by Louise Penny
“When Ruth was talking about killing that bird, it made me think of hunting. And that reminded me of the blind.”
The Chief’s face went slack from surprise. Merde, he thought. The hunting blind. That wooden structure high up in a tree in the forest. It was a platform with wooden railings, built by hunters to sit comfortably and wait for a deer to walk past. Then they’d kill it. The modern equivalent of the Ancient Mariner in his crow’s nest.
It was, for a man who’d seen far too many deaths, shameful.
But it might, this day, redeem itself.
“The blind,” whispered Gamache. He’d actually been on it, when he’d first come to Three Pines to investigate the murder of Miss Jane Neal, but he hadn’t thought of it in years. “It’ll work?”
“I think so. It’s not as high as a transmission tower, but it’s on the top of the hill and it’s stable. We can attach a satellite dish up there for sure.”
Gamache waved Thérèse and Jérôme over.
“Gilles’s figured out how to get a satellite dish up above.”
“How?” the Brunels asked together and the Chief told them.
“That’ll work?” asked Jérôme.
“We won’t know until we try, of course,” said Gilles, but he was smiling and clearly hopeful, if not completely confident. “When do you need it up by?”
“The dish and other equipment are arriving sometime tonight,” said Gamache, and both Thérèse and Jérôme looked at him, surprised.
Gilles walked with them to the door. The others were just leaving, and the four of them put on their parkas and boots, hats and mitts. They thanked Clara, then left.
Gilles stopped at his car. “I’ll be by tomorrow morning then,” he said. “À demain.”
They shook hands, and after he’d driven away Gamache turned to the Brunels.
“Do you mind walking Henri? I’d like a word with Ruth.”
Thérèse took the leash. “I won’t ask which word.”
* * *
“Good.”
Sylvain Francoeur glanced from the document his second in command had downloaded, then went back to the computer. They were in the Chief Superintendent’s study at home.
As his boss read the report, Tessier tried to read his boss. But in all the years he’d worked for the Chief Superintendent, he’d never been able to do that.
Classically handsome, in his early sixties, the Chief Superintendent could smile and bite your head off. He could quote Chaucer and Tintin, in either educated French or broad joual. He’d order poutine for lunch and foie gras for dinner. He was all things. To all people. He was everything and he was nothing.
But Francoeur also had a boss. Someone he answered to. Tessier had seen the Chief Superintendent with him just once. The man hadn’t been introduced as Francoeur’s boss, of course, but Tessier could tell by the way Francoeur behaved. “Grovel” would be too strong a word, but there’d been anxiety there. Francoeur had been as anxious to please that man as Tessier was to please Francoeur.
At first it had amused Tessier, but then the smile had burned away when he realized there was someone who scared the most frightening man he knew.
Francoeur finally sat back, rocking a little in the chair.
“I need to get back to my guests. I see it went well.”
“Perfectly.” Tessier kept his face placid, his voice neutral. He’d learned to mirror his boss. “We got completely kitted out, drove there in the assault van. By the time we got there Beauvoir could barely stand. I made sure some of the evidence ended up in a baggie in his pocket, with my compliments.”
“I don’t need to know the details,” said Francoeur.
“Sorry, sir.”
It wasn’t, Tessier knew, because Francoeur was squeamish. It was that he just didn’t care. All he cared about was that it was done. The details he left up to his subordinates.
“I want him sent on another raid.”
“Another?”
“Do you have a problem with that, Inspector?”
“It’s a waste of time, in my opinion, sir. Beauvoir’s had it. He’s past the edge now, hanging in midair. He just hasn’t fallen. But he will. There’s no way back for him and nothing to go back to. He’s lost everything, and he knows it. Another raid is unnecessary.”
“Is that so? You think this is about Beauvoir?”
The calm should have warned him. The slight smile certainly should have. But Inspector Tessier had taken his eyes off Francoeur’s face.
“I realize this is about Chief Inspector Gamache.”
“Do you?”
“But did you see here—” Tessier leaned forward and pointed to the computer screen. He didn’t see that the Chief Superintendent’s eyes never left him. Never wavered. Barely blinked.
“The psychologist’s report, Dr. Fleury. Gamache was so upset he went to see him today. A Saturday.”
Too late, he looked up into those glacier eyes. “We picked this off Dr. Fleury’s computer late this afternoon.”
He hoped for some sign of approval. A slight thaw. A sign of life. But all he met was the dead stare.
“He says Gamache is spinning out of control. Delusional even. Don’t you see?” And even as he said that he could have shot himself. And might have. Francoeur saw everything, ten steps ahead of everyone else. Which was why they were on the verge of success.
There’d been a few unexpected setbacks. The raid on the factory was one. The dam plot discovered. Gamache again.
But that’s what made this report all the sweeter. The Chief Superintendent should be pleased. Then why was he looking like that? Tessier felt his blood cool and grow thick and his heart labor.
“If Gamache ever tries to go public, his own therapist’s report can be leaked. His credibility will be gone. No one will believe a man who…” Tessier looked over at the report, desperate to find that perfect sentence. He found it and read, “… is suffering from persecution mania. Seeing conspiracies and plots.”
