“HOW’S LOWERY A FLOATER TODAY IF HE CLOCKED OUT FOUR decades back?” Ryan voiced the question I’d been asking myself.

I had no answer.

We were heading north on 15. The coroner’s van was somewhere behind us. Pomerleau and Lauzon would check their soggy passenger into the morgue, where he’d wait in a cooler until I unwrapped him in the morning.

“Maybe the hit was a mistake.”

“Thirteen-point match?” My tone conveyed the skepticism I felt.

“Remember that lawyer in Oregon?”

Brandon Mayfield. The FBI linked him to the Madrid train bombing based on fingerprint evidence. Turned out the match was erroneous.

“That was a fluke,” I said. “You think printing the body on-site will cause blowback?”

“On the good agent, yeah. A bonehead move, but probably little harm done.”

“He meant well.”

Ryan shook his head in disbelief.

For several miles, silence filled the Jeep. Ryan broke it.

“You going home?”

I nodded.

Minutes later we were arcing over the Saint Lawrence on the Champlain Bridge. Below us, the river flowed cold and dark. To one side, tiny gardens and lawns winked nascent green amid the condo and apartment towers on île-des-Soeurs.

Back in the city, traffic moved like mud through a straw. The Jeep lurched and jerked as Ryan shifted between gas and brake.

Kind, yes. Witty, affirmative. Generous, absolutely. Patient, no way. Travel with Ryan was often a trial.

I checked my watch. Five ten.

Normally Ryan would have queried my dining plans by now. Suggested a restaurant. Tonight he didn’t.

Supper with his daughter? Beers with the boys? A date?

Did I care?

I cracked my window. The smell of oily water drifted into the Jeep. Warm cement. Exhaust.

Yeah. I cared.

Would I ask?

No way. Since our breakup we’d established a bimodal new balance. Professional relations: same as always. Social relations: don’t ask, don’t tell.

My choice, really. Though Lutetia was once again history, getting dumped for Ryan’s ex still hurt.

Once burned, twice shy.

And there was Charlie Hunt.

Snapshot image. Charlie on the rooftop deck of his uptown Charlotte brownstone. Cinnamon skin. Emerald eyes. Tall as his daddy, who’d played in the NBA.

Not bad.

I slid a glance toward Ryan.

Sandy hair. Turquoise eyes. Long and lean as his daddy in Nova Scotia.

Not bad either.

Truth be told, after decades of marriage, then a rocky postseparation readjustment, followed by going steady and an undeserved boot to the scrap heap, I was grooving on the nonmonogamy thing.

Except for two teensy details. Ryan hadn’t shared my bed since the previous summer’s split. Charlie Hunt had yet to gain access.

On dual levels it had been a long, cold winter.

The sound of Ryan’s mobile broke into my musings.

I listened as he said a lot of ouis, asked a few questions. From the latter I assumed the call was about John Lowery.

Ryan spoke to me after disconnecting. “Bandau sent a query south. Turns out our boy died in combat in Vietnam.”

“Are you using the Sesame Street theme as your ringtone?”

“Keeping the clouds away,” Ryan sang.

“Got some Big Bird sheets on your bed?”

“Bien sûr, madame.” Big wink. “Want to come check them out?”

“Lowery? Vietnam?”

“Ever hear of an outfit called JPAC?”

“Sure. I used to work with them. The Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command. Used to be called CILHI until two thousand three.”

“Hallelujah. Alphabet soup.”

“Now I’ve said my ABC’s,” I sang.

“Let’s not push the metaphor, Ryan said.

“Central Identification Laboratory Hawaii. JPAC resulted from the merger of CILHI and the Joint Task Force–Full Accounting Commission. JPAC’s lab portion is now referred to as the CIL. It’s the largest forensic anthropology laboratory in the world.”

“Lowery didn’t come through JPAC, but that’s where his case has been bounced. What’s your connection with the place?”

“Every positive JPAC ID has to be approved by a zillion reviewers, some of whom are civilian and external to the CIL. I served in that capacity for many years.”

“Right. I forgot about those midwinter trips to Hawaii.”

“Travel was required twice yearly for lab oversight.”

“And a little surfing, my coconut princess?”

“I don’t surf.”

“How about I hang ten over to your place and we—”

“I rarely had time to set foot on a beach.”

“Uh-huh.”

“When was Lowery ID’ed?” I asked.

“Bandau didn’t say.”

“If it was back in the sixties, things were totally different.”

Ryan turned off rue Sainte-Catherine, drove half a block, and slid to the curb in front of a gray stone complex with elaborate bay windows fronting the sidewalk. Sadly, my unit is in back and derives no benefit from this architectural whimsy.

“You plan to do plastic man first thing tomorrow?”

“Yeah. Since there’s a five-hour time difference, I’ll phone the CIL tonight, see what I can learn about Lowery.”

I felt Ryan’s eyes on my back as I walked toward the door.

Quebec springs usually send a lot of work my way. Rivers and lakes thaw. The snow melts. Corpses emerge. Citizens abandon their sofas for the great outdoors. Some discover the corpses. Some join their ranks.

