The devils choir, p.1
The Devil's Choir, page 1
part #3 of A Victor Lessard Thriller Series
THE DEVIL’S CHOIR
MARTIN MICHAUD
THE DEVIL’S CHOIR
A VICTOR LESSARD THRILLER
Translated by Arthur Holden
Copyright © Martin Michaud, 2021
Originally published in French under the title La chorale du diable, © Martin Michaud, 2011, Les Éditions Goélette, © Martin Michaud, 2013, Les Éditions Coup d’oeil.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purpose of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.
All characters in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Publisher: Scott Fraser | Editor: Shannon Whibbs
Cover designer: Sophie Paas-Lang
Cover image: istock.com/Instants
Printer: Marquis Book Printing Inc.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Title: The devil’s choir / Martin Michaud ; translated by Arthur Holden.
Other titles: Chorale du diable. English
Names: Michaud, Martin, 1970- author. | Holden, Arthur, 1959- translator.
Description: Series statement: A Victor Lessard thriller ; 3 | Translation of: La chorale du diable.
Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210168129 | Canadiana (ebook) 20210168218 | ISBN 9781459742703 (softcover) | ISBN 9781459742710 (PDF) | ISBN 9781459742727 (EPUB)
Classification: LCC PS8626.I21173 C4613 2021 | DDC C843/.6—dc23
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Ontario, through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and Ontario Creates, and the Government of Canada.
Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.
The publisher is not responsible for websites or their content unless they are owned by the publisher.
Dundurn Press
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“Master of the Quebec thriller.”
Praise for the Victor Lessard Thriller Without Blood
With its memorable characters, rich atmosphere, and shrewd plot, Without Blood is a welcome addition to Montreal noir.
— Kathy Reichs, author of the Temperance Brennan Bones series
With a strong Montreal setting and a twisty, dual-strand plot that keeps you guessing, Martin Michaud’s Without Blood is the real thing.
— Peter Robinson, author of the Inspector Banks series
Atmospheric and compelling, Without Blood is a spine-chilling read with an intensely memorable cast.
— Ausma Zehanat Khan, author of A Deadly Divide
Praise for the Victor Lessard Thriller Never Forget
Never Forget will leave you bloodless, and I mean that in the nicest possible way.
— Alan Bradley, author of the Flavia de Luce series
A raucous crime thriller.
— Publishers Weekly
[An] immersive thriller full of darkness, loathing, and vengeance.
— Montreal Review of Books
A fine crime novel featuring a cast of well-delineated characters and a plot that demands the reader’s undivided attention.
— Booklist
Never Forget is a crackerjack read. Michaud artfully constructs the world of the Montreal police and a broad cast of characters while keeping his eye steady on ways to ratchet up the tension at every turn.
— Quill & Quire
Martin Michaud is a master at twisty storytelling and compelling atmosphere. This kept me on the edge of my seat from start to finish. I can’t wait to read Lessard’s next case!
— Catherine McKenzie, author of Six Weeks to Live
Michaud is at his best recalling … fraught times through the cooler lens of our present day. It’s great to see Canadian history used to such good effect in a story that resonates as well today as when it happened.
— Margaret Cannon, Globe and Mail
Victor Lessard Thrillers
Without Blood
The Devil’s Choir
Never Forget
To Geneviève
To my family
And to those who are dear to me,
who struggle against illness in silence, courageously,
without ever surrendering to self-pity
Be sober, be vigilant;
because your adversary the devil,
as a roaring lion, walketh about,
seeking whom he may devour.
— Saint Peter
Fanaticism is a plague
which, from time to time,
produces seeds capable of infesting the earth.
— Denis Diderot
Val-d’Or, Quebec
March 1985
The bayonet plunges into a swamp of entrails.
Dulled at first, the pain takes a moment to arrive. The blood glides over his skin.
Clutching the handle, young Carbonneau stares at his abdomen as though it were an oddity, and suddenly understands the meaning of what he’s just done.
Seppuku.
The boy who probed his thoughts is observing him closely. The other one, the Asian, is keeping his distance. Young Carbonneau’s screams bounce off the bedroom walls and wash over the astronauts on the wallpaper.
How could he have let himself be talked into this?
Val-d’Or
April 1985
The seven-year-old boy watches through the window as the wind shakes the trees’ high branches. Ice crystals whirl in the air, settling on the ground in a carpet of frost.
He puts on his duffle coat and woollen toque, then slips his sheet music into his knapsack. As he goes down the stairs to the main door, he glances toward the nave. It’s almost empty. Only a few worshippers are still kneeling there. Among them is a woman in a fur coat who seems to be praying fervently.
