LaManche's somber monotone droned on, describing the room and its lifeless occupants. I half listened, relieved that I wouldn't be needed. Or would I?

There were supposed to be kids. Where were they?

Through the open window I could see sunshine, pine trees, and glistening white snow. Outside, life went on.

Silence interrupted my thoughts. LaManche had stopped dictating and replaced wool gloves with latex. He began to examine victim number two, lifting the eyelids and observing the inside of the nose and mouth. Then he rol ed the body toward the wal and raised the shirttail.

The outer layer of skin had split and the edges were curling back. The peeling epidermis looked translucent, like the delicate film inside an egg.

Underneath, the tissue was bright red, mottled white where it had lain in contact with the crumpled sheets. LaManche pressed a gloved finger into the back muscle and a white spot appeared in the scarlet flesh.

Hubert rejoined us as LaManche was returning the body to its supine position. We both looked a question at him.

"Empty."

LaManche and I did not change expression.

"There are a couple of cribs in there. Must be the kids' room.

Neighbors say there were two babies." He was breathing hard. "Twin boys. They're not in there."

Hubert took out a hankie and wiped his chapped face. Sweat and arctic air are not a good combination. "Anything here?"

"Of course this wil require a ful autopsy," answered LaManche in his melancholy bass. "But based on my preliminary, I would say that these people were alive when the fire broke out. At least this one was."

He indicated body number two.

"I'l be here another thirty minutes or so, then you may remove them."

Hubert nodded and left to tel his transport team.

LaManche crossed to the first body, then returned to the second. I watched in silence, breathing warmth onto my mittened fingers. Final y, he finished. I didn't have to ask.

"Smoke," he said. "Around the nostrils, in the nose and air passages."

He looked at me.

"They were stil breathing during the fire."

"Yes. Anything else?"

"The lividity. The cherry red color. That suggests carbon monoxide in the blood."

"And .. .?"

"The blanching when you applied pressure. Livor isn't fixed yet.

Blanching only occurs for a matter of hours after lividity first develops."

"Yes." He looked at his watch. "It's just past eight now. This one could have been alive as late as three or four A.M." He pul ed off the latex gloves. "Could have been, but the fire brigade got here at two-thirty, so death was before that. Livor is extremely variable.

What else?"

The question went unanswered. We heard commotion below, then feet pounded up the stairs. A fireman appeared in the doorway, flushed and breathing hard.

"Estidecolistabemacr'

I ran through my quebecois lexicon. Not there. I looked at LaManche.

Before he could translate the man went on.

"Someone here named Brennan?" he asked LaManche.