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Isabelle felt herself grow faint, and thought she might pitch forward, out of the sleigh.

“But I didn’t believe them,” Haniya said to Gloria’s swaying back. “I know they’re alive.”

They glided through the silent woods.

As the rails of the sleigh requested silence, shhhhh, Haniya spoke. “One night a particularly drunk soldier raped me, and then, as he beat me, his machete fell from his belt. When he passed out, I was able to saw through the rope. Took a long time, but I did it.” Haniya turned to face Isabelle. Her eyes steady, her voice soft, almost kindly. “I killed him. Then I killed them all. Then I released the others, and we escaped, taking their machetes with us.”

She paused then. “They had child soldiers guarding the camp.” Haniya stared ahead, at the pristine landscape. “Have you ever heard of brown brown?”

“Non.”

“When children are abducted, that’s how they turn them into soldiers. They’re given brown brown. It’s cocaine mixed with gunpowder.”

Isabelle inhaled deeply but said nothing. Dear God, she thought. Dear God.

“It . . . it . . . turns them into something else,” said Haniya. “When we went to get away, a boy tried to stop us. I could see that look in his eyes. His brown brown eyes.”

“What did you do?” Isabelle whispered.

Shhhhh went Gloria’s tail. Shhhhh went the rails of the sleigh.

“I’m here, aren’t I?” said Haniya.

Almost, thought Isabelle, and wondered how much of herself Haniya had left behind at the boundary.

“We finally crossed the border. And were safe.” Now Haniya smiled. “But you know as well as I do, Inspector, that no place is safe.”

Haniya Daoud tipped her head back again, closed her eyes, and let the cold snowflakes melt into her scars. To the sky she said, “I’m alive because of my children. I had to survive, to save them. Every woman and child I save is my baby.”

Isabelle wondered, but didn’t ask, if Haniya Daoud, once out, had turned her machetes into plowshares. But she was pretty sure she knew the answer.

Haniya opened her eyes and looked around, as though surprised to see the thick Québec forest, and the trees. Then her eyes came to rest on Isabelle.

“Your turn.”

Chapter 32

When Gloria stopped in front of the bistro, Haniya and Isabelle got out.

The village children crowded around, and while some wanted to get into the sleigh, others were far more interested in Gloria. Reaching up as she bent down, they rubbed her huge silky nose.

“Just a moment,” said Billy, laughing, as kids pushed and shoved to climb onto the sleigh. “Everyone’ll get a turn. I promise.”

It was, perhaps, not completely surprising that children understood every word Billy Williams said, while adults struggled.

Gloria started off, pausing to let the car pass as it came slowly down the hill into Three Pines. Billy touched his tuque, in a salute to them. But mostly to Myrna, who also understood him.

Then, with a cheerful jingle, they set off again.

“Papa,” Florence, Zora, and Honoré shouted a minute later as they passed their grandfather. He was walking from the Auberge back into the village and had stopped to wave to them. Then he continued, his hands behind his back, his head down. Thinking.

Haniya Daoud stared at the door that connected the bookstore to the bistro. A door she’d been through a few times. Then she looked at the long, beamed room with its wide-plank floors cut from trees that grew within sight of the building.

At the huge stone hearths at either end, made of rocks pulled from nearby fields.

At the men and women sitting there, including the demented poet and her fucking duck. Sons and daughters of Québec, whether born there or not.

Haniya Daoud, the Hero of the Sudan, had listened as Isabelle Lacoste told her what had happened. There. In this quiet place, in this quiet village.