A Great Reckoning

CHAPTER 35

“I’m telling you, it should be here.”

Nathaniel Smythe looked around, almost frantic now, barely wincing as sleet slapped his face. The map he’d borrowed from Madame Zardo was just a sodden mess in his hands.

The other three had turned so that the combination of rain and snow and ice pelted against the backs of their coats and hoods. The relentless noise almost drowned out Nathaniel’s protests, which were rapidly descending into whining.

“There’s nothing here,” called Jacques. “Gamache fucked with you.”

His shoulders were hunched and his chin was bent into his chest, so that from behind he could have been a crooked old man. The winter coat he wore came to his hips. More a ski jacket than something appropriate for standing on the side of a muddy half-frozen road, in a sleet storm, staring at flat gray fields and forest.

Jacques’s slacks were soaked through, he could barely feel his legs, and he was beginning to shiver uncontrollably.

Nathaniel looked from him to the other two, but they also had their backs turned against the rain and snow and the cadet who’d brought them there with the claim of having found Roof Trusses.

Nathaniel turned full circle, blinking against the sleet that slid off his face. He squinted at the fields, scanning the horizon. Desolate.

No sign of the village. No sign of life.

“Come on,” shouted Jacques, trudging back to the car.

Huifen and Amelia followed. Nathaniel stood rooted in place, obstinate, until he heard the car start up. Then he ran back to it, more than a little afraid they’d leave him there. He got into the backseat beside Amelia, who had her arms wrapped tightly around her chest and her nose tucked into her sodden jacket.

Notre-Dame-de-Pissed-Off.

The heater was on full blast and the tight car smelt of wet wool.

“This was a waste of time,” said Jacques from the driver’s seat, holding his trembling hands to the heat vent.

“But she said it would be here,” said Nathaniel.

“She? I thought it was Gamache.”

“He suggested we investigate, but the information came from the woman I’m staying with.”

“I must’ve missed that class at the academy where they told us to believe old drunks,” said Jacques.

Huifen snorted. In amusement or because she’d caught pneumonia.

Back in Three Pines, they went to change, but when Nathaniel came down the stairs at Ruth’s place in warm, dry clothes, he found Amelia in the living room with the poet.

When they both looked at him with sharp, assessing eyes, he felt he’d descended into a Grimms’ tale. Those stories rarely ended well for fey boys with bright red hair and a smile he hoped was ingratiating but knew just made him look like dinner.

“I lost your map.”

“That’s okay,” said Ruth, getting to her feet. “I don’t need a map anymore.”

“There was nothing there,” said Nathaniel.

He realized he’d failed the Commander’s test. Or, at least, his instinct had. This woman wasn’t reliable. She was exactly as she appeared, after all. A crazy old drunk.

“Well, nothing you could see, anyway,” said Ruth.

“What else is there?” he asked.

“Come on,” said Amelia, getting to her feet.

He followed her out, but instead of taking refuge with the others in the bistro, Amelia got in the car.

A few minutes later, they were back at exactly the same place they’d been an hour before.

Nothing had changed, except it seemed even more desolate.

“I asked Madame Zardo to repeat what she told you, and she said the village was here,” said Amelia.

“That’s what I told you,” he said.

“I also called the toponymie man. He gave me the map coordinates. Here.”

The sleet hit the windshield and slid slowly down the glass, to pile up as slush on the wipers at the bottom. “He looked it up and confirmed that the name Roof Trusses had been officially changed in the 1920s. To Notre-Dame-de-Doleur.”

“Why?”

“Well, Roof Trusses was obviously a mistake,” she said. “He told us that. It should never have been the name to begin with.”

“I know, but why Notre-Dame-de-Doleur?”

“I asked, but he didn’t know. Probably the name of the church.”

“I’ve heard of Notre-Dame-de-Grace,” said Nathaniel. “And Notre-Dame-de-Paris, and Notre-Dame-de-la-Merci. And—”

“Okay, I get it. Notre-Dame-de-Doleur is unusual—”

“Unique.”

“Maybe. But there’s nothing wrong with unique, is there?”

They looked at each other. The girl who was trying so hard to be different, and the boy who was trying so hard to be the same.

“I guess not,” he conceded, without conviction.

“Monsieur Toponymie was surprised by the name,” Amelia admitted. “But there’re other weird ones around. Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha!, for instance.”

“There’s really a town called that?”

“Oui. Complete with an exclamation mark after each ‘Ha.’”

