by Louise Penny
“You go. The GM knows you and is more likely to tell you what we want to know.”
“You sure?”
He looked anything but. “Oui.”
“Move quickly to the elevator,” said Armand. “If anyone stops you, shout and we’ll come.”
“D’accord.”
Just as she was about to leave, he quietly handed her his phone.
“Take this,” he whispered. “Messages will download on the surface.”
Reine-Marie slipped out. He closed the door only when it was obvious that she’d made it safely to the elevator.
“Okay now,” he said, sitting back down on his crate and leaning toward Beauvoir. “Loiselle? What haven’t you told us?”
“He was following me because he wanted to talk.”
“Talk?” said Gamache. “You mean threaten?”
“No, I mean talk.”
“What did he want to say?” asked Daniel.
Jean-Guy told them everything, with Séverine Arbour jumping in now and then.
“And you believed him,” said Gamache when they’d finished. “That he wants to work with us now? Seems pretty abrupt.”
At that moment there was a knock on the door. “Armand?”
When he opened it, Reine-Marie quickly slipped through. As she hugged him, she slid his phone back into his pocket.
“That was fast.”
It didn’t bode well.
“Madame Béland saw me right away. The board members aren’t staying here, and the meeting isn’t here either.”
“Damn,” said Jean-Guy. “It was such a good theory.”
“But?” said Armand. He could tell by Reine-Marie’s bright eyes that there was more.
“But Madame Béland did know where they’re staying, and where the meeting’s being held. Can you guess?”
“The Lutetia,” said Jean-Guy.
“Oui.”
They looked at each other. And smiled. Yes. They were moving forward.
Reine-Marie was brought up to speed about Xavier Loiselle, and the SecurForte operative’s desire to switch sides and help them.
She listened closely, shooting glances at her husband, and remembering his prediction. That the next thing they’d do was get someone on the inside.
And now there were two potential “someones.” Arbour and Loiselle.
“You believe him?” she asked, unknowingly repeating Armand’s question.
“Honestly, I’ve gone back and forth, but yes, eventually I decided he probably meant it.”
“Probably?” asked Daniel. “Is that good enough?”
“It’s all we’ve got, so yes, it’s pretty damned good.” Jean-Guy turned to Gamache. “With Loiselle on board and on the inside, we can finally make a plan.”
“Great,” said Daniel. “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” On seeing their expressions, he explained. “Mike Tyson said that.”
“You’re getting advice from Mike Tyson?” said Beauvoir.
“And you’re inviting someone who might be a killer to join us? What’s worse?”
At that moment, Jean-Guy was tempted to show Daniel what being punched in the face felt like.
And yet, maddeningly, he recognized that Daniel, and Mike, might be right. Only the most disciplined, or the most stubborn, stuck to a plan when the first blow landed.
The key was knowing when to adapt, and when to hold firm.
And he also recognized, somewhat grudgingly, that Daniel had a right to question. He had a lot at stake.
Was Xavier Loiselle an ally, or a spy?
Was he a member of their Resistance, or a collaborator?
“You’re right,” said Jean-Guy, to Daniel’s surprise. “But I think this’s a risk we need to take.” He turned to Séverine Arbour. “What was your impression of Loiselle?”
She thought about it, then nodded. “I agree. I think he’s sincere. He could’ve turned us in when we went to the office this afternoon, but he didn’t. I think he’s on our side. Is that a certainty?” She looked at Daniel. “No. As an engineer, I’m not at all comfortable with probabilities. The bridge will probably stay up. The plane will probably fly. No. We deal with as close to certainties as we can get. But life isn’t a schematic. It’s not an engineering project. Sometimes we need to take a risk. And sometimes, I guess, we need to be the one doing the punching.”
Beauvoir nodded to Daniel. And Daniel, after a pause, nodded back.
“Did you say you went back to GHS Engineering this afternoon?” asked Armand.
“Yes,” said Arbour. “All three of us. Loiselle pretended he was still tailing us.”
