How the Light Gets In: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel

by Louise Penny

  Myrna had described Constance as lonely. Is this why? Had she been alone and lonely all her life, from before her first breath even?

  Sold by her parents, excluded by her sisters. What would that do to a person? Could it twist her into something grotesque? Pleasant, smiling, the same as all the others on the outside, but hollow on the inside?

  Gamache had to remind himself that Constance was the victim, not a suspect. But he also remembered the police report on the first sister’s death. Virginie had fallen down the stairs. Or maybe, he thought, been pushed.

  The sisters had entered into a conspiracy of silence. Myrna assumed it was in reaction to the extreme glare of publicity they’d suffered as children, but now Chief Inspector Gamache wondered if there was another reason for their silence. Something from within their own household, not from outside.

  And yet, he had the impression that seventy-seven-year-old Constance was returning to Three Pines, to Myrna, and bringing with her not simply the only photo that existed of the grown-up girls, but also the story of what really happened in that home.

  But Constance was killed before she could say anything.

  “She’d have brought it on herself, of course,” said Jérôme.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, she killed her sister.”

  Gamache gawked. How could Jérôme possibly know that, or know Gamache’s suspicions?

  “The reason she was alone in the sac. There were almost certainly six of them, two to a sac, but the singleton would have killed and absorbed her twin,” Jérôme explained. “Happens all the time.”

  “Why do you want to know all this, Armand?” Thérèse asked.

  “There’s been no public announcement, but the last Quint, Constance Ouellet, was murdered two days ago. She was preparing to come down here, to Three Pines.”

  “Here?” asked Jérôme. “Why?”

  Gamache told them. He could tell, as he spoke, that this was more than another death to them, even more than another murder. There was an added weight to this tragedy, as though Thérèse and Jérôme had lost someone they knew and cared about.

  “Hard to believe they’re all gone,” said Thérèse, then she thought about it. “But they never seemed completely real. They were like statues. Looked human but weren’t.”

  “Myrna Landers said it was like finding out her friend was a unicorn, or a Greek goddess. Hera, come to earth.”

  “An interesting thing to say,” said Thérèse. “But how did this get to be your case, Armand? Constance Ouellet was found in Montréal. It would be the jurisdiction of the Montréal police.”

  “True, but Marc Brault handed it to me when he realized there was a connection.”

  “Lucky you,” said Jérôme.

  “Lucky all of us,” said Gamache. “If not for that, we wouldn’t be in this home.”

  “Which brings us to another issue,” said Jérôme. “Now that we’re here, how are we going to get out?”

  “The plan?” asked Gamache.

  They nodded.

  The Chief paused to gather his thoughts.

  Jérôme knew now would be the time to tell them what he’d found. The name. He’d only just glimpsed it in the moment before he realized he’d been caught. In the moment before he’d run. Run away. Back down the virtual corridor. Slamming doors, erasing his trail. Running, running.

  He’d only just glimpsed it. And, thought Jérôme, maybe he got it wrong. In his panic, he must have gotten it wrong.

  “Our only hope is to find out what Francoeur’s doing and stop it. And to do that we have to get you reconnected to the Internet,” Gamache said. “And not dial-up. It needs to be high-speed.”

  “Yes,” said Thérèse, exasperated. “We know that. But how? There is no high-speed here.”

  “We create our own transmission tower.”

  Thérèse Brunel sat back and stared. “Have you hit your head, Armand? We can’t do that.”

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “Well, beside the fact it would take months and require all sorts of expertise, don’t you think someone would notice we were building a tower?”

  “Ahh, they’d notice that, but I didn’t say ‘build,’ I said ‘create.’” Gamache got up and walked to the kitchen window. He pointed, past the village green, past the three huge pine trees, past the homes covered in snow. And up the hill.

  “What’re we looking at?” Jérôme asked. “The hill over the village? We could put a tower on it, but again, that would take expertise.”

  “And time,” said Thérèse.

