by Louise Penny
Inside the St-Laurent Bar he paused. Ahead of him was the circular wooden bar and around it tables and the huge windows. Open fires roared in the two hearths.
But this wasn’t where he was expected.
Glancing to his right Gamache was surprised to see a door, one he’d never noticed before. Opening it he walked into a bright and airy side room, almost a solarium, with its own lit fireplace.
Whoever had been talking stopped as he entered. A dozen faces looked at him. All elderly, all white, all male. They were seated on the comfortable floral sofas and in wing chairs and armchairs. He’d been expecting something more formal, a boardroom, a long table, a lectern.
He’d also been expecting that the meeting wouldn’t have started. It was 1:25. Émile had said they started at 1:30 but it seemed clear the meeting was well under way.
Gamache glanced at Émile, who smiled then broke eye contact.
“Bonjour,” said the Chief Inspector. “I hope I’m not disturbing you.”
“Not at all.” René Dallaire, as large and affable as the last time they met, greeted him. Others got to their feet as well. Gamache made the rounds, shaking hands, smiling greetings.
Everyone was cordial, pleasant, and yet he had the impression there was tension in the room, as though he’d interrupted an argument.
“Now, you wanted to speak with us?” Monsieur Dallaire said, indicating a large chair.
“Yes. It will come as no surprise that it’s about the death of Augustin Renaud.” Gamache sat down. There were sympathetic nods from some, others just stared, wary. While this wasn’t exactly a secret society, it did seem secretive.
“Actually, I’d like to start off by talking about Charles Chiniquy.”
That brought the reaction he was expecting. A few sat up in their seats, more than a few looked at each other then back to Gamache with some annoyance.
Once again René Dallaire took the lead. “Forgive me, Monsieur Gamache, but you do realize we’re not a general historical society?”
“Oui, merci, I know that you’re the Société Champlain.” As he said it something twigged. The Société Champlain. “But my story begins neither with Samuel de Champlain nor with Augustin Renaud, but somewhere in between. In 1869, to be exact, with Father Chiniquy.”
“He was a nut,” one elderly man said from the back.
“So you do know him,” said Gamache. “Yes, he was a nut to some, a hero to others. He was something else entirely in our story.”
Gamache glanced at Émile, who was looking out the window. Distancing himself from what was about to happen? Gamache wondered.
“Father Chiniquy was famous for one thing,” said the Chief. “He wanted to save alcoholics. To do that he went to where he’d find them. In the Québec of the 1860s that was rue du Petit-Champlain, directly below us.”
Indeed, if he could throw himself out that window with enough force he’d sail over the Dufferin Terrace and land on rue du Petit-Champlain below. Now a charming, cobbled street filled with lace stores and cafés and tourist shops, but back then it was the notorious Basse-Ville. Filled with drunks and blackguards and prostitutes, filled with sewage and disease.
Filled with poor French workers and Irish immigrants. And a fallen priest determined to save them and maybe himself.
“One summer’s evening Chiniquy was in a bar scouting souls when he overheard a conversation between two Irishmen. Patrick and O’Mara. They’d been hired as diggers in the Upper Town to hack out a basement under an old building. There were more than twenty laborers on the site, but it was Patrick and O’Mara who made the discovery. They found something they believed might be valuable.”
Despite themselves the members of the Société Champlain had grown interested. A few still looked annoyed and impatient but even they were listening. Only Émile continued to stare out the window.
What was he thinking? Gamache wondered. Did he see what was coming, know what was coming?
But it didn’t matter. It was too late.
“Chiniquy listened to the two men and as he listened he grew more interested. Finally he joined them. The men, knowing who Chiniquy was, weren’t overly welcoming at first but once the priest offered to buy them drinks they warmed up. And after a few more drinks they told him what they’d found.
“It was a coffin. At first Chiniquy was disappointed. Old Quebec City was practically built on coffins, built on bones. Not finding one would have been unusual. Surely these workers knew that. But this one was different, they said, it was heavy.
