she was taking ephedra to lose weight,’ he said.
‘Could she have been taking it for a cold?’ Lacoste asked, undeterred by the maniacal Nichol.
‘It’s not sold as a cold remedy any more,’ said Lemieux.
‘And even if it was, there was none in her room or the bathroom. We’ll do another search, but unless she hid it, and she didn’t really have reason to, then someone else slipped it to her.’
‘Which is why you declared this a murder,’ said Beauvoir.
‘Which is why I think this might have something to do with body image.’
They looked at him, perplexed, having lost the thread of what he was saying.
‘Madeleine Favreau wasn’t taking ephedra, but someone was. Someone had bought it, probably for themselves, and then used it on her.’
‘But ephedra is banned in Canada. Health Canada pulled it years ago,’ said Lemieux. ‘It’s also banned in the US and Britain.’
‘Why?’ asked Lacoste.
Agent Lemieux consulted his notes again. He didn’t want to make a mistake here. ‘There were 155 deaths in the US and more than a thousand incidents reported by doctors. Mostly heart and stroke. And not in the elderly. These were for the most part young and vigorous people. An investigation was launched and it was decided that ephedra certainly burned fat, but it also raised the heart rate and blood pressure.’
‘Then a couple athletes died,’ said Beauvoir.
‘A baseball and a football player, that’s right,’ agreed Lemieux. ‘That was when the baby robin really hit the fan.’ Even Gamache smiled. Nichol did not. ‘An investigation was launched and it was discovered that ephedra affects the heart, but mostly in people with a pre-existing condition.’
‘So it’ll raise the heart rate of anyone,’ recapped Beauvoir. This was what he craved. Facts. ‘But can actually kill people with already damaged hearts. Did Madame Favreau have a damaged heart?’
‘No medication in her medicine cabinet,’ said Gamache. ‘We won’t have the coroner’s report until later today.’
‘I wonder how many people have heard of ephedra?’ said Beauvoir. ‘I hadn’t, but then I don’t diet. Presumably most people who diet have heard of it, is that fair to say?’ He turned to Lacoste, who thought about it. She dieted every now and then. Like most women she owned a fun-house mirror that one day showed her fat, the next slim.
‘I think anyone who diets habitually would know about it,’ she said, slowly, trying to figure it out. ‘Dieters become obsessed with losing weight and any product that promises to do it without effort would be noticed.’
‘So we’re looking for a dieter?’ asked Nichol, confused.
‘But there’s a problem,’ said Lemieux. ‘You can’t buy it here. Or in the States.’
‘That is a problem,’ conceded Gamache.
‘Except,’ came a voice behind them. The technician who’d downloaded the information was sitting at one of their desks, looking out from behind a flat screen. ‘You can order ephedra on-line.’ He pointed to the screen in front of him. Getting up, they moved to his station.
There on the screen was a long list of Googled sites, all offering to ship perfectly safe ephedra to anyone desperate and stupid enough to want it.
‘Still,’ said Armand Gamache, straightening up. ‘The ephedra alone wouldn’t do it. Once the ephedra was in her body the potential was there, but the murderer needed one more thing. An accessory. The old Hadley house.’ To everyone’s amazement he turned to Nichol. ‘You were right. She was scared to death.’
NINETEEN
Clara leaned back and reached for her mug. In front of her were the remains of breakfast. Crumbs. The plate looked so forlorn she popped a couple of slices of bread into the teepee toaster and closed the doors.
She and Myrna had stayed with Agent Lacoste at the old Hadley house while she did whatever she needed to do. Not nearly fast enough in their opinion. Most of the time Clara had stood just inside the room and stared at the little bird, curled on its side, legs up to its chest, not unlike Madeleine, though smaller. And with feathers. Well, maybe not so much like Madeleine. Still, there was a similarity. They were both dead.
But while Clara felt terrible about Madeleine, she carried no guilt. Unlike this little creature. She knew she’d helped kill it. They’d all known there was a bird. In fact, that was why they’d decided to use this particular room, in hopes of maybe saving it.
Had she even tried? No. Instead she’d been terrified the bird would attack out of the shadows. Far from trying to save the bird Clara had