“You’re kidding.”

“Do I look like I’m kidding?”

“No, but you sound like you are. Ha ha.”

He caught the faintest upturn at the corners of her mouth. It looked like victory.

“Makes the people in Notre-Dame-de-Doleur seem pretty lucky, doesn’t it?” she said. “It could’ve been worse.”

“It was worse. Roof Trusses.”

But he was impressed that she’d pursued it. Not giving up, where the others had. Where he had.

But did it matter? Even if this was where the village once stood, it wasn’t there anymore.

They sat side by side and looked through the slowly fogging windows.

“It’s gone,” he said.

“You’re missing the point. It might be gone, but it was here once. And I bet some people stayed behind. They always do. Let’s go.”

She got out of the car before he could point out that no one had stayed behind. At least, no one living.

And then he understood what Amelia meant. And what Madame Zardo had meant.

They were six feet under. The remaining villagers were remains.

Notre-Dame-de-Doleur, née Roof Trusses, had become a ghost town.

It took them almost an hour, and they were soaked through and chilled to the bone, but finally they found the cemetery. It had been overcome by the forest, especially lush in that area. The gravestones had sunk and toppled over, but most could still be read. Whoever had made them had etched the names deep into the local granite.

Amelia and Nathaniel barely noticed that the sleet had turned to full-on snow until after they’d examined every gravestone they could find.

Then they turned to each other, the huge spring flakes falling between them.

There was near silence, except for the familiar tapping as the snow landed. On them. On the trees. On the ground.

And they noticed another sound now. A plopping. Plunking. Plinking.

A timpani.

The forest was playing music for them.

An hour later, they walked into the bistro and handed two metal buckets to Olivier.

He looked into them warily, then smiled. “Sap buckets. Where’d you get these?” He placed them on the floor and admired them. “You don’t see originals like this much anymore. And they’re full.”

“We emptied most of the other buckets into these two,” Nathaniel explained.

“Seemed a shame to waste the sap,” said Amelia. “They were in the woods by Roof Trusses.”

“You found it?”

They nodded.

Behind Olivier, over by the fire, Ruth lifted her hand, and when the cadets waved at her, she extended her finger in greeting.

“Does she know what that means?” Nathaniel whispered to Olivier.

He laughed. “She sure does. Do you?”

“Well, it means—”

“It means she likes you,” said Olivier.

Jacques and Huifen were also there. They sat at what they now considered their table in the bistro, with hot chocolates and the map, and nodded to the younger cadets.

But Amelia and Nathaniel walked right by them with just a friendly “Bonjour.” And joined Ruth.

“I’d ask you to sit,” said Ruth, “but I don’t want you to.”

Nathaniel lifted his hand and slowly unfolded his finger. He’d never given anyone the finger. Had wanted to, many, many times. But never had. And the first time he flipped someone off, it was an old woman.

It didn’t seem a good reason to be proud of himself, and yet he was. Between the waves of terror.

Rosa, nesting in Ruth’s lap, muttered, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

And Ruth laughed.

“Oh, what the hell. Sit down, but don’t order anything.”

They took off their wet jackets and hung them on nails by the fire, then moved their chairs a bit closer to the warmth. Ruth leaned toward the cadets and examined them. Soaked through, chilled to the marrow. But happy.

“You found Roof Trusses,” she said, and they nodded. “But did you find the grave?”

Clara and Myrna followed Reine-Marie into the historical society in Saint-Rémy. The secretary there confirmed that there’d been a very successful retrospective on the region’s involvement in the Great War.

“Then perhaps you can tell me where all the material is?” asked Reine-Marie.

“We gave it to you, didn’t we?” said the elderly Québécoise volunteer.

“You gave me a lot of boxes,” Reine-Marie confirmed. “And I’ve been through most of them, but I can’t find a single item relating to the First World War.”

“Are you sure?”

The woman clearly suspected Reine-Marie had either lost or stolen the items. Reine-Marie was feeling slightly defensive when she realized she’d almost certainly given that very same look to researchers who claimed not to have something she believed was in the material they’d been given.

She looked at the courteous, suspicious face. And smiled.

“I know it sounds unbelievable, but I really did look and it really isn’t there.”

“Hmmm.” The woman sat back in her plastic chair. “Now where could it be?”

While she pondered, and Reine-Marie waited, Clara and Myrna passed the time by wandering the permanent exhibit in the large room that opened up behind the volunteer desk. It was filled with clothing, and photographs, and maps.

