A Fatal Grace

TWENTY-ONE

Dr Sharon Harris had just settled into her easy chair and ordered a Dubonnet when Gamache arrived, full of apologies and smiles. He joined her in a Dubonnet and sat down. They had a window seat, looking through the mullions at the frozen pond and Christmas trees. Over her shoulder he could see the fire crackling and playing in the hearth. Dr Harris was absently toying with a discreet white tag hanging from their table. She glanced at it.

‘Two hundred and seventy dollars.’

‘Not the Dubonnet, I hope.’ Gamache stopped his untouched drink partway to his mouth.

‘No.’ She laughed. ‘The table.’

‘Santé.’ He took a sip and smiled. He’d forgotten. Everything in the bistro was an antique, collected by Olivier. And everything was for sale. He could finish his drink and buy the cut crystal glass. It was, actually, a lovely glass. As he held it up and looked through it the crystal picked up and refracted the amber light from the fireplace, splitting it into parts. Like a very warm rainbow. Or the chakras, he thought.

‘Are you still looking to move here?’ he asked, bringing himself back to the table and catching her wistful gaze out the window.

‘If a place comes up I would, though when they do they get bought fast.’

‘The old Hadley home came up about a year ago.’

‘Except that place, though I have to admit I looked at the listing. Cheap. Almost gave it away.’

‘How much were they asking?’

‘I can’t remember exactly but it was less than a hundred thousand.’

‘C’est incroyable,’ said Gamache, taking a handful of cashews.

Dr Harris looked around the bistro, filling up with patrons. ‘No one seems too bothered by the murder. Not a popular woman, our victim?’

‘No, it seems not. She was the one who bought the Hadley house.’

‘Ahh,’ said Dr Harris.

‘Ahh?’ questioned Gamache.

‘Anyone who’d buy that house must have been insensitive in the extreme. I didn’t even like looking at its picture on the computer listing.’

‘People have different sensibilities.’ Gamache smiled.

‘True,’ she agreed, ‘but would you buy it?’

‘I don’t even like going in it,’ he whispered to her conspiratorially. ‘Gives me the willies. What’ve you got for me?’

Dr Harris leaned down and drew a dossier from her briefcase. Placing it on the table she took a handful of nuts, leaned back and looked out the window again, sipping her drink between salty mouthfuls.

Gamache put on his half-moon reading glasses and spent the next ten minutes going over the report, finally putting it down and taking a contemplative sip of Dubonnet.

‘Niacin,’ he said.

‘Niacin,’ she agreed.

‘Tell me about it.’

‘Besides the niacin she was a healthy, though perhaps underweight, forty-eight-year-old woman. She’d given birth. She was pre-menopausal. All very natural and normal. Her feet were charred from the shock and her hands were blistered, in the same pattern as the tubing of the chair. There was a tiny cut underneath that but it was old and healing. It’s all consistent with electrocution except for one thing. The niacin.’

Gamache leaned forward, taking his glasses from his face and tapping them gently on the manila folder. ‘What is it?’

‘A vitamin. One of the B complex.’ She leaned forward so that they were both talking over the table. ‘It’s prescribed for high cholesterol and some people take it thinking it can increase brain power.’

‘Can it?’

‘No evidence.’

‘Then why do they think that?’

‘Well, what it does produce is a facial flush, and I guess someone thought that meant blood was rushing to the brain and you know what that can only mean.’

‘More brain power.’

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ She shook her head in disdain. ‘Fitting that people with so little brain power would come to that conclusion. A normal dose is five milligrams. It’s enough to slightly raise the heart rate and the blood pressure. As I said, it’s often prescribed by doctors, but it’s also available over the counter. I don’t think you can overdose on it. In fact, it’s even put into some breakfast cereals. Niacin and thiamin.’

‘So if the normal dose is five, what did CC have in her?’

‘Twenty.’

‘Phew. That’s a lot of cereal.’

‘Captain Crunch a suspect?’

Gamache laughed, the wrinkles round his eyes falling into familiar folds.

‘What would twenty milligrams have done to her?’ he asked.

