her eyes squinted as if she’d lost her light.
‘Why did you put her in solitary, Officer Dabrezil?’
‘Misbehavior.’
‘Specifically, I mean.’
She mentioned that Flo would insult her. Isaure would laugh her off and advise her to mind her tongue. Then the woman would insult her race, and Isaure would demand that she take that back, but Flo would use the foulest language to insult the color of her skin. Isaure deposited her in solitary. Freed, Flo would then compliment her race, as if she’d learned her lesson. ‘Black is so beautiful, it’s gorgeous! You, too, Isaure!’ She’d go on like that and be irritating. Isaure could not put her away for antics like that. Then the next day, she’d insult her island.
‘“You don’t talk to me about Haiti like that,” I’d tell her.’
But she did anyway, her tongue becoming increasingly vicious. ‘Black is beautiful, but Haiti is dog shit piled on—’
Another round of solitary.
‘On we go that way. Then the last time, that was different.’
‘Isaure! Help me wring the neck of this here chicken.’
‘That bird already dead, Flo.’
‘Aw, but I need the practice, Dabby. Don’t you do this with your Haiti Voodoo shit? Wring chickens’ necks? You castrate goats, right? Make a stew of cockroaches and rat cocks.’
‘Don’t you get into nothing with me, Florence, not today.’
‘Anytime you’re mad at me, you call me Florence. Not Flo. You should call me Florence some time when you’re not mad, just to confuse me.’
‘You talk that crazy talk again. That gets you in big trouble.’
‘You think? I’m making sense to me. All that matters.’
Suspicious that something was brewing, C.O. Dabrezil walked away, hoping her nemesis would chill.
Flo continued to prepare chickens for the evening meal.
‘Why do you think she did that?’ Cinq-Mars asked.
‘Coated the inside of chicken breasts with enough cayenne pepper to kill a grizzly bear. She did it because she was Flo. Understand me. She hated people. She wanted to show it.’
‘Mmm. Almost as though she wanted people to hate her. Strange behavior.’
‘I think so. You know what happened. More solitary.’
Cinq-Mars wrote down a few notes. Then changed the subject.
‘Do you mind detailing for me, Isaure, your history in the Sûreté du Québec leading to your suspension?’
The woman stared back at him, not hard, and in a way that seemed vacant, as though she was suddenly absent from herself. Then she answered, ‘I mind.’
‘Why’s that?’
She took her time before answering. ‘It’s a condition of my employment.’
‘With the penitentiary?’
‘With the SQ.’
‘Why is that? Forgive me, but it sounds strange.’
‘Not for the SQ. They don’t like to be embarrassed.’
‘You’re saying that if I learned why you are under suspension from your force, the force would be embarrassed.’
‘Humiliated, frankly.’
‘So you’ve been told to keep quiet.’
‘Quiet, I’m worth something. Talk, it’s good riddance to me.’
Cinq-Mars paused to study her. She was resolute in her body language, argumentative, defiant. ‘Did you commit a crime?’ he asked.
‘Some say.’
‘What do you say?’
‘I did the right thing.’
‘Were you charged with a crime? Bear in mind, if it’s a crime, that’s something I can find out. It’s not confidential.’
‘Not a crime, no,’ she stipulated. ‘So it is confidential.’
‘They suspended you for cause. For what reason? They didn’t say it was for doing the right thing.’
‘They called it insubordination. I’ll say no more.’
An insubordination that, if revealed to the public, might embarrass the provincial police. Yeah, he could see that.
‘Do you know why I was chosen for this investigation?’ Cinq-Mars asked.
‘Because of me?’
‘Yep. The SQ can’t investigate. Potentially, you’re a suspect, and you’re one of their own.’
‘Seriously, you don’t think I’m a suspect. You can’t!’
‘Imagine, if you’re guilty, how embarrassed the SQ will be then. They’ll be humiliated.’
She wasn’t sure if he was mocking her or not. Then decided not. ‘Let’s make sure that never happens. I do not want to embarrass my department.’
Now he wasn’t sure if she was mocking him. ‘First,’ he said, ‘tell me, as the others have, or they will if they haven’t had the chance to do so yet, that you didn’t kill Flo.’
‘I didn’t kill Flo.’
‘Where were you—’
‘I was on the other side of the room.’
‘The farthest away. That’s true. When Doi screamed. Before that—’
‘I didn’t move around much,’ Isaure Dabrezil claimed.
‘Ever go to the bathroom?’
She thought about it.
‘Remember,’ Cinq-Mars said, ‘seven surviving witnesses are recording where everyone was standing for me.’
