The Nature of the Beast

by Louise Penny

  Gamache could have kicked himself. He’d been so intent on who to invite he hadn’t properly scanned the room for who not to. Rosenblatt was certainly a retired professor. Their background check bore that out. But Gamache was far from convinced he wasn’t more than that. Just as Mary Fraser and Sean Delorme were almost certainly file clerks. And much more.

  “Can I help?” asked the elderly professor.

  “Non, merci. I think we have it covered.”

  Rosenblatt examined him, then looked around the bistro at the people chatting over drinks.

  “They have no idea what’s coming their way once word of the gun gets out.”

  “None of us can tell the future,” said Gamache. It was an intentionally banal response. He just wanted to get away and wasn’t interested in wasting precious time on some esoteric conversation.

  “Oh, I think some can, don’t you?”

  Something in his tone made Gamache refocus and give the scientist his attention. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean some can predict the future because they create it,” said Rosenblatt. “Oh, not the good things. We can’t make someone love us, or even like us. But we can make someone hate us. We can’t guarantee we’ll be hired for a job, but we can make sure we’re fired.” He put down his apple cider and stared at Gamache. “We can’t be sure we’ll win a war, but we can lose one.”

  Gamache was very still, examining the scientist. Then he sat down.

  “So many people make the mistake of thinking wars are fought with weapons,” said Rosenblatt, almost to himself. “But they’re really fought with ideas. The side with the most ideas, the best ideas, wins.”

  “Then why kill the person with those ideas?” asked Gamache. “I take it we’re talking about Gerald Bull. Someone thought he was the genius and had him shot in the head.”

  “You know the answer to that. To stop anyone else from getting him. Having him on our side might not guarantee we’d win a war, but giving him to an enemy just about guarantees we’d lose it.”

  “And when it became apparent you got it wrong?” asked Gamache.

  “Me?”

  “A manner of speech, monsieur. I meant nothing by it.”

  “Of course.”

  “When it was clear the wrong person was killed?” asked Gamache. “That Gerald Bull wasn’t the ideas man at all, but just a fake front?”

  “Ah, then there’s a problem. A big one. A very big one. That would need to be taken care of.”

  “Are you saying what I think you are?” said Gamache. It was the closest Michael Rosenblatt had come to admitting involvement in the death of Gerald Bull. And more.

  “I’m saying nothing. I’m an old man, who can’t even dress himself.” He looked down at his disheveled clothing.

  “You are not your clothes, monsieur,” said Gamache. “They’re a costume. Perhaps even a disguise.”

  “I’m glad you think so.” Rosenblatt looked amused, but then his face turned serious. “You think I had something to do with it? I’ve been sitting here thinking about what would happen if those plans are found. All those lives lost. I think only very old men appreciate what a terrible thing it is to die before your time.” He leaned across the table toward Gamache. “It is not something I could ever be part of.”

  “Unless it was to save even more lives,” suggested Gamache.

  “Maybe that’s what old men are for. To make decisions that no young man can.” He was watching Gamache closely. “Or should have to. I’m old enough to be your father. I wish I was. Perhaps you’d trust me then. I have no children of my own.”

  “But David? Your grandson?”

  When Rosenblatt didn’t answer, Gamache nodded.

  “Fictitious?”

  “I find people are less suspicious of grandfathers,” Rosenblatt admitted. “So I created David. But I’ve spoken of him so often, I can almost see him. He’s skinny and dark-haired and smells of Ivory soap and bubblegum, which I give him behind his mother’s back. Some days he’s more real to me than people who actually exist.”

  Michael Rosenblatt looked down at his hands. “That goddamned gun in the woods is real but my grandson isn’t. What a world.”

  Armand glanced at the clock, ticking. “There’s something you should know. I spoke to John Fleming this morning.”

  It was Rosenblatt’s turn to grow very still.

  “I know he worked with Gerald Bull,” said Gamache. “I know he was here in Three Pines. I know he was in Brussels with Dr. Bull and Guillaume Couture. And I know he killed Gerald Bull. But I also believe it was not his idea.”