‘Produced quite a flush. A classic hot flash. Sweating, discoloration of her face.’ Dr Harris thought some more. ‘I’m not all that familiar with it so I looked it up in the pharmacopoeia guide. There’s nothing dangerous about niacin. Uncomfortable, yes, but not dangerous. If the person was hoping to kill her, he got it wrong.’

‘No, I think he got it just right. He did kill her, and niacin was an accomplice. CC de Poitiers was electrocuted, right?’

Dr Harris nodded.

‘And you more than anyone knows how hard that is.’

Again she nodded.

‘Especially in the middle of winter. She had to not just touch a power source, but she had to be standing in a puddle with metal boots and…’

He left it dangling. Dr Harris thought about it for a moment. Tried to see the scene in her mind. The woman standing in a puddle at the chair, reaching out – ‘Bare hands. She had to have bare hands. That’s how he did it. And I thought you’d asked for the extensive blood work in case of poisoning.’

‘The gloves. I kept asking myself, why did she take off her gloves? Why would anyone?’

‘Because she was hot,’ said Dr Harris. She loved her job but she envied Gamache and Beauvoir the ability to put all the pieces together.

‘Someone at the community breakfast slipped her enough niacin to produce a flush. How long would it take?’ Gamache asked.

‘About twenty minutes.’

‘Enough time for her to be at the curling when it came on. At some point she began to get flushed and removed her gloves and probably her hat. We’ll see in the pictures tomorrow.’

‘What pictures?’

‘There was a photographer there. CC hired him to take publicity shots of her mingling with the common folk. His film gets to the lab tomorrow.’

‘Now why would she do that?’

‘She was a designer, a kind of minor Martha Stewart. Just came out with a book and was considering a magazine. The pictures would have been for that.’

‘Never heard of her.’

‘Most people hadn’t. But she seemed to have this image of herself as a successful and dynamic motivator. Like Martha, her business went beyond what colors the walls should be – white, by the way – into a personal philosophy of life.’

‘Sounds odious.’

‘I can’t get a grasp of it,’ admitted Gamache, leaning back comfortably. ‘I don’t know whether she was completely delusional or whether there was something almost noble about her. She had a dream and she pursued it, and damn the doubters.’

‘You agree with her philosophy?’

‘No. I spoke to someone today who described it as a kind of Frankenstein. I think that was quite accurate. Actually, that reference keeps popping up in this case. Someone else talked about the villagers celebrating the death of the monster, like in Frankenstein.’

‘The monster wasn’t Frankenstein,’ Dr Harris reminded him. ‘Dr Frankenstein created the monster.’

Gamache felt his chest tighten as she spoke. There was something there. Something he’d been approaching and missing throughout this case.

‘So what now, patron?’ she asked.

‘You’ve taken us a huge step forward with the niacin. Thank you. Now we just follow the headlights.’

‘Sorry?’

‘I always think a case is like driving from here to the Gaspé. A great long distance and I can’t see the end. But I don’t have to. All I have to do is keep throwing light in front of me, and follow the headlights. Eventually I’ll get there.’

‘Like Diogenes with his lamp?’

‘In reverse. He was looking for one honest man. I’m looking for a murderer.’

‘Be careful. The murderer can see the man with the lamp coming.’

‘One more question, doctor. How would someone give her niacin?’

‘It’s water soluble, but quite bitter. Coffee would probably mask it. Orange juice I guess.’

‘Tea?’

‘Less likely. It’s not strong enough.’

She gathered her things and taking her key from her pocket she pointed it out the window and pressed a small button. Outside a car came to life, headlights on and presumably the heater struggling to warm the inside. Of all the inventions in the last twenty years Gamache knew the two best were car seat warmers and automatic ignition. Too bad for Richard Lyon he’d invented magnetized soldiers instead.

Gamache walked her to the door, but just as she was about to leave something else occurred to him. ‘What do you know about Eleanor de Poitiers?’

Dr Harris paused for a moment.

‘Nothing. Who is she?’

‘How about King Henry the Second?’

‘King Henry the Second? You’re not seriously asking me about some long dead British royal? My favorite was Ethelred the Unready. Will he do?’

‘What a repertoire you have. Ethelred and Captain Crunch.’

‘A catholic education. Sorry I couldn’t help.’