“The two men figured this was not only unusual but perhaps even valuable. They’d dragged it from the work site down the hill to Patrick’s home. His wife refused to have it inside. He insisted, but knew he couldn’t keep it there for long. The home was little more than a shack, and already crowded with Patrick, his wife and six kids. Now there was also a dead man.”
Gamache examined his audience. They were all listening now, including Émile. They could see the scene, as could Gamache. The trampled and discouraged Irish woman. Having survived the harrowing voyage to her New World, she’d found it even worse than the humiliation and famine she’d fled and, as though life wasn’t difficult enough, her husband had brought a corpse home from work.
“The men set about opening it, carefully prying the sealed lid off,” Gamache continued the story. “Imagining why it was so heavy. It must, they felt, be filled with gold, with jewelry, with silver. This must be the coffin of a very rich person. But once opened, they were sorely disappointed. There was nothing inside except a ratty old book, a bible, and some remains. Bones and bits of clothing. It was heavy because it was lead-lined.”
There was a small stir in the room. Did they know where this was headed?
“Patrick and O’Mara had been in the bar discussing how best to strip the lead, sell it then dump the body into the river, the bible with it. They couldn’t read, so it was useless. Chiniquy asked to see the bible. At that stage the men grew wary. Then the priest tried another tack. If they would bring the coffin and the bible to the Literary and Historical Society the next night, Chiniquy could promise them a small reward.
“Why? the men had asked.
“Because they collect everything historic, especially books. This coffin might be old, Chiniquy reasoned.
“Patrick and O’Mara were already half drunk and didn’t really care. If there was money they’d be there. The next night they showed up and were met by Father Chiniquy and another man. James Douglas.”
“Is there a point to this?” one of the members of the Société Champlain asked.
“Please, Benoît,” René Dallaire looked pained. “Civility.”
“I’ll be civil when he stops wasting my time.”
“There is a point, monsieur, and we’re almost there,” said Gamache. He could feel his phone buzzing but couldn’t very well look at it now. “I’m sure you’ve heard of Dr. Douglas?”
There were nods.
“He opened the coffin and examined the contents while Father Chiniquy looked at the bible. Then James Douglas made a mistake. He offered Patrick and O’Mara five hundred dollars each. Chiniquy was furious, but said nothing. The workers immediately knew something was up. That was a small fortune, way too much for the remains of some long-dead guy and a ratty old bible.
“They refused, insisting on one thousand dollars each, and they got it but only after Douglas had secured their pledge of secrecy and found out where they lived. The Irishmen, who hated the English, also feared them. They knew what lay behind the civilized veneer. They knew what an Englishman was capable of, if crossed. Patrick and O’Mara agreed, then carried the coffin to the basement and left.”
His phone buzzed again. Still Gamache ignored it.
“How do you know all this?” someone asked.
“Because I found this.”
Gamache bent down to his satchel and removed a black leather book. As he held it he looked at Émile who looked surprised, and something else. Was that a small
“It’s Father Chiniquy’s journal for the year 1869. Augustin Renaud found it and recognizing its significance he hid it.”
“Where was it?” Émile asked.
“The library of the Literary and Historical Society,” said Gamache, staring at his mentor.
“Augustin Renaud hid the journal in a library?” asked René Dallaire.
“No,” clarified Gamache. “His murderer did.”
“Why’re you telling us all this?” Jean Hamel, slender and contained and sitting next to René Dallaire as always, asked.
“I think you know why,” said Gamache, looking the man directly in the eyes until Hamel lowered his.
“Where did you say the Irish workers were digging?” a member asked.
“I didn’t, but I can tell you. It was under the Old Homestead.”
The room grew very quiet. Everyone stared at Gamache.
“You found the other book, didn’t you,” said Émile into the silence.
“I did.”
Gamache reached into the satchel, now on his lap. The satchel he’d spent the last few hours protecting.