  “But the tower’s already there,” said Gamache, and they looked again. Finally Thérèse turned to him, astonished.

  “You mean the trees,” she said.

  “C’est ça,” said Gamache. “They make a natural tower. Jérôme?”

  Gamache turned to the rotund man, wedged between the armchair and the window. His back to them. Staring up and out of the village.

  “It might work,” he said, uncertainly. “But we’d need someone to put a satellite dish on a tree.”

  They walked back to the breakfast table.

  “There must be people who work with trees around here—what’re they called?” Thérèse’s city mind stumbled over itself. “Lumberjacks or something? We could get one of them to climb up with a dish. And from that height I bet we could find a transmission tower using line-of-sight. And from there we connect with a satellite.”

  “But where do we find a satellite dish?” Jérôme asked. “It can’t be a regular one. It needs to be some satellite dish that can’t be traced.”

  “Let’s say we do get online,” said Thérèse, her mind racing ahead, “we’d have another problem. We can’t use the Sûreté log-ins to get into the system, Francoeur would be looking for those. So how do we get back in?”

  Gamache placed a piece of notepaper on the wooden table.

  “What is it?” Thérèse asked.

  But Jérôme knew. “It’s an access code. But using what network?”

  Gamache turned the paper over.

  “La Bibliothèque nationale,” said Thérèse, recognizing the logo. “The national archives of Québec. Reine-Marie works there, doesn’t she?”

  “Oui. I did my research on the Ouellet Quints yesterday at the Bibliothèque nationale and I remembered Reine-Marie saying that the archive network goes all over the province, into the smallest library and into the massive archives at the universities. It’s connected to every publicly funded library.”

  “It also goes into the Sûreté archives,” said Thérèse. “The files of all the old cases.”

  “It’s our way in,” said Jérôme, his eyes glued to the bit of paper and the logo. “Is it Reine-Marie’s? A code belonging to Reine-Marie Gamache would trip an alarm.”

  He knew he was looking for reasons this wouldn’t work, because he knew what was waiting on the other side of that electronic door. Prowling. Pacing. Looking for him. Waiting for him to do something stupid. Like go back in.

  “I thought of that,” said Gamache, his voice reassuring. “It belongs to someone else. She’s one of the supervisors, so no one will question if that code is logged on.”

  “I think it might work.” Thérèse’s voice was low, afraid to tempt the Fates.

  Gamache pushed himself out of the chair. “I’m off to see Ruth Zardo, then I need to head in to Montréal. Can you speak with Clara Morrow and see if she knows anyone who puts up satellite dishes?”

  “Armand,” said Thérèse at the door, as he collected his car keys and put on his coat and gloves. “You must know that you might’ve solved two ends of the problem. The satellite connection and the access codes, but how do we get from one to the other? The whole middle part is missing. We’ll need cables and computers and someone to connect it all.”

  “Yes, that’s a problem. I might have an idea about that though.”

  Superintendent Brunel thought Gamache looked even unhappier about the solution than the problem.
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  After the Chief Inspector left, Thérèse Brunel walked back into the kitchen and found her husband sitting at the table, staring at his now cold breakfast.

  “The worm has turned,” she announced, joining him at the table.

  “Yes,” said Jérôme, and thought that was a perfect description of them.

  EIGHTEEN

  “You lied to me.”

  “You sound like a schoolgirl,” said Ruth Zardo. “Are your feelings all hurt? I know what’ll help. Scotch?”

  “It’s ten in the morning.”

  “I was asking, not offering. Did you bring Scotch?”

  “Of course I didn’t.”

  “Well then, why’re you here?”

  Armand Gamache was trying to remember that himself. Ruth Zardo had the strange ability to muddle even the clearest goal.

  They sat in her kitchen, on white plastic preform chairs, at a white plastic table, all salvaged from a Dumpster. He’d been there before, including at the oddest dinner party he’d ever attended, where he’d been far from certain they’d all survive.

  But this morning, while maddening, was at least predictable.

