I had spent the better part of an hour in Felice’s company and still had no idea what to make of her. She was a proven liar and an admitted tax cheat. Almost certainly she dealt drugs or served as an accomplice to people who did. There had been moments when I’d felt she’d been toying with me, and yet I’d never sensed malice in her, the way I had in some of the people I’d met that day. She seemed to have a conscience, or she made a good show of having one. I had no question she cared for her father, the elusive Vic Bazinet, who seemed to have run up gambling debts with the Dillons, if I read the situation correctly. And I did not doubt Felice’s love for her boys. I found that I liked her, pitied her, and mistrusted her all once.

If her intent had been to overwhelm me with information, she had succeeded. She had stalled me long enough for the sun to vanish. I was to blame for that, as well, though. I had hoped to linger long enough for Vic to return from work in his septic truck.

A black cloud passed, or what I thought was a cloud until I realized the wind had died.

Thousands of crows were flapping overhead, moving in a great flock across the Androscoggin toward the city limits of Lewiston.

When Charley had told me about the roost, I hadn’t expected anything this vast. The image that entered my mind now was of John James Audubon dismounting from his horse as a multitude of passenger pigeons darkened the sky from horizon to horizon—a living storm of wingbeats instead of thunder.

I do not consider myself a superstitious person. I reject the primitive thinking that tempts us to see ill omens in the behavior of birds and other animals. I never use the term “murder of crows,” even in jest. But the pall cast by the flock touched some ancient part of my soul. And a shiver passed through me that had nothing to do with the fast-plunging temperature. I was overcome by the spectacle of these carrion birds so numerous as to be beyond counting.

I doubted I could capture their flight in a photo, but I dug out my phone, even so. I had turned it off while I’d been interviewing Felice. Now I found the usual texts and emails, but only one voice message.

It was from Stacey Stevens of all people. Seeing her name made me catch my breath.

I pressed Start and held the cold glass to my ear.