  Gamache once again brought out the old photograph of the three men, the unholy trinity.

  “I showed this to you once before. There’s Dr. Bull, Dr. Couture, and John Fleming. But someone else was there that day, wasn’t there? The person who took this picture and ordered the death of Gerald Bull.”

  “It wasn’t me.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  “It doesn’t matter what you think. It was long ago. It’s done.”

  “It’s not done,” Gamache snapped, lowering instead of raising his voice, so that it came out a growl. “What has happened here is a direct consequence of that decision that day. The war wasn’t won, it went dormant. And now it’s flaring up.”

  “You must understand—” Rosenblatt began.

  “I don’t need justifications, I need clear answers. Who was there that day? Who took this picture? Was it you? Who’s behind all this?”

  “It wasn’t me,” said Rosenblatt. “I swear. If I had anything to tell you I would. The thought of those plans falling into someone else’s hands sickens me.”

  “John Fleming is coming here,” said Gamache, his voice struggling back to normal. He picked up the photograph and got to his feet.

  “What?”

  “If we don’t find the plans by six, he’ll be brought here. And all will be revealed. The plans, and everything else.”

  “You can’t,” Rosenblatt rasped. “The man’s a monster.”

  “Oui. Man-made. And whose idea was he?”

  CHAPTER 39

  They sat on chairs in a semicircle in the Gamache living room. Fortunately the play didn’t have a huge cast. A few boarders at the rooming house, the landlady, and the proprietor of the hardware store next door.

  “You want us to read this out loud?” asked Monsieur Béliveau, holding the script as though it was written in urine.

  “Actually, I like the idea,” said Gabri.

  “You would,” said Clara.

  “No, really. I know from my time on the stage—” He paused dramatically, daring them to make a rude comment. For some reason, the silence seemed even more insulting. “—that something can sound completely different when lifted off the page by a good actor.”

  “If only we had one of those,” said Ruth.

  “Well, we have nothing to lose,” said Olivier.

  “That’s the spirit,” said Myrna.

  But Gamache and Beauvoir knew that wasn’t true. They had the most precious of commodities to lose. Time. It would be five thirty by the time they finished reading Fleming’s play. There would be no time for anything else.

  Armand had told them in broad strokes why they were there. They divvied up roles, leaving Gamache and Beauvoir as the audience, then began the read-through.

  Some, like Ruth, simply read their lines, while others, like Clara, threw themselves into their roles. Gabri, who’d allowed himself to be talked into the male lead, shot annoyed glances at Clara when it became clear she had a hidden talent.

  The other revelation was Monsieur Béliveau, who started off quite stilted but, inspired by Clara’s all-in performance, rose to the occasion and by the second act had everyone in stitches as the comic-relief owner of the hardware store that had everything except what the other characters really wanted. Milk. Every character went into the hardware store looking for milk.

  It became a leitmotif of the play.

  What was

not revealed, however, was the whereabouts of the plans.

  When the final word was spoken and silence descended, they looked over at Armand and Jean-Guy, who were leaning forward in their chairs hoping to catch that one vital word or phrase.

  But there were no more words. They’d run out of play.

  Gamache pulled out his device, which kept accurate time.

  It was five twenty-three. Thirty-seven minutes left.

  He looked at Brian. “Anything?”

  “I’m sorry, nothing struck me.”

  “Anyone?” asked Gamache.

  They all shook their heads.

  Gamache got up and thanked them sincerely.

  “There’s something you need to know,” he said. He’d debated telling them about the CBC broadcast, but decided they’d hear it themselves soon enough. “The CBC is about to air a story on Gerald Bull’s gun being found.”

  They looked surprised, but not yet shocked.

  “What does that mean?” Myrna asked.

  “Well, they don’t know where it is,” he said, and saw relief in their faces. “But it’s just a matter of time. Once they find out, then everyone will come here.”

