Still Life

by Louise Penny

  ‘Though we have his confession.’

  ‘The confession of a man who isn’t in his right mind. That can’t be enough. We must have evidence. Sometimes our job is to save people from themselves.’

  ‘Inspector Beauvoir, what do you think?’

  This put Beauvoir exactly where he didn’t want to be.

  ‘I think there’s reason to seriously consider prosecuting Matthew Croft in the death of Jane Neal.’ Beauvoir watched Gamache as he said this. Gamache was nodding. ‘We have Philippe’s eye-witness account,’ continued Beauvoir, ‘which fits all the evidence, and we have strong circumstantial evidence that the death demanded a skilled bow hunter, which Philippe isn’t. Croft described the scene perfectly, even showing us how Jane Neal was lying. And he knew about the deer trail. All that combined with Croft’s confession should be enough to lay charges.’

  Maître Cohen ate a forkful of Caesar salad. ‘I’ll go over your reports and let you know this afternoon.’

  On the way back to the station house Beauvoir tried to apologise to Gamache for contradicting him.

  ‘Now, don’t patronise me,’ Gamache laughed, putting an arm across Beauvoir’s shoulder. ‘I’m glad you spoke your mind. I’m just annoyed you made such a strong case. Maître Cohen is likely to agree with you.’

  Gamache was right. Cohen called from Granby at 3.30 in the afternoon, instructing Gamache to arrest Croft and charge him with manslaughter, leaving the scene of a crime, obstruction, and destroying evidence.

  ‘Jesus, she’s really going after him,’ commented Beauvoir.

  Gamache nodded and asked Beauvoir for a few minutes of privacy in the Commander’s office. Surprised, Beauvoir left. Armand Gamache dialed home and spoke with Reine-Marie, then he called his boss, Superintendent Brébeuf.

  ‘Oh, come on, Armand, you’ve got to be kidding.’

  ‘No, Superintendent. I’m serious. I won’t arrest Matthew Croft.’

  ‘Look, it’s not your call. I don’t need to tell you of all people how the system works. We investigate and get the evidence, lay it before the prosecutors, and they decide who to charge. It’s out of your hands. You’ve been given your instructions, do it, for pity’s sake.’

  ‘Matthew Croft didn’t kill Jane Neal. There’s absolutely no evidence he did it. There’s the accusation of a probably unbalanced son and his own confession.’

  ‘What more do you need?’

  ‘When you were investigating that serial killer in Brossard, did you arrest everyone who confessed?’

  ‘This is different and you know it.’

  ‘I don’t know it, Superintendent. Those people who confessed were confused individuals who were fulfilling some obscure need of their own, right?’

  ‘Right,’ but Michel Brébeuf sounded guarded. He hated arguing with Armand Gamache, and not only because they were friends. Gamache was a thoughtful man and Brébeuf knew he was a man of his convictions. But he isn’t always right, Brébeuf told himself.

  ‘Croft’s confession is meaningless. I think it’s his form of self-punishment. He’s confused and hurt.’

  ‘Poor baby.’

  ‘Yes, well, I’m not saying it’s noble or attractive. But it’s human. And just because he’s begging for punishment doesn’t mean we should comply.’

  ‘You’re such a sanctimonious bastard. Lecturing me on the moral role of a police force. I know damn well what our job is. You’re the one who wants to be police, judge and jury. If Croft didn’t do it he’ll be released. Trust the system, Armand.’

  ‘He won’t even come to trial if he continues in this ludicrous confession. And even if he’s eventually released, you and I know what happens to people arrested for a crime. Especially a violent crime. They’re stigmatised for the rest of their lives. Whether they did it or not. We’d be inflicting on Matthew Croft a wound that will stay with him for ever.’

  ‘You’re wrong. He’s inflicting it on himself.’

  ‘No, he’s challenging us to do it. Goading us into it. But we don’t have to react. That’s what I’m saying. A police force, like a government, should be above that. Just because we’re provoked doesn’t mean we have to act.’

  ‘So, what are you telling me, Chief Inspector? From now on you’ll only arrest people if you’re guaranteed a conviction ? You’ve arrested people before who turned out not to have committed the crime. Just last year, remember the Gagné case? You arrested the uncle, but it turned out the nephew had done it?’