“Why did you do that?” asked Reine-Marie. “Isn’t that like walking right into the rat’s nest?”
“We wanted to try to get into Carole Gossette’s files,” said Madame Arbour. “She oversees both the Patagonia and Luxembourg projects. We thought we might find out what GHS Engineering was really doing.”
Armand sat forward. “You mentioned Patagonia earlier. What’s that about?”
“Seven years ago the regional government realized that an abandoned mine was poisoning the drinking water of a town downriver,” she explained. “GHS Engineering was contracted by the Chilean government to build a water treatment plant. Which they apparently did.”
“Apparently?” asked Reine-Marie.
“According to what I was seeing coming across my desk, it was taking a very long time to build. Far too long. I wasn’t suspicious of anything at first, except maybe government corruption, payoffs. The usual. Contractors prolonging construction to make more money. I did see that one of the first things GHS did before even beginning the project was to order a water sample taken and analyzed so they’d know what was coming down from the mine.”
“That makes sense, doesn’t it?” said Reine-Marie.
“Yes. What didn’t make sense is that the detailed results of that test were missing. What I did see was that GHS bought the mine and closed it.”
“But why buy it?” asked Daniel. “If it was already abandoned and closed?”
“Exactly,” said Madame Arbour. “So I began to look closer. What really triggered my suspicions were the containers coming back from Chile. The documentation said they were equipment, but the weights didn’t make sense, and the destinations didn’t either. They cleared customs in record time, then the containers moved from site to site, eventually ending up in smelters. You don’t melt down an excavator.”
“The mine had been reopened,” said Jean-Guy. “They were shipping back ore.”
“And hiding the fact,” said Madame Arbour.
“But why? What’s in the mine?” asked Daniel. “Gold?”
“Something even more precious.”
“Diamonds?” he asked, and when Madame Arbour shook her head, he said, “Uranium?”
Madame Arbour held up her hand to stop the cavalcade of guesses. “Rare earth minerals.”
Daniel leaned back on his crate. “Wow. Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure. There was a mention, just in passing, in a report from a Chilean geologist. But it didn’t say what sort.”
“What’s a rare earth mineral?” asked Reine-Marie. “It sounds familiar.”
“The market went wild for them a few years ago,” Daniel explained, “when scientists realized what they could be used for.”
“Like?” asked Armand.
Séverine Arbour ran through some of the uses. Everything from laptops to medical equipment. From nuclear reactors to airplanes.
“And there’re experiments with next-generation telecommunications,” said Jean-Guy.
“Shit,” said Daniel. “If you could get in on the ground floor…”
“Yes,” said Séverine Arbour. “You could make a fortune. The thing with rare earth minerals is that they tend to be far stronger than other minerals. Last longer, are lighter and easily adaptable. Versatile. Pretty much an engineer’s dream.”
“What kind did they find?” Daniel asked.
“That’s the problem,” said Jean-Guy. “And that’s why we wanted to find the water test. We don’t know.”
“So you don’t know what it might be used for,” said Armand.
“Exactly,” said Arbour.
“Is that what they’re trying to cover up?” said Reine-Marie. “Not that they found the minerals, but what they’re doing with it? And that’s what Stephen and Monsieur Plessner found out?”
“I think so,” said Jean-Guy. “But when we went to GHS, Loiselle interrupted us.”
“But I thought—” began Daniel.
“He had no choice,” explained Jean-Guy. “Someone from SecurForte was with him. Someone way up the chain. It was clever of Loiselle to be there, too. He appeared to have informed on us, but I think he was playing the only hand he could. Solidifying his position with his superior while also protecting us. But there’s something else. I recognized the SecurForte officer. And so would you.”
“Me?” asked Gamache. “Who was he?”
“That man we saw on the security tape here at the hotel, having tea with Claude Dussault and Eugénie Roquebrune.”
Gamache absorbed that information quickly, then asked, “Did he tell you his name?”
“Yes. Thierry Girard.”
