Glass Houses

CHAPTER 4

“Now?” asked Matheo Bissonette, turning from the window to look at Lea. They’d finished breakfast at the B&B and now sat in the living room in front of the fireplace.

Despite the fire in the grate, and the sweater he wore, he still felt chilled.

“He just took a photo of the thing,” said Matheo. “If we wait much longer, it looks bad.”

“Bad?” said Lea. “Don’t you mean worse?”

“We should’ve said something yesterday,” said Patrick. His voice, slightly whiny at the best of times, was now almost infantile. “They’ll wonder why we didn’t.”

“Okay,” said Matheo, trying not to snap at Patrick. “Then we’re agreed. Now’s the time.”

It wasn’t what Patrick said that was so annoying, it was how he said it. He’d always been the weakest of them, and yet, somehow, Patrick always got his way. Maybe they just wanted the whining to stop, thought Matheo. It was like nails on a blackboard. So they gave in to him.

And, with age, it was getting worse. Matheo now felt like not just yelling at the guy, but also giving him a swift kick in the pants.

Gabri had brought in a fresh French press of coffee and asked, “Where’s Katie?”

“There’s a glass house nearby,” said Patrick. “Not a classic one, like we make, but interesting. She wants to see it. Might work for the one we’re building on the Magdalen Islands.”

Gabri, who’d asked just to be polite, drifted, uninterested, back to the kitchen.

Matheo looked from his wife, Lea, to his friend Patrick. They were both exactly his age, thirty-three, but they appeared older, surely, than he did. The lines. The hint of gray. Had they always looked like that, or just since the robes and mask had appeared?

Lea, tall, willowy, when they’d met at university, was less willowy. She was now more like a maple. Rounded. Solid. He liked that. Felt more substantial. Less likely to weep.

They had two children, both at home with Lea’s parents. He knew that when they returned, it would be like walking into a ferret’s den. The kids, under the questionable influence of Lea’s mother, would have gone feral.

To be fair, it didn’t take much.

“Gamache’s in the bistro with his wife. Everyone’ll hear,” said Patrick. “Maybe we should wait.”

“But everyone should hear,” said Lea, getting up. “Right? Isn’t that the point?”

The friends weren’t looking at each other as they spoke. Or even at the mesmerizing fire in the grate. All three stared out the window of the B&B. At the village green. Deserted. Except for …

“Why don’t you stay here?” she said to Patrick. “We’ll go.”

Patrick nodded. He’d caught a chill yesterday, and his bones still felt it. He pulled his chair closer to the fire and poured a strong, hot coffee.

Armand Gamache wasn’t looking at the mesmerizing fire in the large open hearth of the bistro. He was staring out the leaded-glass window, with its flaws and slight distortions. At the cold November day and the thing on the village green.

It was as though a bell jar, like those put around dead and stuffed animals, had been placed over it. The robed figure stood completely alone, isolated, while around him the villagers went about their lives. Their movements circumscribed, dictated by the dark thing.

The villagers were pushed to the edge. Edgy. Glancing toward it and away.

Gamache shifted his gaze and saw Lea Roux and her husband, Matheo Bissonette, leaving the B&B, walking quickly through the chilly morning. Their breaths coming in puffs.

They arrived with a small commotion, rubbing their hands and arms. They hadn’t brought the right clothing, not expecting weather that was cold even for November.

“Bonjour,” said Lea, walking up to the Gamaches’ table.

Armand rose while Reine-Marie nodded and smiled.

“Mind if we join you?” asked Matheo.

“Please do.” Reine-Marie indicated the empty chairs.

“Actually,” said Lea, a little embarrassed, “I wonder if Myrna would mind if we talked in the bookstore? Would that be okay?”

Armand looked at Reine-Marie, both of them surprised by the suggestion. She got up.

“If it’s all right with Myrna, it’s fine with me,” she said. “Unless—”

She waved toward Armand, indicating perhaps they meant they just wanted to speak with him. She was used to that. Sometimes people had things they wanted to say to a cop, and did not want Madame Cop to hear.

“Non, non,” said Lea. “Please come. We’d like you to hear this too. See what you make of it.”

Picking up their coffees, and curious, the Gamaches followed Lea and Matheo into the bookstore.

Myrna didn’t mind at all.

“It’s a quiet morning,” she said. “Apparently Death standing vigil in the middle of the village isn’t good for business. I’ll alert the Chamber of Commerce.”