  ‘True, I was wrong. But I believed the uncle had done it.

  That was a mistake. This is different. This would be deliberately arresting someone I believe did not commit the crime. I can’t do it.’

  Brébeuf sighed. He’d known from the first minute of this conversation that Gamache wouldn’t change his mind. But he had to try. Really, a most annoying man.

  ‘You know what I’m going to have to do?’

  ‘I do. And I’m prepared for it.’

  ‘So as punishment for insubordination you’ll walk through Sûreté Headquarters wearing Sergeant LaCroix’s uniform?’ Mai LaCroix was the immense desk Sergeant who presided over the entry to HQ like Buddha gone bad. To add to the dimension of the horror, she wore a Sûreté-issue skirt some sizes too small.

  Gamache laughed at the image. ‘I’ll make you a deal, Michel. If you can get that uniform off her. I’ll wear it.’

  ‘Never mind. I guess I’ll just have to suspend you.’ Michel Brébeuf had come close to doing this once before, after the Arnot case. His own superiors had ordered him to suspend Gamache, again for insubordination. That case had almost ended both their careers, and the stink still stuck to Gamache. He’d been wrong then, too, in Brébeuf’s opinion. All he had to do was say nothing, it wasn’t as though their superiors were proposing letting the criminals go. Just the opposite, really. But Gamache had defied the authorities. He wondered if Gamache really believed the Arnot case was over.

  Brébeuf never thought he’d be doing this, ‘You’re suspended from this moment for the period of one week, without pay. A disciplinary hearing will be held at that time. Don’t wear a skirt.’

  ‘Thanks for the tip.’

  ‘D’accord. Give me Beauvoir.’

  It took a lot to stun Jean Guy Beauvoir, but his conversation with the Superintendent did just that. Gamache knew that he cared deeply for Beauvoir, like a son, but the younger man had never shown him any feelings, except that of junior to respected superior. That had been enough. But now Gamache saw the depth of Beauvoir’s pain at having to do this thing, and he received a great gift. The gift of knowing he was cared for in return.

  ‘Is it true?’

  Gamache nodded.

  ‘Is this my fault? Did I do this by arguing against you? What a fool. Why didn’t I just keep my mouth shut?’ Beauvoir was pacing the small office like a leopard trapped.

  ‘This isn’t about you. You did the right thing. The only thing you could do. As did I. As did Superintendent Brébeuf, for that matter.’

  ‘I thought he was a friend of yours.’

  ‘He is. Look, don’t feel badly about this. I knew when I called the Super he’d have to do this. I called Reine-Marie before, to run it by her.’

  Beauvoir felt pricked, a tiny little point of pain that the Chief Inspector had consulted his wife but not him. He knew it was unreasonable, but feelings so often were. It was why he tried to avoid them.

  ‘When she said “do it” I called him with a clear conscience. I can’t arrest Matthew Croft.’

  ‘Well, if you can’t, I can’t. I won’t do Brébeuf’s dirty work for him.’

  ‘It’s Superintendent Brébeuf, and it’s your job. What was that this afternoon I heard? Just some Devil’s Advocate bullshit ? You know how I hate that. Say what you really think, don’t play pretentious little mind games. Is that all that was? Taking the other position like some empty adolescent intellectual game?’

  ‘No, it wasn’t. I believe Matthew Croft did it.’

 

‘So arrest him.’

  ‘There’s more.’ Now Beauvoir looked really miserable. ‘Superintendent Brébeuf ordered me to take your badge and gun.’

  This shook Gamache. Had he thought this all the way through he wouldn’t have been surprised, but he hadn’t seen it coming. He felt his stomach lurch. The force of his reaction stunned him. He’d have to think about why and fortunately he had a long drive home in which to consider.

  Gamache pulled himself together, reached into his breast pocket and handed over both his badge and his warrant card. Then he slipped the holster off his belt.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ whispered Beauvoir. Gamache had been quick to recover, but not quick enough to hide his feelings from Beauvoir. As he took the items Beauvoir remembered one of the many things he’d learned from Gamache. Matthew 10:36.

  The funeral for Jane Neal, spinster of the village of Three Pines in the county of St Rémy, Province of Quebec, was held two days later. The bells of the Église Ste Marie rang and echoed along the valleys, heard miles away, and felt deep in the earth, where creatures lived who might not otherwise, had Jane Neal herself not lived and been the sort of person she’d been.

