Thomas didn’t answer. Raymond left after telling him he would hurt his eyes by squeezing them shut so tightly.
Thomas waited until all was still and quiet, then got up to put away his computer. When he opened his suitcase, he found the wooden box he’d taken from his mother’s house along with his father’s ashes. He stared at it for a few moments, then went to the bathroom for his nail clippers.
He carefully forced the lock and got back into bed to begin reading.
At two o’clock in the morning, Thomas returned Camille’s last letter to its envelope. As he slipped it back into the box, he felt there was still a sliver of hope.
All wasn’t lost just yet.
17
Detective Pilguez parked his Ford station wagon in the Columbarium visitors’ lot. As he made his way up the path to the administrative building, he shuddered.
The manager’s assistant welcomed him at the door with a scowl that rivaled his own, then took him to his boss’s office, where the executive seemed even more disturbed than either of them were.
“There you are, finally! They broke the window and forced the cabinet door open,” he moaned.
“I can see perfectly well, thanks. Nice cabinet, by the way. Did they close it before they left, or did you cover the crime scene in your greasy fingerprints so you could make my job even harder?”
With that, the detective set the tone. The manager stuttered as the officer began to draw his own conclusions about what had occurred.
“What kind of valuables were inside? Money? Bonds?”
“Just files.”
“Incriminating ones, I imagine, for someone to take the time to burgle such a depressing place.”
“They didn’t take any papers. Just an urn.”
“A what?” Pilguez frowned.
“A funerary urn.”
“Ah, and nothing else?”
“That’s quite a lot already.”
“If you say so. Was it made of gold?”
“Brass. The urn itself has no real value.”
“What was inside, then?”
“Ashes, of course.”
“Ah,” repeated Pilguez.
“Don’t you understand? They stole human remains. This is very serious.”
“Whose remains?”
“That’s the problem. We have no idea.”
“Ah!”
There was an awkward silence.
“I know plenty of people with skeletons in their closets, but this takes the cake. What were the remains doing in your office?”