“Don’t leave,” said Lea. “We’d like your opinion too. Right, Matheo?”

It really wasn’t a question. Though he looked less sure, he recovered quickly and nodded.

“About what?” asked Myrna.

Lea waved them to take seats on the sofa and in the armchairs, as though it were her place. Far from taking offense, Myrna liked that Lea felt so at home. And there was nothing officious about the gesture. She made it feel inclusive rather than demanding.

When they were settled, Matheo put a bunch of papers on the pine coffee table.

Gamache looked at the pages, mostly articles from Spanish newspapers, in Spanish.

“Can you tell me what they’re about?”

“Sorry.” Matheo sorted through the pages. “I meant to put this one on top.”

It was pink and unmistakable. The Financial Times.

The front page article had the byline Matheo Bissonette. Gamache noted the date.

Eighteen months ago.

A photograph accompanied the article. It showed a man in a top hat and tails, carrying a briefcase with writing on it. The man looked both dapper and seedy.

Gamache put his glasses on and, along with Reine-Marie and Myrna, he leaned over the picture.

“What does it say on the briefcase?” asked Myrna.

“Cobrador del Frac,” said Matheo. “It means debt collector.”

Gamache was reading the article, but stopped and looked up over his half-moon glasses.

“Go on.”

“My parents live in Madrid. About a year and a half ago, my father emailed this article.” Matheo shuffled the printouts and found an article from another newspaper. “He’s always looking for things that might interest me. I’m a freelance journalist, as you know.”

Gamache nodded, his attention taken by the Spanish article, which also had a photo of the top-hat-and-tails debt collector.

“I pitched it to various papers and the Financial Times bought the story from me. So I went to Spain and did some research. The cobrador del frac is a particularly Spanish phenomenon, and with the financial crisis they’ve grown.”

“This man is a debt collector?” asked Reine-Marie.

“Oui.”

“Well, they sure look nicer than the debt collectors in North America,” said Myrna.

“They’re not what they appear,” said Matheo. “They’re not at all civilized or genteel. That’s more a disguise than a costume.”

“And what are they disguising?” asked Gamache.

“What it is they’re collecting,” said Matheo. “A collection agency here will repossess a car or a home or furniture. A cobrador del frac takes away something else entirely.”

“What?” asked Armand.

“Your reputation. Your good name.”

“How does he do that?” asked Reine-Marie.

“He’s hired to follow the debtor. Always keeping a distance, never speaking to the person, but always there.”

“Always?” she asked, while Armand listened, his eyebrows drawing together in unease.

“Always,” said Lea. “He stands outside your home, follows you to work. Stands outside your business. If you go to a restaurant or a party, he’s there.”

“But why? Surely there’re easier ways to collect on a bad debt?” said Reine-Marie. “A lawyer’s letter? The courts?”

“Those take time, and the Spanish courts are clogged with cases since the meltdown,” said Matheo. “It could be years, if ever, before someone pays up. People were getting away with terrible things, taking clients and partners and spouses for all they were worth, knowing they’d almost certainly never be made to pay it back. Scams were proliferating. Until someone remembered—”

He looked down at the photograph. Of a man in a top hat and tails. Only now did the Gamaches notice the man in the crowd, a distance ahead, hurrying forward but glancing back. A look of dread dawning.

And the cobrador del frac following. His face rigid, expressionless. Remorseless.

A corridor was opening through the crowd to let him pass.

“He shames people into paying their debts,” said Matheo. “It’s a terrible thing to see. At first it looks comical, but then it becomes chilling. I was in a restaurant in Madrid recently with my parents. A very nice one. Linens and silverware. Hushed tones. A place where high-level business is discreetly conducted. And a cobrador was standing out front. First the maitre d’ then the owner went out and tried to shoo him away. Even tried to shove him. But he just stood his ground. Holding that briefcase. Staring through the window.”

“Did you know who he was staring at?” Reine-Marie asked.

“Not at first, but the man eventually gave himself away. Got all flustered and angry. He went outside and screamed at him. But the cobrador didn’t react. And when the man stomped off, he just turned and quietly followed. I can’t tell you exactly why, but it was terrifying. I almost felt sorry for the man.”

“Don’t,” said Lea. “They deserve what they get. A cobrador del frac is only used in the most extreme cases. You’d have to have done something particularly bad to bring that on yourself.”