“Last year the Literary and Historical Society sold a number of boxes of books, boxes they hadn’t bothered to examine. Augustin Renaud bought some of them. When he went to see what he had he found they were from the collection of Father Charles Chiniquy. Not very promising, for a Champlain scholar—”
The use of the word “scholar” brought some harrumphs.
“—so he didn’t hurry to read them. But eventually, scanning them, he came across something extraordinary. He made mention of it in his own diary, but in true Renaud fashion he was”—Gamache searched for the word—“guarded.”
“Don’t you mean demented?” asked Jean Hamel. “Nothing he said or wrote can be trusted.”
“No, I mean guarded. And he was quite right. What he’d found was staggering.”
Gamache withdrew another black leather book. This one was larger, thicker than the first. Frayed and brittle, but in good condition. It had not seen the sun for hundreds of years then, dug up, it had sat anonymously on the bookshelves of Father Chiniquy’s home for thirty years until his death.
“This,” Gamache held up the book, “was Father Chiniquy’s secret, and in the end the secret had died with him so that when his housekeeper packaged up his books and sent them to the Lit and His more than a century ago, no one knew what treasures they contained.
“In reading Chiniquy’s journals Augustin Renaud found the report of the fateful encounter one July evening in 1869. And among the many religious books, the hymnals, the sermons, the family bibles in the box of used books he found this.”
Gamache laid his large hand on the plain leather cover, barely recognizable for what it was.
Once again his phone buzzed. It was his private line. Few knew the number, but it hadn’t stopped ringing for the past ten minutes.
“May I?” Émile reached out.
“Oui.” Gamache stood and handed the book to his mentor and watched as Émile did exactly what he himself had done an hour earlier. Exactly what he imagined Augustin Renaud had done a month ago. What Father Chiniquy had done a century ago.
Émile opened the simply tooled leather book to the inscription page.
There was a sharp intake of breath then Émile sighed and with the sigh two words escaped. “Bon Dieu.”
“Yes,” said the Chief. “Good God.”
“What is it?” Jean Hamel asked, stepping out from the convenient shadow of his friend René. It was clear now who was the real leader of the Société Champlain.
“They’d found Champlain,” said Émile, staring at Gamache. It wasn’t a question, it was beyond question. “It was Champlain’s coffin the Irish workers found beneath the Old Homestead.”
“Ridiculous,” said the ornery member. “What would Champlain be doing buried under the Old Homestead? We all know he was either buried in the chapel, which burned, or in the cemetery, not hundreds of yards away in a field.”
“Champlain was a Huguenot,” said Émile, his voice barely audible. “A Protestant.” He held out the book. A bible.
“But that’s impossible,” snapped Jean. There was a hubbub of agreement. Hands snatched at the bible and the uproar subsided as it made the rounds and the men saw the evidence.
Samuel de Champlain, inscribed in ink. The date, 1578.
It was an original Huguenot bible, a rare find. Most had been destroyed in the various Inquisitions, burned along with their owners. It was a dangerous book, to the church and to whoever possessed it.
Champlain must have been a devout man indeed to have kept such a thing, and to have been buried with it.
The room was quiet, just the mumbling and crackling of the fire. Gamache took the bible back and replacing it in his satchel along with Chiniquy’s journal he said, “Excusez-moi,” to the group lost in their own thoughts, and left the room.
Outside he took the call and noticed there’d been twenty-seven calls from a variety of people. Reine-Marie, his son Daniel and daughter Annie. From Superintendents Brunel and Francoeur and Agent Isabelle Lacoste. From various friends and colleagues, and from Jean-Guy Beauvoir whose call was now coming in.
“Bonjour, Jean-Guy. What’s happened?”
“Chief, where’ve you been?”
“In a meeting, what’s going on?”
“There’s a video, gone viral on the Internet. I just heard about it from Peter Morrow, then Lacoste called and a few friends. More calls are coming in. I haven’t seen it yet.”
