Glass Houses

CHAPTER 10

“You told him to leave. You must’ve known then what would happen,” said the Crown Prosecutor. “There’d even been a death threat.”

“The man was enraged and provoked,” said Chief Superintendent Gamache. “People say things they don’t mean.”

“And people do things they later regret,” said the Crown. “When they’re angry. But it’s still done and can’t be undone. It might be manslaughter and not murder, but still a man would have been slaughtered. Surely your experience as head of homicide taught you that.”

“It has,” Gamache admitted.

“And still you didn’t act. If not then, when? What were you waiting for?”

Gamache looked into the face of the prosecutor, then at the crowd jammed into the stuffy courtroom. He knew how it sounded. How it probably would’ve sounded to him.

But there was nothing he could have done that would have been legal. Or effective.

What happened that November evening proved that the cobrador was having an effect.

Chief Superintendent Gamache had doubted what happened had been Marchand’s idea. He was fairly new to the village and hadn’t been any trouble, until that night. It seemed someone had gotten to him. Told him, either directly or through manipulation, to threaten the cobrador.

Gamache doubted that the goal was to kill the Conscience. More likely, it was to scare him away. After all, who wouldn’t run when faced with a poker-wielding madman?

Despite the cliché, the dead weren’t silent. They told all sorts of tales. If the cobrador had been killed, they’d have unmasked him, and found out who he was. And probably found out why he was there.

But if the cobrador had just run away, no one would ever know who he was, or why he was in Three Pines.

Or who he was there for.

Though the why was beginning to dawn on Gamache. It had come in the form of a tiny plastic bag.

The plague.

But the plan had failed. The Conscience hadn’t budged. Hadn’t even flinched. Had been willing to risk death, for his cause.

The Conscience knew something about someone in the village. And that someone was getting mighty rattled.

But none of this came out in court. The Crown Prosecutor didn’t ask, and Armand Gamache didn’t offer this information.

“Mr. Zalmanowitz,” said the judge, and the Crown Prosecutor approached the bench. “Monsieur Gamache is not on trial. Censor yourself.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

But he looked like he thought Gamache should be another defendant, and not a witness for the prosecution.

Beyond Zalmanowitz’s desk, reporters were madly taking notes.

There were, Judge Corriveau knew, many ways of being on trial. And different types of courts.

Chief Superintendent Gamache would be found guilty.

She turned her attention back to the Crown Prosecutor. That horse’s ass.

Judge Corriveau no longer even tried to repress her private thoughts. But she fought hard to keep them from creeping into her public utterances.

Therein lay a mistrial. And this case would indeed find itself in a higher court.

“How did it strike you,” the Crown asked, “when you saw Lea Roux come to the defense of the cobrador?”

“I would’ve been surprised to see anyone standing between a man swinging a fireplace poker and his target.”

“And yet, that’s what you were planning to do, wasn’t it?”

“I’m trained.”

“Oh yes, I keep forgetting.”

That brought a round of appreciative chuckles from the crowd and a tap of the gavel from Judge Corriveau, who wished it could have been on top of the Crown’s head.

“I knew Madame Roux,” said Gamache. “Her rise in politics. It’s a fierce arena, especially in Québec.”

“Did you think it was a stunt, then? To gain political capital?”

“If it had been that, she’d have sided with the mob, don’t you think?” asked Gamache. “A populist feeding anger and fear is more likely to get elected. If that’s what she was after, I doubt she’d have protected the outsider, the intruder.”

That shut the Crown up and brought a slight snort from above Gamache and to his left.

“I began to say that I knew Madame Roux by reputation. In my position I have a lot of dealings with senior government officials, elected and appointed. You hear things in the halls of the National Assembly, in the chat before committees sit down to business. Lea Roux had a reputation for being fierce, but also principled. A potent combination. She’d brought forward many progressive bills in the National Assembly, often against her leader’s wishes.”

“So she would choose her principles over her career?” asked the Crown.

“It would appear so.”

Though Gamache’s time in homicide had taught him something else. Appearances could not be trusted.

“That was a very brave thing you did,” said Clara, when they’d returned to the Gamaches’ home.

“Can you believe it worked?” asked Lea, her eyes wide, her face flushed despite just coming in from the cold.

Reine-Marie had invited Lea and Matheo to join them for dinner.

Lea was on a high after confronting the mob. Adrenaline. Something Gamache knew a lot about.

The pounding heart. The effort to keep terror in check. Standing your ground. The body taut, the mind whirring.

And then it was over. But the adrenaline still coursed, like a drug, through the body. They were all feeling it, but none more than Lea. The first to make the stand.

