NNE WAS STILL SLEEPING WHEN I LEFT FOR THE LAB MONDAY morning. I jotted a note asking her to phone when she woke. I didn’t expect a call before noon.

Exiting the garage, I was almost blinded. The sky was immaculate, the sun brilliant off the weekend’s snow.

Once again the city’s armada of plows had prevailed. All roads were clear in Centre-ville. Farther east, most side streets were passable, though bordered by vehicles buried to their roofs. The cars looked like hippos frozen in rivers of milk.

Here and there I passed frustrated commuters, shovels pumping, breath mimicking the exhaust from their half-hidden vehicles.

The lesser streets surrounding the lab were impossible, so I parked in Wilfrid-Derome’s pay lot. Crossing to the building’s back entrance, I wove between snowbanks and circled a small sidewalk plow, its amber light pulsing in the crystalline air.

My footfalls sounded sharp and crunchy. In the distance, tow trucks jolted residents awake with their brain-piercing two-toned whrrps. Out of bed! Move your ass! Move your car!

The day’s first surprise ambled in as I was reaching to check my voice mail.

Michel Charbonneau is a large man whose size isn’t diminishing any with age. His bull neck, beefy face, and spiky hair give him the look of an electrified football tackle.

Unlike Claudel, who favors designer silks and wools, Charbonneau has taste that runs to polyesters and markdowns. Today he wore a burnt-orange shirt, black pants, and a tie that looked like a street fight at the south end of a color wheel. His jacket was an unfortunate brown and tan plaid.

Dropping into a chair, Charbonneau draped his overcoat across his lap. I noticed an abrasion on his left cheek.

Charbonneau noticed me noticing.

“You should see the other guy.”

He grinned.

I didn’t.

“Sorry I didn’t get back to you. Claudel and I were last-minute loan-overs to narco, and the bust came down on Friday. I suppose you read about it?”

“No. I haven’t gotten to the news.” Anne and I had dispensed with all forms of journalism over the weekend, opting for videos and oldies on the Movie Channel.

“Task force had been backgrounding the thing for months.”

I let him go on.

“Couple of pharmaceutical pinstripes were pipelining pseudo-ephedrine under the counter. Stuff’s used in the production of methamphetamines. Product was warehoused in Quebec and Ontario, then trucked all over Canada and the lower forty-eight.”

Charbonneau hunched forward, rested elbows on thighs, and let his hands dangle.

“These bozos were supplying cookers from Halifax to Houston. Dragged forty-three to the bag on Friday, eleven more on Saturday. A lot of lawyers will be banking retainers.”

“Was Andrew Ryan involved in the sting?”

Charbonneau smiled and wagged his head.

“Even if he is SQ, that guy’s the stuff of legend.”

To say some rivalry exists between the SQ and the CUM would be like saying the Palestinians have some issues with the Israelis.

“Why is that?” I picked up a pen and began drawing squares inside squares.

“Saturday morning Ryan almost gets his lights blown out, right? That night I see him cool as an ice slick, squiring a number half his age.” Charbonneau leaned back and curved a figure eight in the air with his hands. “Very little spandex, acres of skin. Ryan’s what, forty-five? Forty-seven? Chick’s barely out of braces.”

I subdivided a square. Disinterested.

“The señorita’s hanging in, so I guess the guy’s still got what it takes.”

Ryan and I had been discreet. Beyond discreet. Charbonneau had no way of knowing we’d been lovers.

“Hanging in?” Casual.

Charbonneau shrugged. “I’ve seen them together before.”

“Really.”

“Let’s see, when was that?” Charbonneau sailed on, unaware of the reaction his words were having. “August? Yeah. August. It was hotter than a friggin’ banana boat.”

A meaty finger pointed in my direction.

“I came by here to ask about a case. You were down South. I had to testify, and the preliminary took place in early August. I spotted Ryan and the prom queen as I was leaving the courthouse. Yep. It was the first week of August.”

The first week of August. Ryan in Charlotte. An urgent phone call. Trouble with his niece. An unscheduled return to Canada.

I tossed the pen and buckled down my face.

“Monsieur Charbonneau, I called Friday because I’ve found information relevant to the pizza basement skeletons.”

Charbonneau slumped back and thrust out both feet. “I’m listening.”

“I got a second opinion on the buttons found by Said Matoub.”

Charabonneau looked blank.

“The owner of the pizza parlor.”

“The guy who found the skeletons.”

“Actually that was the plumber, but close enough. Matoub admitted to having pocketed three silver buttons while collecting the bones.”

“Right.”