Tessier scrolled down, reading fast. Trying to create a wall of reassuring words between himself and Francoeur.
“Chief Inspector Gamache is not simply a broken man,” he read, “but shattered. When I return from Christmas vacation I will recommend he be relieved of duty.”
Tessier looked up and met, again, those arctic eyes. Nothing had changed. Those words, if they penetrated, had only found more ice. Colder. Older. Endless.
“He’s isolated,” said Tessier. “Inspector Lacoste is the only one left of his original investigators. The rest have either transferred out on their own or been moved by you. His last senior ally, Superintendent Brunel, has even abandoned him. She also thinks he’s delusional. We have the recordings from her office. And Gamache refers to it here.”
Once again Tessier rifled through the therapist’s report. “See? He admits they’ve left for Vancouver.”
“They may have gone, but they got too close.” Francoeur spoke at last. “Thérèse Brunel’s husband turned out to be more than a weekend hacker. He almost figured it out.”
The voice was conversational, at odds with the glacial look.
“But he didn’t,” said Tessier, eager to reassure his boss. “And it scared him shitless. Brunel shut down his computer. Hasn’t turned it on since.”
“He saw too much.”
“He has no idea what he saw, sir. He won’t be able to put it together.”
“But Gamache will.”
It was Tessier’s turn to smile. “But Dr. Brunel didn’t tell him. And now he and the Superintendent are in Vancouver, as far from Gamache as they could get. They’ve abandoned him. He’s on his own. He admitted as much to his therapist.”
“Where is he?”
“Investigating the murder of the Quint. He’s spending most of his time in some small village in the Townships, and when he’s not there he’s distracted by Beauvoir. It’s too late. He can’t stop it now. Besides, he doesn’t even know what’s happening.”
Chief Superintendent Franc
Francoeur stopped within inches of his second in command, his eyes never leaving Tessier.
“You know what’s at stake?”
The younger man nodded.
“You know what happens if we succeed?”
Again Tessier nodded.
“And you know what happens if we don’t?”
It had never occurred to Tessier that they could possibly fail, but now he thought about it, and understood what that would mean.
“Do you want me to take care of Gamache, sir?”
“Not yet. It would raise too many questions. You need to make sure Dr. Brunel and Gamache don’t come within a thousand kilometers of each other. Understood?”
“Yessir.”
“If it looks like Gamache is coming close, you need to distract him. That shouldn’t be difficult.”
As Tessier walked to his car he knew Francoeur was right. It wouldn’t be difficult. Just a tiny little shove and Jean-Guy Beauvoir would fall. And land on Chief Inspector Gamache.
TWENTY-THREE
Jérôme and Thérèse walked Henri around the village green. Their second circuit. Deep in conversation. It was biting cold, but they needed the fresh air.
“So Armand investigated what the Cree elder told him,” said Jérôme. “And he found she was telling the truth. What did he do?”
“He made absolutely certain his case was seamless, then he took the proof to the council.”
This was the council of superintendents, Jérôme knew. The leadership of the Sûreté. Thérèse sat on it now, but at the time she was a lowly agent, a new recruit. Oblivious to the earthquake that was about to shake everything the Sûreté felt was stable.
Service, Integrity, Justice. The Sûreté motto.
“He knew it would be almost impossible to convince the superintendents, and even if convinced, they’d want to protect Arnot and the reputation of the force. Armand approached a couple of members of the council he thought would be sympathetic. One was, one wasn’t. And his hand was forced. He asked for a meeting with the council. By now Arnot and a few others suspected what it was about. They refused, at first.”
“What changed their minds?” asked Jérôme.
“Armand threatened to go public.”
“You’re kidding.”
But even as he said that, Jérôme knew it made sense. Of course Gamache would. He’d discovered something so horrific, so damning, he felt he no longer owed loyalty to the Sûreté leadership. His loyalty was to Québec, not a bunch of old men around a polished table looking at their own reflections as they made decisions.
“What happened at the meeting?” Jérôme asked.
“Arnot and his immediate deputies, the ones Armand had the most proof against, agreed to resign. They’d retire, the Sûreté would leave the Cree territory, and everyone would get on with their lives.”
“Armand won,” said Jérôme.
“No. He demanded more.”
Their feet crunched over the snow as they made their slow circuit in the light of the three great trees.
“More?”
“He said it wasn’t enough. Not even close. Armand demanded that Arnot and the others be arrested and charged with murder. He argued that the young Cree who died deserved that. That their parents and loved ones and their community deserved answers and an apology. And a pledge that it would never happen again. The council reluctantly agreed after a bitter debate. They had no choice. Armand had all the proof. They knew it would ruin the Sûreté when it all became public, when the very head of the force was tried for murder.”
That was the Arnot case.
Jérôme, like the rest of Québec, had followed it. It was, in many ways, his introduction to Gamache. Seeing him on the news walk into court, alone, each day. Swarmed by the media. Answering impolite questions politely.
Testifying against his own brothers-in-arms. Clearly. Thoroughly. Hammering home, in his reasonable, thoughtful voice, the facts.