Jean-Guy Beauvoir wasn’t prepared for Gamache’s reaction. Rarely had he seen his former boss and mentor so surprised.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Thierry Girard?” Gamache asked. “Are you sure?”
“Yes,” said Madame Arbour. “Why? Do you know him?”
Instead of answering, Gamache was quiet for a moment. Thinking. Slowly leaning back until he rested against the concrete wall. His hand went to his face, and his eyes narrowed in concentration.
“Thierry Girard used to be Claude Dussault’s second-in-command. He told us last night that Girard had left the Préfecture for a job in private industry. But I didn’t know it was with SecurForte.”
He looked at Beauvoir across the storeroom. As he had across so many rooms, across so many crimes, across so many corpses, across the years.
“They were both meeting with Eugénie Roquebrune yesterday,” said Jean-Guy. “It looks like he’s still Dussault’s second-in-command, only now in SecurForte.”
His voice was gentle, knowing that Claude Dussault and Gamache went way back. And that his father-in-law considered Dussault a friend.
Though evidence was now nearly overwhelming that that was no longer true.
It looked like Claude Dussault had quietly taken over as head of SecurForte, with Thierry Girard back as his loyal second-in-command. Running the day-to-day operations of the private army, while Dussault remained at the head of the Préfecture.
His power absolute.
Had these two men, individually decent, somehow warped each other? Found, fed, magnified, justified the worst in each other? Until the unthinkable became acceptable became normal?
“Wait a minute,” said Daniel. “This Thierry Girard was the second-in-command at the Préfecture de Paris before Fontaine?”
“Oui,” said his father. “Irena Fontaine took over eighteen months ago.” Armand turned back to Beauvoir and was about to speak, when Daniel interrupted.
“I was in Fontaine’s office this afternoon. There’re posters around, including one of Copenhagen Harbor. I commented on it. Asked how she liked Copenhagen. But she said she’d never been outside France.”
Beauvoir was about to ask what that had to do with anything when he suddenly got it.
“Cologne,” he said.
“Cologne,” said Armand, nodding, and smiling at his son. “Well done.”
“I don’t understand,” said Séverine Arbour.
“Irena Fontaine couldn’t have been the one who bought the cologne for Claude,” said Armand.
“Not if she’s never been outside France,” said Daniel.
“When Monique Dussault told me that Claude’s second-in-command gave him the cologne,” said Reine-Marie, “I assumed she meant Commander Fontaine. But actually she meant Thierry Girard, who also bought some for himself. Was he the one we interrupted in Stephen’s apartment?”
“Perhaps,” said Armand.
They were getting closer to the truth, but there was still far too much they didn’t know. And time was short. It was now quarter to six. Just a few hours before he was to meet Dussault in Place de la Concorde.
Information would be his only ammunition, and so far he had precious little of that.
He checked for the messages that had downloaded when Reine-Marie took his phone to the surface.
Jean-Guy, the rational man who lived in a near perpetual state of magical thinking, also checked his phone.
Not surprisingly, it was empty of new messages.
Armand’s was not.
“What is it?” Reine-Marie asked, noticing Armand’s brows drop, then draw together.
“An update from Mrs. McGillicuddy. It looks like Stephen sold all his holdings.”
“We know that,” she said. “The fake art—”
“Non. All his holdings. Everything,” said Armand. “All his shares, his investments, even in his own company. He’s mortgaged his homes. Liquidated everything.”
“But that’s not possible,” said Daniel, moving to his father’s side to read the message.
“He’s in the hospital,” said Reine-Marie. “How…?”
“It says here he did it late Friday,” said Daniel, scanning the message. “Minutes before market close.”
“Mrs. McGillicuddy’s just discovered it,” said Armand. “This was no last-minute whim on Stephen’s part. He’s obviously spent years putting everything in place. This”—he held up his phone—“was the coup de grâce.”
“That would come to—” Daniel began.
“Billions,” said Armand.