‘Niacin.’ He pointed to the dossier still on their table. ‘You saved the day.’

She felt absurdly pleased.

‘Actually,’ he said as he helped her into her coat, ‘there is one more thing. Eleanor of Aquitaine.’

‘Oh, that’s easy. The Lion in Winter.’

‘Honey, could you get the door? I’m in my studio,’ Clara called. There was no answer. ‘Never mind,’ she called after the second knock. ‘I’ll get it. Don’t bother yourself. No really. I don’t mind.’ She yelled the last at the closed door to his studio. She was pretty certain he was in there playing free cell.

It was unusual to hear a knock. Most of the people they knew walked right in. Most helped themselves to whatever was in the fridge. Peter and Clara sometimes came home to find Ruth asleep on their sofa, a glass of Scotch and the Times Literary Review on the hassock in front of her. Once they found Gabri in the bath. Apparently the hot water in the B. & B. had run out, and so had Gabri.

Clara yanked open the door, prepared for the blast of cold air and not totally surprised to see Chief Inspector Gamache, though a tiny part of her still hoped it might be the chief curator of the MOMA, come to see her works.

‘Come on in.’ She stepped aside and quickly closed the door after him.

‘I won’t keep you long.’ He gave a tiny bow and she bowed back, thinking maybe she should have given a subtle curtsy. ‘Do you have a video player?’

Now there was a question she wasn’t expecting.

He unzipped his parka and brought out a video, kept warm against his body.

‘The Lion in Winter?’ She looked at the box.

‘Précisément. I’d very much like to watch it, as soon as possible.’ He was perfectly contained and relaxed, but Clara knew him well enough to know this wasn’t a casual request or a nice way to spend a quiet winter evening in the country.

‘We do. Ruth and Myrna are coming over for dinner, though.’

‘I don’t want to be in the way.’

‘Never.’ She took his arm and led him into the warm and inviting kitchen. ‘Always room for more, but I want to make sure you don’t mind the company. Peter’s made a family specialty from the leftover turkey and vegetable. It looks horrible but tastes like heaven.’

Before long Peter had emerged from his studio and the others had arrived, Myrna enveloping everyone in her generous arms and Ruth making for the bar.

‘Thank God,’ was Ruth’s reaction when told Gamache wanted to watch a video. ‘I thought I’d have to make conversation yet another night.’

Clara prepared a basket with dinners for Richard and Crie and Myrna volunteered to deliver it.

‘May I drive you up?’ Gamache offered.

‘It’s a short walk. Besides, if I walk that’ll give me permission to have seconds.’ Myrna smiled as she wrapped a huge colorful scarf round her neck until she looked like an African tribesman in a cold spell.

‘Could you check on Crie when you’re there?’ Gamache lowered his voice. ‘I’m worried about her.’

‘What’re you thinking?’ Myrna asked, her normally jovial face searching and serious. ‘It’s natural for a child who just saw her mother murdered to be abnormal for a while.’

‘True, but this seems like more. Could you just see?’

She agreed and was off.

Agent Yvette Nichol edged up to the car in front of her in the fast lane of the autoroute, heading from Montreal back to the Townships. Her bumper was just inches from the car in front. Any minute now the driver would notice.

That was the moment. That exquisite moment. Would he hit the brake? Even a slight tap would send their cars careering together at 140 kilometers an hour and they would be a fireball within seconds. Nichol gripped her steering wheel tighter, her eyes keen with concentration and rage. How dare he slow her up? How dare he use her lane? How dare he not pull over? Slow, stupid man. She’d show him, as she showed anyone who stood in her way. Rage made her invincible. But there was something else too.

Glee.

She was going to scare the shit out of the driver.

‘I read your book,’ said Gamache to Ruth as the two of them sat in front of the cheery fire while Peter puttered in the kitchen and Clara browsed her bookshelves for something to read.

Ruth looked as though she’d rather be sitting in scalding oil than next to a compliment. She decided to ignore him and took a long gulp of her Scotch.

‘But my wife has a question.’

‘You have a wife? Someone agreed to marry you?’

‘She did and she was only a little drunk. She wants to know what FINE means in your title.’