“But there’s more,” said Thérèse quietly. “What didn’t make the papers.”
“More?”
* * *
“May I make you a tea, madame?” Gamache asked Ruth.
Once more they were in her small kitchen. Ruth had put Rosa to bed and taken off her cloth coat, but didn’t offer to take Gamache’s parka.
He’d found a bag of loose Lapsang souchong and held it up. Ruth squinted at it.
“That’s tea? That would explain a few things…”
Gamache put the kettle on. “Do you have a pot?”
“Well, I thought…” Ruth jerked her head toward the baggie.
Gamache stared at her for a moment before decoding that.
“A pot,” he said. “Not ‘pot.’”
“Oh, in that case, yes. Over there.”
Gamache poured hot water into the teapot and swirled it around before pouring it out. Ruth sprawled in a chair and regarded him as he spooned loose black tea into the chipped and stained pot.
“So, time to drop your albatross,” said Ruth.
“Is that a euphemism?” Gamache asked, and heard Ruth snort.
He poured the just boiling water onto the tea and put the cover on. Then he joined her at the table.
“Where’s Beauvoir?” Ruth asked. “And don’t give me any of that crap about being on another assignment. What happened?”
“I can’t tell you the specifics,” said Gamache. “It’s not my story to tell.”
“Then why did you come here tonight?”
“Because I knew you were worried. And you love him too.”
“Is he all right?”
Gamache shook his head.
“Shall I be mother?” asked Ruth, and Gamache smiled as she poured.
They sat and sipped in silence. Then he told her what he could, about Jean-Guy. And he felt his load was lightened.
* * *
The Brunels walked in silence except for the rhythmic sound of their boots crunching on the snow. What had once seemed annoying, a noise that broke the quietude, now seemed reassuring, comforting even. A human presence in this tale of inhumanity.
“The Sûreté council voted not to arrest Pierre Arnot and the others immediately,” said Thérèse, “but to give them a few days to put their affairs in order.”
Jérôme thought about that for a moment. The use of those particular words.
“Do you mean…?”
Thérèse said nothing, forcing him to say it.
“… kill themselves?”
“Armand was vehemently against it, but the council voted, and even Arnot could see it was the only way out. A quick bullet to the brain. The men would go to a remote hunting camp. Their bodies, and confessions, would be found later.”
“But…” Again Jérôme was at a loss for words, trying to corral his racing thoughts. “But there was a trial. I saw it. That was Arnot, wasn’t it?”
“It was.”
“So what happened?”
“Armand disobeyed orders. He went to the hunting camp and arrested them. Brought them back to Montréal in handcuffs and filed the papers himself. Multiple charges of first-degree murder.”
Thérèse stopped. Jérôme stopped. The comforting munching of the snow stopped.
“My God,” Jérôme whispered. “No wonder the leadership hate him.”
“But the rank and file adore him,” said Thérèse. “Instead of bringing shame on the service, the trial proved that while corruption exists, so does justice. The corruption within the Sûreté shocked the public. At least, the degree of it did. But what also surprised them was the degree of decency. While the leadership privately rallied around Arnot, the body of the Sûreté sided with the Chief Inspector. And the public certainly did.”
“Service, Integrity, Justice,” Jérôme quoted the motto Thérèse had above her desk at home. She too believed in it.
“Oui. They suddenly became more than words for the rank and file. The only question left unanswered was why Chief Superintendent Arnot did it,” said Thérèse.
“Arnot said nothing?” asked Jérôme, looking down at his feet. Not daring to look at his wife.
“He refused to testify. Proclaimed his innocence throughout the trial. Said it was a putsch, a lynching by a power-hungry and corrupt Chief Inspector.”
“He never explained himself?”
“Said there was nothing to explain.”
“Where is he now?”
“In the shoe.”
“Pardon?”
“The shoe. It’s where the worst offenders are kept,” said Thérèse.
“You keep them in a shoe? Is that really wise?”
Thérèse stared at her husband, then for the first time since this conversation started, she laughed.
“I mean the Special Handling Unit at the maximum security penitentiary. The SHU.”
“That would make more sense,” agreed Jérôme. “And Francoeur?”
“He—”
Thérèse Brunel began to answer but stopped. There was another sound. Coming toward them, out of the darkness.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Neither fast, nor slow. Not hurried, but neither was it leisurely.
They stopped, two elderly people frozen in place. Jérôme drew himself up to his full height. He stared into the night and tried not to think that the very mention of the name had conjured the man.
And still the steps approached. Measured. Assured.
“That was where I made my mistake.”
The voice came out of the darkness.
“Armand,” said Thérèse with a nervous laugh.
“Christ,” said Jérôme. “We almost needed the pooper-scooper.”
“Sorry,” said the Chief.
“How did it go with Madame Zardo?” asked Jérôme.
“We talked a bit.”
“About what?” Thérèse asked. “The Ouellet case?”
“No.” The three of them, and Henri, walked back toward Emilie Longpré’s home. “About Jean-Guy. She wanted to know what happened.”
Thérèse was silent. It was the first time Armand had mentioned the young man’s name, though she suspected he thought about him almost constantly.
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