“Can anyone hire a cobrador?” asked Myrna. “I mean, how do they know there is a legitimate debt? Maybe they just want to humiliate.”

“The company screens,” said Matheo. “I’m sure there’re some abuses, but for the most part if you’re being followed by a cobrador, there’s good reason.”

“Armand?” Reine-Marie asked.

He was shaking his head, his eyes narrow.

“It feels like vigilante action,” he said. “Taking justice into their own hands. Condemning someone.”

“But there’s no violence,” said Lea.

“Oh, there’s violence,” said Gamache. And put his finger on the face of the terrified man. “Just not physical.”

Matheo was nodding.

“The thing is,” he said, “it’s very effective. The people almost always pay up, and quickly. And you have to remember, innocent people aren’t targeted. This isn’t the first action, it’s the last. It’s what people resort to when all else fails.”

“So,” said Gamache, looking at Matheo. “Are you considering bringing the cobrador del frac to Québec? Are you asking me if it would be legal?”

Matheo and Lea stared at Gamache, then Matheo laughed.

“Good God, no. I’m showing you this because Lea and I think that that”—he pointed out the window—“is a cobrador del frac.”

“A debt collector?” asked Gamache, and felt a slight frisson. Like the warning before a quake.

Lea was all eyes now, glancing swiftly from Armand to Reine-Marie to Myrna and back. Examining them for any hint of amusement. Or agreement. Or anything. But they were almost entirely expressionless. Their faces as blank as the thing on the village green.

Armand sat back in his chair and opened his mouth, before closing it again, while Reine-Marie turned and looked at Myrna.

Finally Armand leaned forward, toward Matheo, who leaned toward him.

“You do know that that”—he inclined his head toward the village green—“doesn’t look anything like this.” He nodded at the photograph.

“I know,” said Matheo. “When I was researching the article, I heard rumors of something else. Something older. Dating back centuries.” He also glanced over, then looked away, as though it was folly to stare at the thing too long. “The ancestor of the current cobrador. I’d hear whispers that the thing was still alive, in remote villages. In the mountains. But I could never find one, or find anyone who admitted hiring one.”

“And that original cobrador is different?” asked Reine-Marie.

“It’s still a collector, but the debt is different.”

“Degree of debt?” asked Gamache.

“Type of debt. One is financial, often ruinous,” said Matheo, looking at the photo on the table.

“The other is moral,” said Lea.

Matheo nodded. “An elderly man I spoke with in a village outside Granada had seen one, but only once, as a boy, and in the distance. It was following an old woman. They disappeared around a corner and he never saw either again. He wouldn’t speak on the record, but he did show me this.”

From his pocket, Matheo pulled a blurry photocopy of a blurry photograph.

“He took this with his Brownie camera.”

The image was grainy. Black and white.

It showed a steep, narrow street and stone walls that came right to the road. There was a horse and cart. And in the distance, at a corner, something else.

Gamache put his glasses back on and brought the paper up so that it almost touched his nose. Then he lowered it and handed it to Reine-Marie.

Removing his glasses, quietly, he folded them. All the while staring at Matheo.

The photo showed a robed, masked figure. Hood up. And in front of the dark figure there was a gray blur. A gray ghost, hurrying to get away.

“Taken near the end of the Spanish Civil War,” said Matheo. “I hate to think…”

There was no mistaking it. In the photo, almost a hundred years old, was the thing that now stood in the center of Three Pines.

“And did you believe it, Chief Superintendent?” asked the Crown.

His rank now seemed more a mockery in the mouth of the Crown than an advantage.

“It was hard to know, at that moment, what to believe. It seemed not only extraordinary but, frankly, incredible. That some sort of ancient Spanish debt collector had appeared in a small village in Québec. And I wouldn’t have believed it, had I not seen it for myself. The photograph and the real thing.”

“I understand you took that piece of paper Matheo Bissonette showed you.”

“I took a copy of it, yes.”

The Crown turned to the clerk.

“Exhibit B.”

The photograph of Three Pines that gray November morning was replaced by what looked, at first, like a Rorschach test. Blots of black and gray, the borders bleeding, uncertain.

And then it coalesced into an image.

“Is that it?”

“It is,” said Gamache.

“And is that what was on your village green?”

Gamache stared at the image, the collector of moral debts, and felt again that frisson.

“It is.”