  Anyone who placed himself within Ruth’s orbit, and certainly within her walls, and wasn’t prepared for dementia had only himself to blame. What often came as a surprise to people was that the dementia would be theirs, not Ruth’s. She remained sharp, if not clear.

  Rosa slept in her nest made from an old blanket, on the floor between Ruth and the warm oven. Her beak was tucked into her wing.

  “I came for the Bernard book, on the Quints,” he said. “And for the truth about Constance Ouellet.”

  Ruth’s thin lips pursed, as though stuck between a kiss and a curse.

  “Long dead and buried in another town,” Gamache quoted, conversationally, “my mother hasn’t finished with me yet.”

  The lips unpursed. Flatlined. Her entire face went limp, and for a moment Gamache was afraid she was having a stroke. But the eyes remained sharp.

  “Why did you say that?” she asked.

  “Why did you write that?” He brought a slim volume out of his satchel and placed it on the plastic table. Her eyes rested on it.

  The cover was faded and torn. It was blue. Just blue, no design or pattern. And on it was written Anthology of New Canadian Poetry.

  “I picked this up from Myrna’s store last night.”

  Ruth lifted her eyes from the book to the man. “Tell me what you know.”

  He opened the book and found what he was looking for. “Who hurt you once, so far beyond repair that you would greet each overture / with curling lip? You wrote those words.”

  “Yes, so? I’ve written a lot of words.”

  “This was the first poem of yours to be published, and it remains one of your most famous.”

  “I’ve written better.”

  “Perhaps, but few more heartfelt. Yesterday, when we were talking about Constance’s visit, you said she told you who she was. You also said you didn’t ask her any more questions. Alas.”

  She met his eyes, then her face cracked into a weary smile. “I thought maybe you’d picked up on that.”

  “This poem is called ‘Alas.’” He closed the book and quoted by heart, “Then shall forgiven and forgiving meet again / or will it be, as always was, / too late?”

  Ruth held her head erect as though facing an attack. “You know it?”

  “I do. And I think Constance knew it too. I know the poem because I love it. She knew it because she loved the person who’d inspired it.”

  He opened the book again and read the dedication, “For V.”

  He carefully placed it on the table between them.

  “You wrote ‘Alas’ for Virginie Ouellet. The poem was published in 1959, the year after her death. Why did you write it?”

  Ruth was quiet. She bent her head and looked at Rosa, then she dropped her thin, blue-veined hand and stroked Rosa’s back.

  “They were my age, you know. Almost exactly. Like them, I grew up in the Depression and then the war. We were poor, my parents struggled. They had other things on their mind than an awkward, unhappy daughter. So I turned inward. Developed a rich imaginary life. In it, I was a Quint. The sixth quint,” she smiled at him, and her cheeks reddened a bit. “I know. Six quints. Didn’t make sense.”

  Gamache chose not to point out that that wasn’t the only leap of logic.

  “They always seemed so happy, so carefree,” Ruth went on.

  Her voice became distant and her face took on an expression Gamache had never seen before. Dreamy.

  *

  Thérèse Brunel followed Clara from the bright kitchen into her studio.

  They passed a ghostly portrait on an easel. A work-in-progress. Thérèse thought it might be a man’s face, but she wasn’t sure.

  Clara stopped in front of another canvas.

  “I’ve just started this one,” she said.

  Thérèse was eager to see it. She was a fan of Clara’s work.

  The two women stood side-by-side. One disheveled, in flannel and a sweatshirt, the other beautifully turned out in slacks, a silk blouse, a Chanel sweater and thin leather belt. They both held steaming mugs of tisane and stared at the canvas.

  “What is it?” Thérèse finally asked, after tilting her head this way and that.

  Clara snorted. “Who is it, you mean? It’s the first time I’ve done a portrait from memory.”

  Thérèse wondered how good Clara’s memory could be.

  “It’s Constance Ouellet,” Clara said.