“Your partner took the buttons to the McCord for evaluation.”

“Lady there said they were old.”

“Antoinette Legault. She was only partially correct.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“According to Monique Mousseau at Pointe-à-Callière, only two of the buttons are nineteenth century in age. The third is a forgery.”

“Meaning what?”

“She didn’t know.”

“How old is the fake?”

“She couldn’t assign an age, but doubted it was of much antiquity.”

“OK. So maybe the buttons don’t go with the bones. That ain’t exactly a smoking gun.”

“Have you heard of a man named Nicolò Cataneo?”

“Nick the Knife? Who hasn’t?”

“The building housing Matoub’s pizzeria currently belongs to Richard Cyr. Cyr purchased the property from Nicolò Cataneo.”

“Yeah? When?”

“In 1980.”

Charbonneau retracted his feet and sat up.

“How long did Cataneo own the place?”

“Ten years.”

Charbonneau frowned.

“Does that mean something, Detective?”

“Might.”

“I know Cataneo was connected.”

Charbonneau began picking at the cuticle on his right thumb.

“What is it you’re not telling me?”

Charbonneau looked undecided a moment, then slumped back.

“Things exploded here in the late seventies. The Calabrian and Sicilian factions went at each other big-time. Power struggle ended with the assassination of a boss named Paolo Violi.”

“And?”

“A new boss took over.”

Down the hall I heard one phone ring, then another, and another. LaManche was gathering his troops for the morning meeting.

“And?”

“New boss broke with the Bonannos in New York and established ties between the Montreal family and the Caruana/Cuntrera family.”

“Your point?” I made a show of checking my watch.

“It was a wild ride.” Charbonneau shrugged. “Bunch of guys got killed.”

“And maybe some girls?”

Charbonneau shrugged again. “You didn’t say anything about trauma to those bones.”

“I didn’t find any. You’ll speak to your partner?”

Charbonneau tugged an earlobe, rolled his eyes sideways, then back to me. He hesitated a moment, then seemed to arrive at some private decision.

“Luc’s spoken to Cyr.”

“I know.”

“Guess he didn’t tell you.”

“No.”

“We probably should have.”

“That would have been nice.”

“The old geezer never mentioned Cataneo.”

“Perhaps that has to do with your partner’s social skills.”

“You learn anything else?”

I told him about Cyr’s list of tenants, and about the phone calls I’d made.

“So who do you like? The drag queen or the guy in the side curls and hat?”

“Chabad-Lubavitch men don’t wear the payot or the streimel.”

“Just having some fun with you, Doc. You think either could be a player?”

“You’re asking my opinion?”

Charbonneau nodded.

“Not likely.” I rose.

Charbonneau lumbered to his feet, flipped his coat over one arm, and dug a paper from a pocket. “I’m supposed to give you this.”

The note contained the telephone number left by Mrs. Ballant/ Gallant/Talent, the name Alban Fisher, and an address in Candiac.

“That a phone trace?”

I nodded.

“Someone giving you a hard time?”

“Besides the freak that broke into my condo?”

“Oh, yeah?” Charbonneau’s face tensed.

Mistake.

“It’s nothing. Anyway, Ryan’s got stepped-up surveillance on my place.”

I glanced at the paper Charbonneau had handed me.

“This woman called claiming to know something about the pizza parlor bones.”

“What?”

“Beats me. She said she knew what had gone on in Cyr’s building.”

“You let me know what this lady says as soon as you talk to her. If you don’t reach her today I’ll take a spin out there. And you let me know if anyone hassles you, Doc. I mean it.”

Again, Charbonneau hesitated, longer this time.

“Don’t let Luc get under your skin. He’ll come around. And, Doc, he won’t stand for you being hassled either. You can believe that.”

I wondered.

Having survived the minefield of Charbonneau’s conversation, I should have been prepared for my next surprise. I wasn’t.

When I arrived in the conference room, the five pathologists were deep in discussion.

I mumbled an apology for my late arrival. LaManche slid a photocopy across the table.

Three autopsies had already been assigned. Pelletier got two crack addicts found in the Lionel-Groulx Metro. Morin drew a cyclist crushed by a fire truck.

I flipped a page and glanced quickly through the last two cases.

A man had been discovered facedown below the staircase at the Mont Royal end of Drummond.

Nom de décédé: Inconnu. Unknown.

A woman had been found dead in her bed.

Nom de décédé: Louise Parent

Date de naissance: 1943/6/18

Info.: Mort suspecte

My eyes dropped to the next line.

My heart dropped like a rock.