‘I’m not surprised your wife has no idea what fine means. Probably doesn’t know what happy or sane means either.’

‘She’s a librarian and she was saying in her experience when people use capital letters it’s because the letters stand for something. Your title is I’m FINE with the FINE in capitals.’

‘She has brains, your wife. She’s the first to notice that, or at least to ask. FINE stands for Fucked up, Insecure, Neurotic and Egotistical. I’m FINE.’

‘You certainly are,’ agreed Gamache.

Agent Robert Lemieux eased over into the slow lane, allowing the maniac tailgating him on the autoroute at 140 kilometers an hour to pass. If he’d been in the mood he’d have put his flasher on the roof and chased the psycho, but he had other things on his mind.

He was sure he’d done well in Montreal. He’d convinced the police artist to do the drawing. He’d visited the bus station and the Old Brewery Mission. He’d advanced the Elle case, which Gamache seemed to want to keep private.

He’d made a note of that in his book.

Agent Lemieux had achieved what he wanted and needed. He was pretty sure Chief Inspector Gamache trusted him. And that was the key. A lot was riding on gaining Gamache’s trust.

‘The only person I remember moving around at the curling match was that photographer person,’ said Myrna a few minutes later. As soon as she’d returned Peter and Clara had put the dinner out for people to help themselves. Gamache had taken her aside briefly and Myrna had agreed there was something very wrong with Crie. They arranged to get together the next day to talk.

Now their dinner was on tray tables in the living room. Clara had been right. It looked like something found in the bottom of the sink on Christmas Day once the dish water had been drained. But it tasted wonderful. Mashed potatoes, roast turkey, gravy and peas, all mushed together in a steaming casserole. Fresh bread and a green salad sat in bowls on the coffee table, with Lucy drifting around like a hungry shark.

‘The photographer popped up everywhere,’ agreed Clara, taking a hunk of bread and spreading it with butter. ‘But he only took pictures of CC.’

‘He was hired to do that. Where were all of you?’ asked Gamache. He took a sip of red wine and listened as the others talked.

‘In the stands, next to Olivier,’ said Ruth.

‘I was sitting between Myrna and Gabri,’ said Clara, ‘and Peter was curling.’

‘Richard Lyon was beside me,’ said Myrna.

‘Was he there the whole time?’ Gamache asked.

‘Definitely. I’d have noticed if he left. Body heat. But what about Kaye Thompson?’ Myrna looked at the others. ‘She was sitting right next to CC. She must have seen something.’

Everyone nodded and looked at Gamache expectantly. He shook his head. ‘I spoke to her today. She says she saw nothing. Only knew something was wrong when CC started screaming.’

‘I didn’t hear that,’ said Ruth.

‘Nobody did,’ said Gamache. ‘It was masked by the noise of Mother clearing the house.’

‘Oh, right,’ said Peter. ‘Everyone was cheering.’

‘How about Crie?’ Gamache asked. ‘Did anyone notice her?’

Blank stares.

Gamache was again struck by how sad it must be to be Crie. She’d swallowed all her feelings, all her pain. She carried such an enormous weight, and yet she was invisible. No one ever saw her. It was the worst of all possible states, he knew, to never be noticed.

‘Do you have a Bible?’ Gamache asked Clara. ‘Old Testament, if you have one. In English, please.’

They wandered over to the bookcase and Clara finally found it.

‘May I return it tomorrow?’

‘You can return it next year if you like. Can’t remember the last time I read the Old Testament,’ said Clara.

‘The last time?’ Peter asked.

‘Or the first time,’ admitted Clara with a laugh.

‘Would you like to watch the movie now?’ Peter asked.

‘Very much,’ said Gamache.

Peter reached out to pick up the cassette from the living room table, but Gamache stayed his hand.

‘I’ll do it, if you don’t mind.’ Gamache took out a handkerchief and slipped the movie out of its sleeve. Everyone noticed, but no one asked, and Gamache didn’t volunteer the information that this particular tape had been found in the garbage of the dead woman.

‘What’s it about?’ asked Myrna.

‘Eleanor of Aquitaine and her husband King Henry,’ said Ruth. Gamache turned to her, surprised. ‘What? It’s a great film. Katharine Hepburn and Peter O’Toole. All the action takes place at Christmas, if I remember well. Strange, isn’t it. Here we are at Christmas too.’