  And now people gathered to say a formal goodbye. Armand Gamache was there, having driven in from Montreal. It made a nice break from his forced inaction. He sailed through the crowd, through the front of the small church, and found himself in the gloom inside. It always struck Gamache as paradoxical that churches were gloomy. Coming in from the sunshine it took a minute or so to adjust. And even then, to Gamache, it never came close to feeling like home. Churches were either great cavernous tributes not so much to God as the wealth and privilege of the community, or they were austere, cold tributes to the ecstasy of refusal.

  Gamache enjoyed going to churches for their music and the beauty of the language and the stillness. But he felt closer to God in his Volvo. He spotted Beauvoir in the crowd, waved, then made his way over.

  ‘I hoped you’d be here,’ said Beauvoir. ‘You’ll be interested to hear we’ve arrested the entire Croft family and their farm animals.’

  ‘You’ve found the safe side.’

  ‘Damn straight, pardner.’ Gamache hadn’t seen Beauvoir since he’d left that Tuesday afternoon, but they’d talked on the phone several times. Beauvoir wanted to keep Gamache in the loop, and Gamache wanted to make sure Beauvoir knew there were no hard feelings.

  Yolande wobbled behind the casket as it was led into the church. André, slim and greasy, was beside her and Bernard slouched behind, his furtive, active eyes darting everywhere as though in search of his next victim.

  Gamache felt deeply sorry for Yolande. Not for the pain she felt, but for the pain she didn’t feel. He prayed, in the silence, that one day she wouldn’t have to pretend to emotions, other than resentment, but could actually feel them. Others in the church were sad but Yolande cut the saddest figure. Certainly the most pathetic.

  The service was short and anonymous. The priest clearly had never met Jane Neal. No member of the family got up to speak, except André, who read one of the beautiful scriptures with less enlightenment than he might read the TV Guide listings. The service was entirely in French, though Jane herself had been English. The service was entirely Catholic, though Jane herself had been Anglican. Afterwards Yolande, André and Bernard accompanied the casket to a ‘family only’ burial, though Jane’s friends had actually been her family.

  ‘A real chill in the air today,’ said Clara Morrow, who had appeared at his elbow, her eyes bloodshot. ‘There’ll be frost on the pumpkins tonight.’ She managed a smile. ‘We’re having a memorial service for Jane at St Thomas’s on Sunday. A week to the day since she died. We’d like you to be there, if you don’t mind coming down again.’

  Gamache didn’t mind. Looking around he realised how much he liked this place and these people. Too bad one of them was a murderer.

  TEN

  The memorial service for Jane Neal was short and sweet, and had it been plump it would have been an exact replica of the woman. The service was really nothing more than Jane’s friends getting up one after the other and talking about her, in French and English. The service was simple, and the message was clear. Her death was just one instant in a full and lovely life. She’d been with them for as long as she was meant to be. Not a minute longer, not a moment less. Jane Neal had known that when her time came God wouldn’t ask how many committees she’d sat on, or how much money she’d made, or what prizes she’d won. No. He’d ask how many fellow creatures she’d helped. And Jane Neal would have had an answer.

  At the end of the service Ruth stood at her seat and sang, in a thin, unsure, alto, ‘What Do You Do With a Drunken Sailor?’ She sang the unlikely sea shanty at a quarter speed, like a dirge, then slowly picked up speed. Gabri joined in, as did Ben and in the end the whole church was alive with people clapping and swinging their hips and asking the musical question, ‘What do you do with a drunken sailor, err-lie in the morning?’

  In the basement after the service the Anglican Church Women served up homemade casseroles and fresh apple and pumpkin pies, accompanied by the thin hum of the sea shanty heard here and there.

  ‘Why “Drunken Sailor”?’ Approaching the buffet, Armand Gamache found himself standing next to Ruth.

  ‘It was one of Jane’s favorite songs,’ said Ruth. ‘She was always singing it.’

  ‘You were humming it that day in the woods,’ Gamache said to Clara.

  ‘Wards off bears. Didn’t Jane learn it in school?’ Clara asked Ruth.