Because my May rotation to Montreal is usually a long one, Birdie accompanies me as a carry-on under the seat. Except during the flight, the little furball is pretty good company.

The cat was waiting inside the front door.

“Hey, Bird.” I squatted to pet him.

Birdie sniffed my jeans, neck forward, chin up, nose sucking in quick little gulps.

“Good day today?”

Birdie moved off and sat with paws primly together.

“Eau de decomp not your scent?” I rose and tossed my purse onto the sideboard.

Bird raised and licked a paw.

My condo is small. L-shaped living-dining room and shotgun kitchen in front, two bedrooms and two baths in back. It’s located at ground level, in one wing of a four-story U-shaped building. French doors give onto a tiny fenced yard from the living room. Opposite, through the dining room, another set opens onto a central courtyard.

Direct access to the lawn on one side and the garden on the other are what hooked me originally. More than a decade down the road, I’m still in the place.

Appetite intact despite the olfactory affront, Birdie padded behind me to the kitchen.

The condo’s interior features earth tones and recycled furniture that I antiqued. Natural wood trim. Stone fireplace. Framed poster of a Jean Dubuffet. Vase full of shells to remind me of the Carolina shore.

My answering machine was blinking like a tripped-out turn signal.

I checked the messages.

My sister, Harry, in Houston, unhappy with her current dating arrangement.

My daughter, Katy, in Charlotte, hating her job, her social life, and the universe in general.

The Gazette, selling subscriptions.

Harry.

My neighbor Sparky complaining about Birdie. Again.

Harry.

Charlie Hunt. “Thinking of you.”

Harry.

Deleting all, I headed for the shower.

Supper was linguini tossed with olive oil, spinach, mushrooms, and feta. Birdie licked the cheese from his pasta, then finished the crunchy brown pellets in his bowl.

After clearing the dishes, I dialed the CIL.

Five thousand miles from the tundra a phone was answered on the first ring. After identifying myself, I asked for Roger Merkel, the lab’s scientific director.

Merkel was in Washington, D.C.

“Dr. Tandler?”

“Hold, please.”

Daniel Tandler is assistant director of the CIL. Being the same age, he and I rose through the forensic ranks together, though always at different institutions. We met as undergrads, via the student association of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. We’d even enjoyed a brief carnal romp way back at the misty dawn of creation. Good fun, bad timing. Enter Pete Petersons. I married, attended grad school at Northwestern, then joined the faculty first at Northern Illinois University, then at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Danny stuck with the University of Tennessee straight through, and upon completion of his doctorate, beelined to Hawaii.

The one that got away? Maybe. But, alas, too bad. Danny Tandler is now married and out of play.

Over the years Danny and I have provided mutual support through dissertation defenses, board exams, job interviews, and promotion reviews. When the CIL needed a new external consultant, Danny proposed my name. That was back in the early nineties. I served in that capacity for almost ten years.

The wait for Tandler was a wee bit longer than the one for the initial switchboard pickup.

“Tempe, me lass. How’s it hanging?” A voice hinting of country and wide-open spaces.

“Good.”

“Tell me you’ve reconsidered and are coming back on board.”

“Not yet.”

“It’s eighty degrees right now. Wait, wait.” Dramatic rustling. “OK. Got my shades on. The sun off the water was blinding my vision.”

“You’re inside a building on a military base.”

“Palm fronds are gently kissing my window.”

“Save it for winter. It’s beautiful here now.”

“To what do I owe this unexpected surprise?”

I told him about the pond, the plastic, and the fingerprint identification of the victim as Lowery.

“Why the packaging?”

“No idea.”

“Bizarre. Let me see if I can pull Lowery’s file.”

It took a full ten minutes.

“Sorry. We’ve got an arrival ceremony starting in less than an hour. Most folks have already headed over to the hangar. For now I can give you the basics. Details will have to wait.”

“I understand.”

I did. An arrival ceremony is a solemn occasion honoring an unknown soldier, sailor, airman, or marine fallen far from home in the line of duty. Following recovery and transfer to U.S. soil, it is step one in the complicated path to repatriation.

I’d attended several arrival ceremonies during my tenure with JPAC. I envisioned the scene about to play out. The newly arrived aircraft. The servicemen and women standing at attention. The flag-draped transfer container. The solemn cross-base drive to the CIL lab.

“Private John Charles Lowery was an eighteen-year-old white male. Went in-country on June twenty-fourth, nineteen sixty-seven.” Danny’s tone suggested he was skimming, picking out relevant facts. “Lowery went down in a Huey near Long Binh on January twenty-third, nineteen sixty-eight.” Pause. “Body was recovered several days later, ID’ed, returned to family for burial.”

“Burial where?”

“Your neck o’ the woods. Lumberton, North Carolina.”

“You’re kidding.”

I heard a voice in the background. Danny said something. The voice responded.

“Sorry, Tempe. I’ve got to go.”

“No problem. I’ll talk to you tomorrow. I should know more once I’ve examined our guy.”

That’s not how it went.