  “Ah, oui?” Again Thérèse tilted her head, but no amount of twisting could make this look like one of the famous Quints. Or any other human. “She never finished sitting for you.”

  “Or started. Constance refused,” said Clara.

  “Really? Why?”

  “She didn’t say, but I think she didn’t want me to see too much, or reveal too much.”

  “Why did you want to paint her? Because she was a Quint?”

  “No, I didn’t know it then. I just thought she had an interesting face.”

  “What interested you? What did you see there?”

  “Nothing.”

  Now the Superintendent turned from her study of the canvas to study her companion.

  “Pardon?”

  “Oh, Constance was wonderful. Fun and warm and kind. A great dinner guest. She came here a couple of times.”

  “But?” Thérèse prompted.

  “But I never felt I got to know her better. There was a veneer over her, a sort of lacquer. It was as though she was already a portrait. Something created, but not real.”

  They stared at the blotch of paint on the canvas for a while.

  “I wonder if you could suggest someone to put up a satellite dish,” Thérèse asked, remembering her mission.

  “I can, but it won’t help.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Satellite dishes don’t work here. You can try rabbit ears, but the TV signal’s still pretty blurry. Most of us get our news from radio. If there’s a big event we go up to the inn and spa and watch their TV. I can lend you a good book though.”

  “Merci,” said Thérèse with a smile, “but if you could find the satellite person anyway that would be great.”

  “I’ll make some calls.” Clara left Thérèse alone in the studio contemplating the canvas, and the woman who’d been not quite real and now was dead.

  *

  Ruth held the volume of poetry in her thin hands, pressing it closed.

  “Constance came to me the first afternoon she was here. She said she liked my poetry.”

  Gamache grimaced. There were two things you never, ever, said to Ruth Zardo. We’re out of alcohol, and I like your poetry.

  “And what did you say to her?” he was almost afraid to ask.

  “What do you think I said?”

  “I’m sure you were gracious and invited her in.”

  “Well, I invited her to do something.”
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  “And did she?”

  “No.” Ruth sounded surprised still. “She stood at my front door and just said, ‘Thank you.’”

  “What did you do?”

  “Well, what could I do after that? I slammed the door in her face. Can’t say she didn’t ask for it.”

  “You were provoked beyond reason,” he said, and she gave him a keen, assessing look. “Did you know who she was?”

  “Do you think she said, ‘Hi, I’m a Quint. Can I come in?’ Of course I didn’t know who she was. I just thought she was some old fart who wanted something from me. So I got rid of her.”

  “And what did she do?”

  “She came back. Brought a bottle of Glenlivet. Apparently she’d had a word with Gabri over at Chez Gay. He told her the only way into my home was through a bottle of Scotch.”

  “A gap in your security system,” said Gamache.

  “She sat there.” Ruth pointed to his plastic chair. “And I sat here. And we drank.”

  “At what stage did she tell you who she was?”

  “She didn’t really. She told me I had the poem right. I asked her which poem and she quoted it to me. Like you did. Then she said that Virginie had felt exactly like that. I asked what Virginie she had in mind, and she said her sister. Virginie Ouellet.”

  “And that’s when you knew?” Gamache asked.

  “God, man, the fucking duck knew then.”

  Ruth got up and returned with the Bernard book on the Quints. She threw it on the table and sat back down.

  “Vile book,” she said.

  Gamache looked at the cover. A photograph, in black and white, of Dr. Bernard sitting in a chair, surrounded by the Ouellet Quints, about eight years of age, looking at him adoringly.

  Ruth was also looking at the cover. At the five little girls.

  “I used to pretend I was adopted out and one day they’d come and find me.”

  “And one day,” Gamache said quietly, “Constance did.”

  Constance Ouellet, at the end of her life, at the end of the road, had come to this falling-down old home, to this falling-down old poet. And here, finally, she’d found her companion.

  And Ruth had found her sister. At last.

  Ruth met his eyes, and smiled. “Or will it be, as always was / too late?”