Cecile Nazari’s hands were playing with the coffee cup. Crumpling it and unfolding the cardboard. They were good strong hands. Capable hands. “Where did you learn to defend yourself like that?”

“All over, but they tied the bow on it in Texas.”

She crushed the paper cup again. “Anyway you’re leaving. Which is probably a good thing. Who knows, maybe you were the target and Qayoumi was the mistake?”

I shook my head. “Not likely.”

Nazari angled her head, as if nothing were impossible. We were avoiding eye contact. She was looking around, anywhere but me. I did the same. For a while we didn’t talk. Just looked around at the train station. The station was covered by a large shed roof. It had iron rafters from long ago. The roof itself was wood.

I said, “Did you show your photos to the investigators?”

Nazari was distracted, thinking. She muttered, “They take their own. But I can mention your theory to them. If I see them.” We watched a group of teenagers crossing the train station noisily. She said, “You should get a ticket now.”

I refocused. “That would be a good idea, yes.”

We stood up. She said, “Ticket office is over there.”

I put on my backpack. We walked slowly across the cold wet floor of the train station. “You were here to see family.” She asked, “Did you?”

That reminded me of Simone Vaugeois’ husband, Gilles, who I hadn’t met. I nodded. “Ended up meeting a cousin, or something. Distant.”

“Sometimes distant relatives are best.”

I asked, “Did you hear about an attack a couple of months ago? Old guy hit on the head?”

“Sure, that’s what Bonnet was talking about when he told you about an uptick in muggings.”

I said, “Otherwise you don’t get a lot of muggings.”

“No. It’s a quiet town.” She stopped herself. “Well it’s normally a quiet town. We had a murder three weeks ago in fact. An entire family chopped up. What do they call it, a home invasion.”

“Benoit Houdin.”

“Correct. Town treasurer.”

“Chopped up, means?”

“Axe murder. The family was killed and then dismembered. Limb for limb. Then they piled all the pieces in the living room. Like something out of a horror movie. The whole thing was incredibly gruesome.”

“The old guy that got attacked is my relative. Gilles Vaugeois.”

She turned to look at me. “Seriously?” She got a distant look in her eyes, looked away from me for a second, then looked right back.

I nodded. “Never met him before. Didn’t even know that he existed. What happened?”