There were many strange things about this case, thought Gamache.

The opening credits started, the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lion roared, the powerful Gothic music filled their quaint little living room and grotesque images of gargoyles leered on the screen. Already the film reeked of power and decay.

And dread.

The Lion in Winter began.

Agent Nichol’s car skidded round the snowy corner, barely making the turn off the main road onto the tiny secondary road that led to Three Pines. Gamache hadn’t invited her to stay at the B. & B. with them, but she would anyway, even if she had to pay her own way. While in Montreal, after interviewing the headmistress of Crie’s snooty private school, Agent Nichol had driven home to pick up a suitcase, stopping briefly to have a bite with her relatives gathered in the tiny, fastidious house.

Her father always seemed nervous on these occasions and had instructed his daughters never to mention the family history in Czechoslovakia. Growing up in the immaculate little home in east end Montreal Nichol had seen a parade of distant relatives and friends of friends come to live with them, though it was less a parade than a cortege. They trudged through the door, all in black with stone stern faces, speaking words she couldn’t understand and sucking all the attention the world had to offer. They demanded and yelled and wailed and complained. They came from Poland and Lithuania and Hungary and young Yvette listened to them and came to believe each person must have their own language. Hovering near the doorway in the tiny, crowded, chaotic living room, a room that had once been so pleasant and calm, young Yvette struggled to understand what was being said. At first the newcomers would speak kindly to her, then when she didn’t react they’d speak more loudly, until finally they screamed at her in the universal language that said she was lazy and stupid and disrespectful. Her mother, once so gentle and kindly, had become impatient too, and yelled at her. In a language she did understand. Little Yvette Nikolev had become the foreigner. All her life she’d stand just on the outside. Longing to belong, but knowing she didn’t, when even her mother sided with others.

It was then she began to worry. If her home was this baffling and overwhelming, what was waiting outside? Suppose she couldn’t make herself understood? Suppose something happened, but she couldn’t follow the instructions? Suppose she needed something? Who would give it to her? And so Yvette Nichol had learned to take.

‘So, you’re back with Gamache,’ her father had said.

‘Yes sir.’ She smiled at him. He was the only one who had ever stood up for her as a child. The only one who’d protected her again those invaders. He’d catch her eye and wave her over and give her a butterscotch candy wrapped in noisy cellophane. He’d instruct her to hide someplace to open it. Away from prying and greedy eyes. Their secret. Her father had taught her the value and necessity of secrets.

‘You must never tell him about Czechoslovakia. Promise me now. He wouldn’t understand. They only want pure Quebecers in the Sûreté. If he found out you’re Czech you’d be kicked out. Like Uncle Saul.’

The very idea of being compared to stupid Uncle Saul made her nauseous. Stupid Uncle Saul Nikolev who’d washed out of the Czech police and couldn’t protect the family. And so they’d all perished. Except her father, Ari Nikolev, and her mother and the discontented and bitter relatives who’d used their home like a latrine, dropping their shit all over the young family.

In the small, neat back bedroom Ari Nikolev watched as his daughter packed her suitcase with the dreariest, drabbest clothes in her closet. At his suggestion.

‘I know men,’ he’d said, when she’d protested.

‘But men won’t find me attractive in these.’ She’d jabbed her finger at the pile of clothes. ‘I thought you said you wanted Gamache to like me.’

‘Not to date. Believe me, he’ll like you in those.’

As she turned to find her toiletry bag he slipped a couple of butterscotch candies into the suitcase, where she’d find them that night. And think of him. And with any luck never realize he had his own little secret.

There was no Uncle Saul. No slaughter at the hands of the communists. No noble and valiant flight across the frontier. He’d made all that up years ago to shut up his wife’s relatives camped in their home. It was his lifeboat, made of words, which had kept him afloat on their sea of misery and suffering. Genuine suffering. Even he could admit that. But he’d needed his own stories of heroics and survival.

And so, after helping to conceive little Angelina and then Yvette, he’d conceived Uncle Saul. Whose job it was to save the family, and who had failed. Saul’s spectacular fall from grace had cost Ari his entire fictional family.