‘Every one of them a criminal.’
‘Except you.’
‘Let’s hope.’
‘The bathroom?’
‘I sure was peeing a lot that day. One of those things. I went in a few times. I wanted it to look like I was checking things out, to make sure no one was goofing off in there. No one was. But really I was pissing a lot.’
‘Sorry to be personal, but can you define “a lot” for me?’
‘Four times. Maybe one more.’
‘When you were in the toilet room, did you look in the other stalls? Were you in there alone?’
She had to think some more. ‘I kind of glanced in them the first time. The second time, when I was washing my hands, I could see in the mirror they were empty. After that, don’t remember. Lost interest maybe. I do not recall doing a serious check. Sue me.’
Cinq-Mars wrote down a note, then entwined his fingers on the secretary’s desktop. He gazed at that woman’s family photos and did a reconnaissance check on the desk clutter. He wasn’t being judgmental, as his desk at work habitually succumbed to chaos. Once a year, not more often, he’d clean up.
Officer Dabrezil was waiting for him to speak, and finally he obliged. ‘Please understand, Isaure, that I’m hoping you will be a critical component of my investigation.’
‘You mean as a suspect?’
‘That, too, but only if you’re guilty. Otherwise, I was thinking along the lines of being kept informed on how the group behaves. Whatever comes up that’s within your purview. We are on the same side of the law, are we not?’
‘Let’s hope. But sure, I’ll help. Even if I am a suspect.’ She was beginning to feel that she wasn’t. ‘In that case, it’s better to see that the real killer is caught, no?’
‘That makes sense. Anything and everything that comes up, Officer, I’d appreciate timely reports. Including minutia. It doesn’t matter if your information seems to be irrelevant. You never know what will help me paint the bigger picture.’
‘Fine with me. Like you say, we’re on the same side.’
‘Let’s hope,’ Cinq-Mars said, echoing her own words back to her.
After Isaure Dabrezil’s departure, Cinq-Mars crossed the floor and knocked on the warden’s open office door. He was invited in. She was a handsome woman of sixty or so, with greying hair worn in a bob, dark-rimmed glasses that perhaps made her look too severe for her expressive eyes. He presented Warden Agathe Paquet with a plan that had ticked his interest during his talk with Dabrezil – one he kept from the guard – and he was well pleased that the warden acquiesced. Of course, she could say one thing and do another, he was not naive about such behavior, yet after this opening volley he felt optimistic.
His plan would also need to pass muster with the Chief of Police. Undoubtedly the more difficult sell, given that he’d already ordered up a motel room and a per diem. He’d be adding to the expenditures of his investigation without a resolution, or even progress, in sight.
Still. Worth a shot. And it might be fun.
He then departed the building, a confounding labyrinth of locked doors and different guards with separate keys and code words. No one person, including guards, had the capacity to exit the building on his or her own. That process served as an additional protective layer, so that merely seizing a guard or her keys provided no one with a way out. As well, every guard walked with a warning device in her palm. A press of the thumb: A thunderous, instant response.
Outside the penitentiary, Cinq-Mars immediately wanted back in. He returned to speak to the people who had just opened the outer door for him.
‘There are bikers in the parking lot – did they just leave?’
‘Yeah. Visitors’ Day. They were visiting.’
‘Who, specifically, were they visiting?’
‘I can find out for you.’
‘Please do.’
He waited. The woman inscribed names off a ledger. Then she returned.
‘Did they get past the spectrometry machine and the sniffer dogs?’
‘They didn’t have to, sir. We don’t allow them direct contact with inmates. They converse through a glass shield. We confiscate their metal for the visit, of course. Guns. Knives. Weapons.’
‘They don’t have to pass the tests, but do they go through them anyway?’
‘They do.’ She shrugged. ‘They’re bikers, they failed the mass spectrometry. What else is new? They handled drugs in the recent past. The dogs indicated they had none on their person. The metal detectors went off, of course, they always do with bikers, but once we got the last of their rings and chains off them, they were admitted.’
The names of the inmates being visited were unknown to Cinq-Mars, all French. None from among his murder suspects.
‘Tell me, inmates in each house-unit have contact with all the other prisoners, correct?’
‘Sure. In the yard. The library. The workshop. The gym. Chapel. Therapy. Everybody runs into everybody else sooner or later.’
When he returned outside, the bikers were gone. He knew where to find them if he wanted to, unless they’d checked out of his motel in the morning. He didn’t really want to find them.
Lunch was next. He drove away from the prison, across a rural landscape back into town.