“Wouldn’t the markets react?” asked Arbour.
Daniel was shaking his head. “He timed the sell orders so they wouldn’t be noticed until the European markets opened tomorrow morning. By then they’d be unstoppable and he’d have the weekend to do whatever else he needed.”
“But what was that?” asked Jean-Guy. “Does Mrs. McGillicuddy say?”
Armand shook his head. “She’s as shocked as we are.”
“Maybe he wasn’t the one who sold it all. Maybe someone else did,” said Reine-Marie. “Broke into his accounts and did it.”
“No, it was Stephen. Mrs. McGillicuddy confirmed it before writing me.” Armand looked at Daniel. “What do you think he’s up to?”
Daniel returned to his crate and thought, finally shaking his head. “Buying his way onto the board would take maybe a hundred million, maybe more. Not billions. He had something else in mind. But what? It looks like he’s going all in on something. If there’s a sell order, was there also a buy order?”
“Mrs. McGillicuddy’s looking. Is it possible to put in a buy order late on Friday,” asked Armand, “to be executed first thing Monday?”
“Yes, for sure. But there’d still be a record. Somewhere. We might be able to track it down,” said Daniel, considering. “If I go to the bank, I can at least see if the money is still in his account, and if not, I might be able to trace where it’s gone. I can also look into those numbered companies he and Monsieur Plessner were buying into.”
Armand brought out his wallet and without hesitation gave the tattered old JSPS card to his son. “This might help.”
Reine-Marie watched Daniel put it in his jacket pocket, and she wondered if he understood the magnitude of what his father had just done.
Armand did not particularly value possessions. But there were two that he held precious. One was his wedding ring. The other was that small card, which he hadn’t been parted from in half a century.
“We need to find out which board member, if any, Stephen approached,” said Armand.
“That’s something I can look into,” said Reine-Marie. “Research the members, see who might be the most vulnerable. I
’ll call Madame Lenoir from the hotel reception and see if we can use the terminals at the Archives nationales.”
“I’ll go with you,” said Séverine Arbour. “I can help.”
“Non,” said Armand. “Jean-Guy, can you go with Reine-Marie?”
“Absolument.”
“You come with me,” he said to Arbour. “I think we can rattle them a bit more.”
“How?” she asked.
“By going to the Hôtel Lutetia.”
“A punch in the face?” asked Jean-Guy.
“Let’s start with a tap on the shoulder,” said Gamache, with a smile. “Sometimes more frightening. Besides”—he turned to Madame Arbour—“I need more information from you about the Patagonia and Luxembourg projects before I see Claude Dussault.”
“You’re still going to meet him?” asked Reine-Marie.
“Unless something changes, yes. If Claude wants to talk, I want to listen.”
“What if he wants to do more than talk?” she asked, trying to keep her tone casual. But the stress was obvious.
“Then he wouldn’t have chosen such a public place,” said Armand. “A side street. A private home. I’d be worried. But Place de la Concorde? It’s far too public to do anything other than stroll and talk.” He held her eyes. “Believe me.”
Reine-Marie nodded. She believed him. She trusted him. It was Claude Dussault she didn’t trust.
“Jean-Guy?” she said, turning to her son-in-law.
“I agree. It’s safe. I think Dussault wants to see how much we know without revealing his own position. They’re worried.”
Armand handed Reine-Marie the scrap of paper from Stephen’s agenda after first taking a photo of it.
“You might look up those dates, too. See if anything significant happened.” He got to his feet. “We need to go up.”
“So soon?” asked Jean-Guy.
CHAPTER 34
“Monsieur Beauvoir?” asked the concierge, crossing the lobby of the grand hotel.
“Oui?”
Up from that crypt, Jean-Guy was breathing in the sweet scent of the fresh flowers in the lobby and almost tearing up at the sight of the fading daylight beyond the doors of the George V.
“A man dropped this off for you.”
She handed him an envelope. Beauvoir opened it. On the slip of paper was written one word.