“What is it?” But even as he asked he could guess, and felt a sickening feeling in his stomach.
“It’s from the tapes, the ones recorded at the raid.”
Everyone had worn tiny cameras integrated into their headsets, to record what happened. Investigators had long realized a verbal debrief wasn’t enough. Even well-intentioned cops would forget details, especially in the heat of the moment, and if things went badly, as they often did, cops could stop being “well intentioned” and start lying.
This made lying harder, though not impossible.
Each camera showed what each officer saw, and what each officer did, and what each officer said. And, like any film, it could be edited.
“Chief?” Beauvoir asked.
“I see.” He felt like Beauvoir sounded. Upset, suddenly exhausted, bewildered that anyone would do this and that anyone would want to see such a thing. It was a violation, especially for the families. His officers’ families.
“I’ll call,” he said.
“I can, if you’d like.”
“No, merci. I’ll do it.”
“Who would do this?” Beauvoir asked. “Who even has access to the tapes?”
Gamache lowered his head. Was it possible?
He’d been told there were three gunmen. But there’d been more, many more. Gamache had assumed it was a mistake. Dreadful, but unintentional.
He’d doubled the number of suspects, and assumed instead of three there were six.
Knowing that to be on the safe side.
He’d been wrong.
He’d brought six agents with him. Chosen them. Handpicked. And he’d brought Inspector Beauvoir. But not Agent Yvette Nichol. She’d stood there, her tactical vest already on. Her pistol on her belt. Her eyes keen. She would go with them into the factory. The place she’d found by following the sounds. By listening more closely than she’d ever listened in her life.
To the trains. To their frequency. To their cadence. Freight trains. A passenger train. A plane overhead. A hoot in the background. A factory.
And whispers. Ghosts in the background.
Three of them, she’d said.
With Inspector Beauvoir’s furious help they’d narrowed and narrowed. Winnowed, whittled. Pored over train timetables, over flight paths, over factories old enough to still use whistles.
Until they knew where Agent Paul Morin was being held.
But there was another goal. The La Grande dam. To save the young agent would be to alert the suspects that their plot against the dam had been discovered. And if they realized that they might destroy it right away, before the tactical squad could be moved into place.
No. A choice had to be made. A decision had to be made.
Gamache could see Agent Nichol standing by the door. Ready. And her rage when told his decision.
“Are you going to watch?” Beauvoir asked.
Gamache thought. “Yes. You?”
“Maybe.” He also paused. “Yes.” There was a silence as both men considered what that meant. “Oh, God,” sighed Beauvoir.
“When you do, don’t be alone,” said Gamache.
“I wish—”
“So do I,” said Gamache. They both wished the same thing. That if they had to relive it, they could at least be together.
Sitting heavily in one of the leather wing chairs of the St-Laurent Bar, Chief Inspector Gamache asked for a glass of water and called Reine-Marie.
“I was trying to get you.” She sounded stressed, upset.
“I know, I’m sorry, I’ve been in a meeting. Jean-Guy just told me. How did you hear?”
“Daniel called from Paris. A colleague told him. Then Annie called. It apparently appeared about noon and has gone wild. Journalists have been calling for the past half hour. Armand, I’m so sorry.”
He heard the strain in her voice and he could have happily killed whoever had done this. Forcing Reine-Marie to relive it, forcing Annie and Daniel and Enid Beauvoir. And worse. The families of those who died.
He wanted to reach down the line and hold Reine-Marie, hug her to him. Rock her and tell her it would be all right, that this was just a phantom from the past. The worst was over.
But was it?
“When will you be home?”
“By tomorrow.”
“Who would do this, Armand?”
“I don’t know. I need to watch it, but you don’t. Can you wait until I come home? If you still want to see it we can watch together.”
“I’ll wait,” she said. She could wait.
She remembered fragments of that day. Armand hadn’t been home. Isabelle Lacoste had contacted her and explained the Chief was working on a case and couldn’t even, in fact, speak with her. Not for a day.
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