  Olivier jumped in. ‘She told me she learned it for school. To teach, right, Ruth?’

  ‘She was expected to teach every subject, but since she couldn’t sing or play piano she didn’t know what to do about the music course for her students. This was when she first started, back fifty years ago. So I taught her the song,’ said Ruth.

  ‘Can’t say I’m surprised,’ mumbled Myrna.

  ‘It was the only song her students ever learned,’ said Ben.

  ‘Your Christmas pageants must have been something,’ said Gamache, imagining the Virgin Mary, Joseph, the baby Jesus and three drunken sailors.

  ‘They were,’ laughed Ben, remembering. ‘We sang all the carols, but they were all to the tune of “Drunken Sailor”. The looks on the parents’ faces at the Christmas concert when Miss Neal would introduce, “Silent Night”, and we’d sing!’ Ben started singing, ‘Silent Night, holy night, all is calm, all is bright’, but to the tune of the shanty. Others in the room laughed and joined in.

  ‘I still find it really hard to sing the carols correctly,’ said Ben.

  Clara spotted Nellie and Wayne and waved at them. Nellie left Wayne and made a bee-line for Ben, beginning to talk before she was halfway across the room.

  ‘Ah, Mr Hadley, I was hoping to find you here. I’m going to be over to do your place next week. How’s Tuesday?’ Then she turned to Clara and said confidentially, as though passing a State secret, ‘I haven’t cleaned since before Miss Neal died, Wayne’s had me that worried.’

  ‘How is he now?’ asked Clara, remembering Wayne’s hacking and coughing during the public meeting a few days earlier.

  ‘Now he’s complaining, so there’s nothing much wrong. Well, Mr Hadley? Haven’t got all day, ya know.’

  ‘Tuesday’s fine.’ He turned to Clara once Nellie had gone back to her pressing job, which seemed to be eating the entire buffet. ‘The place is filthy. You won’t believe the mess an old bachelor and his dog can create.’

  As the line crawled forward, Gamache spoke to Ruth. ‘When I was in the notary’s office asking about Miss Neal’s will, he mentioned your name. When he said, “née Kemp”, something twigged, but I couldn’t figure it out.’

  ‘How did you finally get it?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Clara Morrow told me.’

  ‘Ah, clever lad. And from that you deduced who I was.’

  ‘Well, it took a while after that, but eventually I got it,’ Gamache smiled. ‘I do love your poetry.’ Gamache was just about to quote from one of his favorites, feeling himself a pimply youth in front of a matinee idol. Ruth was backing up, trying to get out of the way of her own beautiful words coming toward her.

  ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ said Clara, to two people apparently maniacally happy to see her. ‘But did you say, “he”?’

  ‘He?’ repeated Gamache.

  ‘He? The notary.’

  ‘Yes. Maître Stickley in Williamsburg. He was Miss Neal’s notary.’

  ‘Are you sure? I thought she saw that notary who just had a baby. Solange someone-or-other.’

  ‘Solange Frenette? From exercise class?’ Myrna asked.

  ‘That’s her. Jane said he and Timmer were off to see her about wills.

  Gamache stood very still, staring at Clara.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Frankly? No. I seem to remember her saying that because I asked Jane how Solange was feeling. Solange would have been in her first trimester. Morning sickness. She just had her baby, so she’s on maternity leave.’

  ‘I suggest one of you get in touch with Maître Frenette as soon as possible.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ said Clara, suddenly wanting to drop everything and hurry home to call. But there was something that had to be done first.

  The ritual was simple and time-worn. Myrna led it, having grounded herself with a full lunch of casseroles and bread. Very important, she explained to Clara, to feel grounded before a ritual. Looking at her plate Clara thought there wasn’t much chance she’d fly away. Clara examined the twenty or so faces gathered in a cluster on the village green, many of them apprehensive. The farm women stood in a loose semi-circle of woolen sweaters and mitts and toques, staring at this huge black woman in a bright green cape. The Jolly Green Druid.

  Clara felt perfectly relaxed and at home. Standing in the group she closed her eyes, took a few deep breaths and prayed for the grace to let go of the anger and fear that hung around her, like black funeral crepe. This ritual was designed to end that, to turn the dark into light, to banish the hate and fear and invite the trust and warmth back.

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