He knew he should tell Yvette. Knew that what had started as his own life raft had become an anchor for his little girl. But she worshipped him, and Ari Nikolev craved that look in her gray eyes.

‘I’ll call you every day,’ he said, lifting her light case from the bed. ‘We need to stick together.’ He smiled and cocked his head toward the cacophony that was the living room as the relatives shouted at each other from entrenched positions. ‘I’m proud of you, Yvette, and I know you’ll do well. You have to.’

‘Yes, sir.’

None of the fucking relatives lifted their heads as she left, her father carrying her case to the car and putting it in the trunk. ‘In case there’s a crash, it won’t hit you on the head.’

He hugged her and whispered in her ear, ‘Don’t mess up.’

And now she approached Three Pines. At the top of du Moulin she slowed, her car skidding slightly to the side on the slippery road. Below her the village glowed, the lights off the tall trees reflected red and green and blue on the snow and the ice, like a giant stained glass window. She could see figures moving back and forth in front of the windows of the shops and homes.

A feeling roiled in her chest. Was it anxiety? Resentment perhaps about leaving her own warm home to come here? No. She sat in the car for a few minutes, her shoulders slowly sagging from up round her ears and her breath coming in long, even puffs. Trying to identify this strange feeling. Then, knitting her brows together and staring out the windshield at the cheery little village, she suddenly knew what she was feeling.

Relief. Was this what it felt like to let the weight down, the guard down?

Her cell phone rang. She hesitated, knowing who it was, and not wanting to leave her last thought.

‘Oui, bonjour. Yes sir, I’m in Three Pines. I’ll be polite. I’ll win him over. I know how important this is. I won’t mess up,’ she said in response to his warning.

She hung up and took her foot off the brake. Her car glided into the village and came to a stop in front of the B. & B.

Eleanor and Henry were going at it hammer and tongs. Their sons were fracturing, turning on each other and their parents. Each character was exploding, sending shards into each other. It was devastating and brilliant. By the end Gamache looked down, surprised to see his plate empty. He didn’t remember eating. He didn’t remember breathing.

But he did know one thing. Given a choice, Eleanor and Henry would be the last people on earth he’d want as parents. Gamache sat staring at the closing credits, wondering what he’d missed, because he’d surely missed something. There was a reason CC had the tape and a reason she’d taken the name de Poitiers, and presumably a reason she’d thrown out a perfectly good video. This tape was found in her garbage. Why?

‘Maybe she bought a DVD,’ suggested Clara when he’d asked them for their theories. ‘We’ve been slowly switching our collection over to DVD. All Peter’s favorite movies eventually go screwy because he watches the good parts over and over.’

‘Hello, everyone,’ Gabri’s cheerful voice called from the kitchen. ‘I heard about the movie night. Am I too late?’

‘The film just finished,’ said Peter. ‘Sorry, old son.’

‘Couldn’t get away earlier. Had to minister to the sick.’

‘How is Inspector Beauvoir?’ Gamache asked, walking into the kitchen.

‘Still asleep. He has the flu,’ Gabri explained to the rest. ‘Am I feverish? Hope I didn’t get it.’ He offered his forehead to Peter, who ignored him.

‘Well, even if you’ve picked it up we’re not at risk,’ Ruth commented. ‘The chances of it jumping from Gabri to a human are pretty small.’

‘Bitch.’

‘Slut.’

‘So who’s looking after him?’ Gamache asked, wondering if he should head for the door.

‘That Agent Nichol showed up and booked herself in. Even paid for it herself using little rolled up bills. Anyway, she said she’d look after him.’

Gamache hoped Beauvoir was unconscious.

Beauvoir was having a nightmare. Through his fever he dreamed he was in bed with Agent Nichol. He felt nauseous again.

‘Here.’ A woman’s voice, quite pleasant, came to him.

Somehow the wastepaper basket had levitated and was right under his mouth. He heaved into it, though there was nothing much left in his stomach to bring up.

Falling back into the damp sheets he had the oddest sensation that a cool cloth had been laid on his forehead and his face and mouth had been wiped clean.

Jean Guy Beauvoir fell back into a fitful sleep.