“Look, this one’s signed,” said Clara. “Turcotte.”

“And dated. 1919.”

It clearly showed Saint-Rémy, a bustling lumber town, and Williamsburg, and it even had Roof Trusses. Not yet rebaptized Notre-Dame-de-Doleur.

But it did not have Three Pines.

“Why?” asked Clara.

But Myrna had no answers. Instead she’d wandered over to a mannequin wearing a lace wedding dress. The mannequin’s waist was about the size of Myrna’s forearm.

“People were smaller then,” she explained to Clara. “Lack of nutrition.”

“Lack of croissants.”

“How did they survive?” asked Myrna, shaking her head.

“The pioneer spirit,” said Clara.

“Got it,” Reine-Marie called from the front desk. “We’re off.”

“Where to?” asked Clara and Myrna, hurrying to catch up.

“The Legion. The show was there, and the secretary thinks the things might’ve been boxed up and put in the basement, and they forgot about them.”

“Ironic,” said Myrna.

Commander Gamache spent most of the day in his office at the academy. The door closed, if not actually locked.

But the message was clear.

Stay away.

Beauvoir could not.

For the umpteenth time that day, Jean-Guy Beauvoir stood outside the closed door and stared at it.

“He’s inside?” he asked the Commander’s assistant, sitting at her desk, for the umpteenth time.

“Oui. Has been all day,” said Madame Marcoux.

“What’s he doing?”

She looked at Beauvoir, incredulous and amused. He knew she wouldn’t tell him, even if she could. But he had to ask.

He leaned closer to the door, but couldn’t hear anything.

Now the amusement disappeared from Madame Marcoux’s eyes, to be replaced by disapproval.

“He asked not to be disturbed. Have you found out who killed Professor Leduc?” she asked.

“Not yet, but—”

“Then maybe you should be doing that, don’t you think?”

It wasn’t a question.

Finally, at the end of the day, Jean-Guy returned, hoping to find the assistant gone, but she was still there.

Beauvoir smiled at her, walked right by, tapped. And entered. As she stood and called, “Stop.”

Armand Gamache looked up sharply, his hand instinctively going to the lid of his laptop.

And as he looked at Jean-Guy Beauvoir, he slowly closed it. In a gesture that felt more like a slap to the face than any hand ever could.

The two men stared, then Jean-Guy’s eyes dropped to the slender computer, closed.

“I’m sorry, sir,” said the assistant, standing at the door and glaring at the intruder.

“It’s not a problem, Madame Marcoux,” said Gamache, rising behind his desk. “You can leave us. I’m finished for the day anyway. Thank you for staying.”

Madame Marcoux hesitated at the door.

“It’s all right, Chantal.”

With a severe look at Beauvoir, she left, closing the door softly behind her while the two men stared at each other.

“We found out about the silencer,” said Beauvoir. “Made by a company in Tennessee. It specializes in customized weapons. They have a record of Leduc’s order. He must have smuggled it across the border.”

Gamache made a sound of disapproval but not of surprise, and waved toward the sitting area of his office. Away, Beauvoir noticed, from his desk. And the closed laptop.

“Is that what you came here to tell me?” asked Gamache, sitting down and taking off his reading glasses.

Beauvoir took the chair across from him and leaned forward. “The joke’s over, patron. What’s this about? What’re you doing in here?”

“Beyond the fact it’s my office?” There was an edge of annoyance in Gamache’s normally composed voice. “What do you want, Jean-Guy?”

Beauvoir, faced with such a simple question, felt overwhelmed.

He wanted to know why Monsieur Gamache had hidden away all day.

He wanted to know why he’d just closed his laptop. What was on it?

He wanted to know why he’d really taken those students down to Three Pines.

He wanted to know why Gamache’s fingerprints were on the murder weapon.

He wanted to know why he’d specifically asked for Paul Gélinas to join the investigation, and lied to Chief Inspector Lacoste, and himself, in the process.

He wanted to know who Amelia Choquet really was.

And he wanted to know who killed Serge Leduc, because in the early dusk it was slowly dawning on Beauvoir that Monsieur Gamache might know.

But Jean-Guy Beauvoir sat there, mute. Staring at the familiar face, the familiar man. Who was becoming a stranger.

“I want you to let me in.”

Jean-Guy’s eyes left Gamache’s, and he slowly turned his head to the desk and the closed computer.