“Shame Patrick and Katie can’t join us,” said Reine-Marie, walking with them into the kitchen. “I saw them driving away earlier this evening.”

“They’re having dinner at Le Relais in Knowlton,” said Lea. “Steak-frites night. Missed all the fun.”

“Though I don’t think Patrick would’ve been much help, do you?” asked Matheo.

It was perhaps true, thought Gamache, who’d also picked up on Patrick’s timidity. But it didn’t need to be said, especially by a friend.

But then, maybe Patrick wasn’t really a friend. Anymore. They seemed to be spending less time together this visit than in the past.

“This looks delicious,” said Reine-Marie, ladling out the stew Olivier had brought. “Merci.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Come on, tell them the truth,” said Gabri, taking a warm dinner roll, substituted for the baguette. “He didn’t make it. Anton did.”

“The dishwasher?” asked Matheo, looking at the stew with some suspicion.

The chicken was tender, delicately seasoned. The stew was complex. Familiar, but exotic.

“It’s all things he collected in the woods,” said Myrna. “Nouveau Québec cuisine. That’s what he wants to create.”

“The dishwasher?” Matheo repeated.

“We all have to start somewhere,” said Myrna.

“How long’s he been here?” asked Lea. “I don’t remember him from our last visit.”

“And he is memorable,” said Clara, thinking of the lithe young man with the floppy hair and ready smile.

“He arrived a couple months ago,” said Gabri. “He and Jacqueline were working together in some home and both lost their jobs.”

“Home, like seniors’ home?” asked Lea.

“No,” said Olivier. “Home like private home. She was a nanny, I think, and he was their private chef.”

“Some home,” said Matheo.

“Are you enjoying your new job, Armand?” asked Lea.

“‘Enjoying’ is perhaps not the word,” he said. “I’m just trying not to be overwhelmed. Let me ask you something. When you were first elected a couple of years ago, you sponsored a bill, one you felt strongly about, if I remember.”

“That’s right. Most new members have some legislation they’re personally attached to. Most are defeated.”

“Was yours?” asked Clara.

“It was. A bill to end overcrowding in emergency wards.”

“Actually, it was about the war on drugs,” said Armand.

“Oh, yeah, that’s right.”

“I read your bill closely,” said Gamache. “I was head of homicide at the time and a huge percentage of the crime, of the killings, in Québec are drug-related.”

“And what did you think?”

“I thought it offered creative solutions to an obviously failing situation.”

“Then why did her bill fail?” asked Gabri.

“A number of reasons,” said Gamache.

Senior Sûreté officers on the take. Corruption in government. The cartels getting more and more powerful and calling the shots.

But he wouldn’t say any of that to them. Though there was one reason that he could discuss.

“It might seem trivial, but one reason is that you named the bill after someone. I can’t remember who.”

“Edouard,” said Lea. “And why was that a problem?”

“It made it feel like a personal crusade by a member trying to make her mark, and not a sweeping solution to a growing social threat.”

“Other bills are named for people,” said Clara. “Lots of them.”

“Absolutely, but those that succeed already have broad public support. Their sponsors have done their legwork. Gotten the media, the public and fellow politicians behind them. You”—he turned to Lea—“did not.”

“True. If politics is an art, I was finger-painting.”

“So who was Edouard?” asked Reine-Marie.

“He was our roommate at Université de Montréal,” said Matheo.

“We all hung out,” said Lea. “Edouard was one of the crowd.”

“A little more than that, wouldn’t you say?” said Matheo.

Even in the candlelight they could see her color rise.

“I had a small crush on him,” said Lea. “We all did. Even you, I think.”

Matheo laughed and grinned. “He was very attractive.”

“What happened to him?” asked Myrna.

“Can’t you guess?” said Matheo.

There was a lull in the conversation.

“He must’ve been young,” said Clara, at last.

“Not even twenty,” said Lea. “He jumped off the roof of the residence. Fifteen stories up. Down. Stoned. It was a long time ago.”

“Not so long,” said Matheo. “We were all very proud that the first thing Lea did when elected was propose La loi Edouard.”

Edouard’s Law.

“It failed,” said Lea.

“But at least you tried,” said Gamache. “And now you’ve learned so much more about the process. Have you considered reentering your bill? Perhaps we can work together to craft an effective bill.”

“I look forward to that,” said Lea.

Gamache waited, then sat back in his chair. Considering.

Lea Roux had been polite, but did not seem all that interested in working with the head of the Sûreté to stop drug trafficking.

And why would that be, he asked himself. And why would she have apparently forgotten that her very first bill, her priority, was Edouard’s Law?

Appearances, again. Like the thing on the village green. They cloaked what was underneath.