‘I brought dessert.’ Gabri pointed to a cardboard box on the counter. ‘Chocolate fudge cake.’

‘Do you know, I think I’m beginning to like you,’ said Ruth.

‘What a difference a gay makes.’ He smiled and started unwrapping it.

‘I’ll make coffee,’ said Myrna.

Gamache cleared the plates and ran warm water in the sink to do the washing up. As he scrubbed the dishes and handed them to Clara to dry, he looked out the frosted window at the lights of Three Pines and thought about the film. The Lion in Winter. He went over the characters, the plot, some of the devastating repartee between Eleanor and Henry. It was a film about power and love warped and twisted and squandered.

But why was it so important to CC? And was it important to the case?

‘Coffee’ll take a couple of minutes yet,’ said Clara, hanging the damp towel on the back of a chair. The room was already filled with the dark smells of fresh brewing coffee and rich chocolate.

‘Could you show me your studio?’ Gamache asked Clara, hoping to get far enough away from the cake to overcome the temptation to put his finger in it. ‘I realize I’ve never seen your art.’

The two drifted across the kitchen toward the door to Clara’s studio, wide open. Next to hers, Peter’s studio was closed.

‘In case the muse should try to escape,’ explained Clara, and Gamache nodded sagely. Now he walked to the center of Clara’s large, crowded studio and stood still.

The studio had tarpaulins spread everywhere and the comforting smell of oils and acrylics and canvas. An old, worn armchair stood in one corner, with stacks of art magazines creating a table on which stood a dirty coffee mug. He turned leisurely, stopping to stare at one wall that held three images.

He moved closer to them.

‘That’s Kaye Thompson,’ he said.

‘Well done.’ Clara came up beside him. ‘And that’s Mother.’ She indicated the next work. ‘I sold Émilie to Dr Harris a while ago but look over here.’ She pointed to the end wall where a huge canvas stood. ‘All three.’

Gamache stood in front of an image of three elderly women, arms entwined, cradling each other. It was an amazingly complex work, with layers of photographs and paintings and even some writing. Em, the woman in the middle, was leaning back precipitously, laughing with abandon, and the other two were supporting her and also laughing. It ached of intimacy, of a private moment caught in women’s lives. It captured their friendship and their dependence on each other. It sang of love and a caring that went beyond pleasant lunches and the remembrance of birthdays. Gamache felt as though he was looking into each of their souls, and the combination of the three was almost too much to bear.

‘I call it The Three Graces,’ said Clara.

‘Perfect,’ Gamache whispered.

‘Mother is Faith, Em is Hope and Kaye is Charity. I was tired of seeing the Graces always depicted as beautiful young things. I think wisdom comes with age and life and pain. And knowing what matters.’

‘Is it finished? It looks as though there’s space for another.’

‘That’s very perceptive of you. It is finished, but in each of my works I try to leave a little space, a kind of crack.’

‘Why?’

‘Can you make out the writing on the wall behind them?’ She nodded toward her painting.

Gamache leaned in and put on his reading glasses.

He read it out loud. ‘Beautiful. Madame Zardo?’ he asked.

‘No, Leonard Cohen. All my works have vessels of some sort. Containers. Sometimes it’s in the negative space, sometimes it’s more obvious. In The Three Graces it’s more obvious.’

It wasn’t obvious to Gamache. He stepped back from the work, then he saw what she meant. The vessel, like a vase, was formed by their bodies, and the space he’d noticed was the crack, to let the light in.

‘I do it for Peter,’ she said quietly. At first Gamache thought he might have misheard, but she continued as though speaking to herself. ‘He’s like a dog, like Lucy. He’s very loyal. He puts everything he has into one thing. One interest, one hobby, one friend, one love. I’m his love and it scares the shit out of me.’ She turned now to look into Gamache’s thoughtful brown eyes. ‘He’s poured all his love into me. I’m his vessel. But suppose I crack? Suppose I break? Suppose I die? What would he do?’

‘So all your art is exploring that theme?’

‘Mostly it’s about imperfection and impermanence. There’s a crack in everything.’