“Why does Paul Gélinas suspect that I killed Serge Leduc?” asked Gamache.

“I think it started with the fingerprints.”

Gamache nodded. “And how did my prints get on the murder weapon?”

Beauvoir sat there, a lump forming in his stomach.

“I don’t know,” he said quietly, almost in a whisper. “But they’re only partials. They’re obviously not your prints.”

“Oh, they’re mine.”

And now there was complete silence. Except for the thrumming in Beauvoir’s ears, as the blood abandoned his extremities and ran to his core. Retreating. Running away. And leaving him light-headed.

“What’re you telling me?”

“You and I both know that partials aren’t admissible,” said Gamache. “We tell people we don’t take them seriously. But the fact is we do. And we should. How often have they led us to the murderer?”

“Often,” admitted Jean-Guy.

“And they do this time too.”

“You’re not—”

“Confessing? Non. I have never touched that gun. I didn’t even know he had it, and would never have tolerated it had I known.”

“Brébeuf’s partials are on the gun. Are you saying it was him? But he’d have wiped the gun. As would you. Amelia Choquet? Her prints were on the revolver, and the gun case, and it was her map. Is she the one who killed him?”

Into the silence he placed another question.

“Who is she?” Jean-Guy asked.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Who is she?” Beauvoir asked again, more firmly this time. “There’s a personal connection, isn’t there? That’s why you reversed the earlier decision and admitted her to the academy. Paul Gélinas was right.”

“Yes, he was. But I need to speak to Madame Gamache first.”

“Is she—”

“I won’t tell you any more, Jean-Guy. And the only reason I’ve gone this far is because I trust you.”

“But not enough to tell me the truth.”

“I have told you the truth. I just can’t tell you more right now. You need to trust me.” Gamache got up, and Jean-Guy rose with him. They walked to the door.

“Do you know who killed the Duke?” asked Beauvoir.

“I think I do, but I have no proof.”

“Then tell me.”

“I can’t. But I will tell you that the key is in the fingerprints on the revolver.”

Beauvoir stopped at the door, his foot against it so that Gamache couldn’t open it. “Deputy Commissioner Gélinas is planning to arrest you for murder, isn’t he?”

“I think so.”

“But you don’t seem worried.”

“Just because I’m not screaming up and down the hallways doesn’t mean I’m not worried. But I’m not panicked. He has his plans and I have mine.”

“You must regret bringing him in,” said Jean-Guy. “Why did you? You went behind Isabelle’s back to do it. You’d never have tolerated that when you were chief inspector, and yet you did it to her.”

Now Gamache did look tired. He met Beauvoir’s gaze. At first Jean-Guy thought Monsieur Gamache was trying to make up his mind whether to confide in him, but then it became something else.

Monsieur Gamache was holding on to Jean-Guy’s eyes like a mariner clings on to a bit of flotsam in a gale.

He was a man overboard.

“It seemed too good an opportunity to pass up,” said Gamache. “The Deputy Commissioner of the RCMP actually visiting Montréal. I had to ask.”

“But you could’ve gone through Lacoste.”

“Yes, but I doubt he’d have come down for her. He doesn’t know her.”

“He doesn’t know you, if he suspects you of murder.”

“You suspect me too, don’t you?”

“I do not,” snapped Beauvoir, though they both knew that was a deception, if not a lie. “Is Gélinas going down to Three Pines with you again tonight?”

“He is. I invited him down again.”

“Why?” asked Beauvoir.

“So he can keep an eye on me,” said Gamache, then smiled. “And I can keep an eye on him.”

“Do you want me to come down with you? I can stay over.”

“No, you need to be with Annie. I spoke with her this afternoon. She sounds happy.”

Armand Gamache offered his hand to the younger man in a gesture that was oddly formal.

Jean-Guy took it.

“Don’t believe everything you think,” said Gamache, before releasing the hand and opening the door. “Pema Chödrön. A Buddhist nun.”

“Of course,” said Beauvoir and gave a heavy sigh as the door closed behind him. He turned to go, only to come face-to-face with Chantal Marcoux, who was standing by her desk in a long cloth coat. She was just putting a knitted hat on her head.

She opened the door to the corridor and ushered him out.

As he walked one way down the hallway, and she walked the other, Beauvoir wondered how much Madame Marcoux had heard. And he wondered if she’d been Serge Leduc’s assistant, before the putsch and the arrival of Commander Gamache.