  “Everyone?” asked Myrna. “Who’s ‘everyone’? Journalists, of course, but who else?”

  “People looking for the plans,” said Gamache. “That’s why we asked you here, and that’s why we need to find them ourselves first. You’ve just read the play, most of you for the first time. If anything should strike you later, please let us know right away. And, of course, it’s vital you tell no one about this. Jean-Guy?”

  He invited Beauvoir into the study and closed the door.

  Gabri left to go back to the B and B and Olivier headed over to the bistro, which would be busy at this time of day.

  Brian helped Reine-Marie clear the coffee mugs while Clara and Myrna put the furniture back, and Ruth did nothing.

  “May I borrow her?” Monsieur Béliveau asked with his exaggerated politeness, indicating Ruth.

  Ruth got up. “No need to ask them. I don’t even know who they are.”

  “We have a no-returns policy,” Clara warned him.

  “And she was already broken when we found her,” said Myrna, picking up a chair.

  Ruth scowled at them and Monsieur Béliveau looked perplexed, then he nodded.

  “I know,” he finally said. “I think I was there when it happened.”

  It was Clara and Myrna’s turn to be perplexed as the two elderly villagers left.

  * * *

  Gabri stood in the doorway of the small library at the very back of the B and B, staring.

  What he saw was so ordinary and yet it was riveting.

  Mary Fraser was reading.

  That was it. Just sitting there. Looking down at her lap. Not at a book, but at a script. The script.

  There was nothing even remotely remarkable about it. Except for the intensity with which she was looking at the page.

  Sean Delorme sat in the wing chair, watching her, studying her as she studied the play.

  And then he looked up. At Gabri. And then he got up and walked slowly, deliberately toward him.

  Gabri took a step back as this previously nondescript, dull man came toward him. There was no weapon in his hand, not even a threatening expression on Delorme’s face, but Gabri found his heart pounding. Sean Delorme stopped at the doorway and the two men stared at each other across the threshold.

  Then Delorme slowly, wordlessly, closed the door until it clicked shut. And then there was another sound, as a bolt was drawn across.

  Gabri stared at the wooden door. His last image of the small library fused into his memory. Of Delorme’s dark eyes and beyond him, Mary Fraser continuing to read. As though her life depended on it.

  * * *

  From the study Beauvoir phoned across to Lacoste at the Incident Room.

  She confirmed that Cohen was at the SHU. “He’s in his car, waiting.”

  “Good” was what Beauvoir said, but good was not what he felt. “Anything in the case files?”

  “No, nothing yet,” she said, and hanging up, she went back to them. Like the play, she knew her answer was right in front of her if only she could find it.

  Isabelle Lacoste had gone over and over the notes. The interviews. The evidence from both murders.

  Antoinette Lemaitre had been killed either by someone she’d invited into her home, or when she’d surprised an intruder. It was someone who knew about Project Babylon, and knew Brian would be in Montréal. Someone who knew that her uncle was Guillaume Couture and that Dr. Couture had been Gerald Bull’s main designer. Perhaps even knew he was the real architect of Project Babylon.

  Someone who thought the plans were hidden in his home. Someone who might’ve been looking for them for years.

  The gun couldn’t be sold. Not anymore. But the plans could.

  Lacoste stopped herself.

  Sidetracked by the goddamned plans again, she thought, and gave a heavy sigh.

  But still, she’d come close, before veering off. Where had she gone astray?

  All right, she told herself. Let’s set aside Antoinette’s murder and go back to the first one. Laurent’s death.

  She herself had been in the bistro when the boy had raced in with yet another ridiculous story, so clearly a product of his imagination.

  Isabelle Lacoste tried to remember what he’d said and done.

  Laurent had run in and come up to their table, jabbering excitedly, announcing to the room that he’d found a huge gun in the woods. With a monster on it.

  When no one paid attention, Laurent had tugged at Gamache’s arm to follow him.

  Instead, the Chief had driven him home. In the car, Laurent had entertained him with more tales about the gun, and about winged monsters and alien invasions and whatever else his fertile imagination produced.