‘That’s how the light gets in,’ said Gamache. He thought of CC who’d written so much about light and enlightenment and illumination, and thought it came from perfection. But she couldn’t hold a candle to this bright woman beside him.

‘Peter doesn’t get it. Probably never will.’

‘Have you ever painted Ruth?’

‘Why do you ask?’

‘Well, frankly, if anyone’s cracked…’ He laughed and Clara joined him.

‘No, and you know why? I’m afraid to. I think she could be my masterpiece, and I’m afraid to try.’

‘In case you can’t do it?’

‘Got it in one. There’s also something scary about Ruth. I’m not sure I want to look that deeply into her.’

‘You will,’ he said, and she believed him. Gamache looked at her silently, his deep brown eyes calm and peaceful. She knew then all the horrible things he’d seen with those eyes. Murdered and mutilated women, children, husbands, wives. He saw violent death every day. She looked down at his hands, large and expressive, and knew then all the horrible things they’d had to do. Handle the bodies of people dead before their time. Fight for his own life and others. And perhaps the worst of all, those fingers had formed loose fists and knocked on the doors of loved ones. To break the news. To break their hearts.

Gamache walked over to the next wall and saw the most astonishing works of art. The vessels in this case were trees. Clara had painted them tall and gourd-shaped, voluptuous and ripe. And melting, as though their own internal heat was too much for them. They were luminous. Literally luminous. The colors were milken, like Venice at dawn, all warm and washed and venerable.

‘They’re marvelous, Clara. They radiate.’ He turned to look at her in astonishment, as though meeting the woman for the first time. He’d known she was insightful, and courageous and compassionate. But he hadn’t appreciated that she was this gifted. ‘Has anyone seen these?’

‘I gave my portfolio to CC just before Christmas. She’s friends with Denis Fortin.’

‘The gallery owner,’ said Gamache.

‘The best in Quebec, probably in Canada. He has connections to the Musée d’Art contemporain and the Museum of Modern Art in New York. If he likes your stuff you’re launched.’

‘That’s exciting,’ said Gamache.

‘Not really. He hated it.’ She turned away, not able to look any human in the eye as she admitted her failure. ‘CC and Fortin happened to be at Ogilvy’s when I was there for Ruth’s book launch. We passed on the escalator. I was going up and they were going down. I heard CC say to him it was a shame he thought my work was amateurish and banal.’

‘He said that?’ Gamache was surprised.

‘Well, he didn’t, but CC did. She was repeating what he’d said and he didn’t contradict her. Then we’d passed and before I knew it I was out the door. Thank God for the vagrant.’

‘What vagrant?’

Should she tell him? But she already felt skinned and lashed and had no stomach for further exposure even to this man who listened as though she was the only one on earth. She couldn’t admit she believed God was a bag lady.

Did she still believe it?

She paused a moment and considered. Yes, came the simple and clear answer. Yes, she still believed she’d met God on the cold, dark, blessed streets of Montreal at Christmas. Still, she’d embarrassed herself enough this night.

‘Oh, nothing. I gave her a coffee and felt better about myself. Seems to work like that, doesn’t it?’

To kind and compassionate people, thought Gamache, but not to everyone. He knew she was holding something back, but chose not to press. Besides, it couldn’t possibly have anything to do with the case and Armand Gamache had no stomach to breach someone else’s boundaries just because he could.

‘Did CC know you were there when she spoke?’

Clara pretended to think back, but she knew the answer. Had known it from the moment she’d seen CC on the escalator.

‘Yes, we made eye contact briefly. She knew.’

‘That must have been devastating.’

‘I actually thought my heart would stop. I really believed Fortin would like my work. It never occurred to me he wouldn’t. It was my fault, living in a fantasy like that.’

‘When someone stabs you it’s not your fault that you feel pain.’

He looked at her face now and at her fists, balled up, knuckles white, her breathing heavy as though pumping herself up. He knew Clara Morrow to be kind and loving and tolerant. If CC de Poitiers could produce this reaction in Clara, what must she have done to others?

And he added Clara’s name to the long list of suspects. What was she hiding deep down in the room she kept locked and hidden even from herself? What had peeped out at him from that silence a few moments ago?

‘Dessert.’ Gabri poked his head into the studio.