Her lips are moving in silence.
He can’t hear her. He doesn’t know her. But he does know that she’s asking God to forgive her sins and watch over her husband, who is gravely ill. He also knows that the husband will die in the next few hours.
The Mass was magnificent, as it is every Sunday. The sermon was stirring.
He loves singing in the choir.
Despite his young age, he’s learned all the pieces with ease. The parish priest, who directs choir rehearsals, is always choosing him to sing the solos.
He’s about to leave the building when someone calls out.
“Just a minute, my boy. I’d like you to meet someone.”
He doesn’t need to look to know who the speaker is: he recognizes the priest’s voice.
Without a word, the boy follows him to the sacristy.
Another man in a cassock is waiting for them.
The priest says the man’s name, but the boy pays no attention to such details.
He looks into the eyes of the new arrival, as he does whenever he meets someone for the first time.
In this case, he sees nothing.
The conversation drags on. The boy is tired. He wants to go home.
He isn’t scared that his mother might worry — if she were still alive, she’d be blind drunk by now, sprawled at the bar in one of the many watering holes on 3rd Avenue — but the man in the cassock isn’t letting up. He peppers the boy with questions.
At last, the interview ends.
The priest gives him some candies in a kraft paper bag.
Despite the lash of the cold air, the boy strides without haste toward the youth centre where he lives.
At the window, the man in the cassock watches him walk away through the snow.
He’s the one.
So much weight on such frail shoulders.
Montreal
May 12th, 2008
“Death is worth living through.”
I heard that sentence a few hours ago. Take it from me, a statement like that makes you freeze. It encrusts itself on your consciousness.
The man who spoke those words has vanished. Lucky for him. If I got my hands on him, I’d show no mercy. For starters, I’d pistolwhip him in the mouth, knocking his teeth out. Then, with the barrel of my Glock tickling the back of his throat, I’d coldly squeeze the trigger.
As I watched his brains splatter the walls and his dark soul slip out through the window, I’d say in a casual voice:
“Death is worth living through.”
Thus endeth the lesson.
I’m awake again.
I know exactly what’s happening. I can see the ambulance attendants working feverishly. They’ve pulled out all the stops: IV tube, catheter, oxygen mask. There’s already something cadaverous about my pallor.
I can’t speak.
In medical jargon, I’m in a state of shock.
That’s how one of the attendants described me as he talked to someone on the phone.
The ambulance is racing through the night, siren howling, headlight beams stippled by the rain.
The rain …
For seven days, Montreal’s been caught in a ceaseless downpour. Tempers are fray ed. Everyone feels sticky.
When will it end?
My leg is in bad shape.
I can see a twisted bone poking through mangled flesh.
The attendants have managed to stop the bleeding, but the short one tells his partner that the leg may have to be amputated. They think I can’t hear. They think I’m out cold. I’ve just closed my eyes to cope with the searing pain.
I’ll need all my strength later on.
And nobody’s going to amputate my leg. I’ll kill the first guy who tries.
Got it?
I can’t feel anything anymore.
Not the pain, not my body, not the sting of ammonia hanging in the air.
I open my eyes. Blood has soaked through the dressing on my leg.
That can’t be good.
Does a person know when he’s going to die?
Do the body’s restraints fall away little by little as the spirit slides into the reaper’s endless embrace?
The ambulance attendants look at me.
“We’re losing him,” the short one says.
I can feel my heart slowing down.
“Hang on, Lessard,” the tall one says. “We’re almost at the hospital.”
I know, I know …
You’re probably wondering how I ended up in this mess.
It all started seven days ago. In the rain.
CONTENTS
The Exodus of the Flies
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
The Relative Power of Absolute Silence
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
The Kiss of the Maimed
35
36
37
38
666
Post-Mortem
Cantata in B-Happy
Author’s Note
Thanks
About the Author
THE EXODUS OF THE FLIES
Feats of valour. Legends are born: the garrulous flies come and go in the mouths of the dead.
— Claude-Michel Cluny
1
Montreal
A week earlier, May 5th
Simone Fortin rests her head on Victor Lessard’s shoulder.
Lessard is holding his umbrella at an angle, trying to shield her against the torrential rain. After a moment, he lowers the umbrella and lets it fall to the ground.
It’s hopeless. They’re soaked.
The detective sergeant’s arm is draped over the young woman’s shoulders. He pulls her close. She’s holding on to his waist.