  A day later, Laurent was dead.

  Who else had he told? His parents. His father. The one person who would know it wasn’t a fantasy, though Lepage claimed not to know what Dr. Bull and the others were building. Was that one more lie in a life that was itself a fabrication? Did he kill his own son to shut him up, knowing that if the massive gun was found, with his etching, questions would be asked and Frederick Lawson might be revealed?

  Is that what happened? Or had Laurent run into someone else in the hours after Gamache had dropped him off? Someone who knew Laurent was telling the truth. Someone who had Laurent show him the gun, and then killed him there and placed his body by the side of the road, to make it look like an accident.

  She was missing something. Or misinterpreting something. There was something she wasn’t seeing.

  That’s when Beauvoir called and reported that they’d found nothing in the play. Her heart dropped. It wasn’t their only hope, but it was their best one.

  She went back to the file folder and began reading again.

  And then she forced herself to stop. She knew the case. Had just refreshed her mind. Now it was time to use her mind. Isabelle Lacoste closed the file, swung her chair around, and stared out the window. Forcing herself to do nothing. Except the most important thing. Think.

  * * *

  Gabri had called from the bistro and asked Gamache to meet him there, leaving Beauvoir alone in the study.

  Jean-Guy hadn’t meant to pry but, once alone, his eyes had strayed to papers on Gamache’s desk. Letters. Offers. Stacks of them. The top one was from the UN to head up their policing division, with a particular focus on Haiti.

  For reasons he couldn’t explain, Jean-Guy’s heart dropped. Haiti was close to Gamache’s own heart. It was a job that demanded diplomacy, and patience, and respect. And French. It would be dangerous, but it would be fulfilling, to train the local police in that shattered nation. It was a perfect fit for the Chief.

  Then Beauvoir refocused and returned to the script in a desperate, last-ditch attempt to find something in the play.

  It seemed more and more likely that Fleming was lying, at least about the play. Probably about the plans too.

  The words swam in front of Jean-Guy’s eyes and nothing was going in. He read and reread the same passage. It was like the recurring nightmare where he had to get away, but couldn’t run.

  He looked at the words and willed his mind to settle down. But all he could think of was Annie and the baby and a world where a goddamned gun was in the hands of a madman. And another madman was on the loose, freed by them.

  Jean-Guy forced himself to close his eyes. And from his mind he pulled the fresh memory of the play being read by Clara and Myrna, Madame Gamache and Brian and Gabri. Ruth and Olivier and Monsieur Béliveau. Their familiar voices lulled him, like his grandmother’s voice reading to him at bedtime about the hockey sweater.

  Slowly the scenes came alive, the characters came alive, in front of him. Beauvoir could see them. The boarders, the shopkeeper. Vivid. At once funny and heartbreaking, and surprisingly human.

  John Fleming was describing a group of people who were being offered a second chance. A lifeboat. But who didn’t recognize it for what it was, because it wasn’t offered in the form they wanted.

  They wanted a burning bush, a bolt of lightning. A lottery win.

  It reminded Jean-Guy of Three Pines. Of the travelers who came upon the village unexpectedly. They sat in the bistro, having stopped just to relieve themselves and get something to eat. They drank their café au laits and ate their pain au chocolat, and consulted their maps. Never once looking up, and around.

  And then they left, climbing out of the lifeboat and back into the ocean. And they swam away. In search of the job, the person, the big house that would save them.

  But every now and then someone did look up. And around. And saw that they’d arrived. They’d made it to shore.

  Jean-Guy had sat in the bistro, or on the bench, or the porch of the Gamaches’ home with Annie and seen that look on new faces, on a few faces. Not many, but it was unmistakable and unforgettable when it happened. It wasn’t joy, it wasn’t happiness. Not yet. It was relief.

  He recognized it because he himself had washed ashore. Here.

  Jean-Guy opened his eyes and sat up straight.

  * * *

  -->