Simone is crying. So is Lessard.
Though the rain hides his tears, he’s making no effort to conceal them.
A few weeks after the actual anniversary, they’re marking the sad occasion once again.
They’re at Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery, where, for a moment, time stands still, allowing Simone Fortin to recall the friend who was like a sister to her, and letting Victor Lessard remember a passion that was snuffed out after its first brief spark.
Ariane Bélanger was only thirty when she died, cut down in her prime by the stroke of a crazed killer’s knife.
From the cemetery, they walk arm in arm along Côte-des-Neiges Road toward the café where Lessard talked to Ariane for the first time.
Simone breaks the silence as she looks at Lessard appreciatively. He’s wearing designer jeans, a black T-shirt, a well-tailored jacket, and a pair of running shoes.
“You look great, Victor. I can’t get over how much weight you’ve lost!”
Taken aback by the compliment, Lessard reddens and growls something unintelligible. Simone is right. He’s lost nearly forty pounds since the last time they saw each other.
They step into the café.
Apart from a couple of freelancers lingering over their coffee as they take advantage of the free Wi-Fi, the place is almost empty. The waitress, a barrel-chested woman with a head like a shrimp, comes to take their order.
“I’ll have a decaf double lungo with a little hot milk,” Lessard says.
Simone gives him an impressed glance.
“How can you possibly remember all that? I’d like a regular coffee, please. Black.”
Lessard shifts in his chair.
He wonders how the young woman can seem so lighthearted when he feels so numbed by his emotions. Every time they get together, the ghost of Ariane Bélanger hovers over them, and Lessard is pulled back into the nightmarish events that led to the tragic deaths of Ariane and Constable Nguyen. He and Simone have never discussed the subject. He supposes she’s just more resilient than he is.
“How are things at the hospital?” he asks, to break the ice. “Still doing emergency work in Trois-Pistoles?”
“Yes. But I’m also completing a specialization in gastroenterology.”
“That’s gotta be a barrel of laughs,” he says disgustedly. “Spending all your time poking around in people’s shi— I mean … you get the idea.”
Simone certainly does get the idea, and she can’t help chuckling.
“There’s more to it than colonoscopies, Victor. It’s a fascinating field. There have been some great advances lately.”
“Yeah, well, it’s still gross. How’s Laurent?”
“Terrific. He’s at the hotel with Mathilde.”
Though he hasn’t seen Mathilde in a while, Lessard has fond memories of Ariane’s young daughter, whom Simone adopted after Ariane’s death. Simone occasionally emails him pictures of the child. And he always sends Mathilde a present for her birthday.
“Are you and Laurent an item yet?”
“I wouldn’t say we are, but I wouldn’t say we aren’t. We’re happy. We support each other.”
“Has he fallen off the wagon?”
“No. It’s tough, sometimes, but he always gets through. What about you, Victor? How’s it going? How are things with Véronique?”
Lessard’s expression darkens.
This is the question he’s been fearing, but he won’t try to dodge it. He’s about to launch into his answer when his cellphone rings. He sighs.
“Sorry, Simone … Hello? … Now? … No, I was just having a cup of coffee … hang on.” He takes out his notebook. “Okay, forty-one thirty-nine Bessborough. Got it.”
The cop rises wearily from his chair.
“I have to go. Sorry.”
Simone needs no explanation.
“We’re in town for a few more days before heading back. If you have any free time, it would be lovely to go out for dinner with Laurent and Mathilde.”
He leans down to kiss her cheek.
“I’ll call you. I promise. Give Mathilde a hug for me.”
He walks back to his parked Corolla.
I’m like an oncologist. I offer people hope without knowing whether I’ll actually keep my word.
Death seems to be part of his karma today.
First there was the visit to Ariane’s grave, and now this call from Nadja Fernandez. Without going into details, she’s just let him know that they have a homicide on their hands. The investigation team is waiting for him at the scene.
His rust-eaten car is speeding through the rain when he sees Véronique Poirier’s name on his caller ID.
He picks up at the last moment.
“Yes?”
“It’s me,” Véronique says. “Is this a bad time?”
“No, but I can’t talk for long. Something urgent has come up.”
“Okay … Listen, we’ve been over this more than once …” Véronique hesitates, but her tone is calm and detached.
Too detached, Lessard thinks.
“You need to come and get your stuff, Victor.”
He closes his eyes.
For weeks now he’s been putting the moment off, hoping that Véronique would change her mind — telling himself that she might start missing him, that she might realize they can’t live without each other.
