A Trick of the Light

TWENTY-ONE

All Clara Morrow wanted was to be left alone. But instead she found herself in her kitchen, listening to Denis Fortin. Looking more boyish than ever. More contrite.

“Coffee?” she asked, then wondered why she’d offered. All she wanted was for Fortin to leave.

“No, merci,” he smiled. “I really don’t want to disturb you.”

But you already are, thought Clara, and knew it was uncharitable. She was the one who’d opened the door. She was beginning to dislike doors. Closed or open.

If someone had said a year ago that she’d long for this prestigious gallery owner to leave her home, she’d never have believed it. Her whole effort, the efforts of every artist she knew, including Peter, was to get Fortin’s attention.

But all she could think about was getting rid of him.

“I suspect you know why I’m here,” said Fortin, with a grin. “I’d actually hoped to speak with both you and Peter. Is he home?”

“No, he’s not. Do you want to come back when he’s here?”

“I don’t want to waste your time,” he said, getting up. “I realize we got off to a terrible start. All my fault. I wish I could change all that. I was very, very stupid.”

She started to say something and he put up his hand and smiled.

“You don’t have to be nice, I know what an ass I was. But I’ve learned, and I won’t be like that again. To you or to anyone else, I hope. I’d like to just say this once, and leave. Let you and maybe your husband think about it. Is that OK?”

Clara nodded.

“I’d like to represent both you and Peter. I’m young and we can all grow together. I’ll be around a long time to help guide your careers. I think that’s important. My thought is to build toward a solo show for each of you and then a combined exhibition. Take advantage of both your talents. It would be thrilling. The show of the year, of the decade. Please consider it, that’s all I ask.”

Clara nodded and watched Fortin leave.

Inspector Beauvoir joined the Chief Inspector on the bridge.

“Look at this.” Beauvoir gave him a printout.

Gamache noticed the heading then quickly read down the page. Stopping, as though hitting a wall, three quarters of the way down. He lifted his eyes and met Beauvoir’s, who was waiting. Smiling.

The Chief went back to the sheet, reading more slowly this time. Reading right to the end.

He didn’t want to miss anything, the way they almost had.

“Well done,” he said, handing the page back to Inspector Beauvoir. “How did you find that?”

“I was going over the interviews and realized we might not have talked to everyone at the party down here.”

Gamache was nodding. “Good. Excellent.”

He looked toward the B and B, his arm extended. “Shall we?”

A few moments later they stepped from the bright, warm sunshine onto the cooler verandah. Normand and Paulette had watched their progress across the village green. Indeed, Gamache suspected everyone in the village had.

It might look sleepy, but Three Pines was in fact keenly aware of everything.

The two artists looked up as they approached.

“I wonder if I might ask you a very great favor?” Gamache said, smiling.

“Of course,” said Paulette.

“Could you perhaps go for a walk around the village, or have a drink at the bistro? On me?”

They looked at him, uncomprehending at first, then it clicked with Paulette. Gathering up her book and a magazine she nodded. “I think a walk would be a great idea, don’t you, Normand?”

Normand looked like he’d just as soon stay where he was, in the comfortable swing on the cool porch, with an old Paris Match and a lemonade. Gamache couldn’t say he blamed him. But he did need them gone.

The two men waited until the artists were well out of ear-shot. Then they turned to the third occupant of the verandah.

Suzanne Coates sat in a rocking chair with a lemonade. But instead of a magazine she had her sketch pad on her lap.

“Hello,” she said, though she didn’t get up.

“Bonjour,” said Beauvoir. “Where’s the Chief Justice?”

“He went off to his home in Knowlton. I’ve checked in here for the night.”

“Why?” asked Beauvoir. He pulled up a seat, while Gamache sat in a nearby rocking chair, and crossed his legs.

“I plan to stay until you find out who killed Lillian. I figure that’s pretty big incentive for you to get the job done quickly.”

She smiled, as did Beauvoir.

“It would move a lot faster if you told us the truth.”

That wiped the smile off her face.

“About what?”

Beauvoir handed her the sheet of paper. Suzanne took it and read, then handed it back. Her considerable energy didn’t so much wane as contract, like an implosion. She looked from Beauvoir to his boss. Gamache was giving her nothing. He simply continued to watch with interest.

“You were here the night of the murder,” said Beauvoir.

Suzanne paused and Gamache was surprised to see that even at this late date, when there was no hope of escape, she still seemed to be considering a lie.

“I was,” she finally admitted, darting looks from one man to the other.

“Why didn’t you tell us that?”

“You asked if I was at the vernissage at the Musée, and I wasn’t. You didn’t actually ask about the party here.”

“Are you saying you didn’t lie?” demanded Beauvoir, glancing at Gamache as if to say, See? Another deer on the same old path. People don’t change.

“Look,” said Suzanne, squirming in her chair, “I go to lots of vernissages, but I’m mostly on the business end of a cocktail wiener. I told you that. It’s how I pick up extra cash. I don’t hide it. Well, I mean, I hide it from Revenue Canada. But I told you all about it.”

She implored Gamache, who nodded.

“You didn’t tell us all about it,” said Beauvoir. “You failed to mention you were here when your friend was murdered.”

“I wasn’t a guest. I was working the party. And not even as a waiter. I was in the kitchen all night. I didn’t see Lillian. Didn’t even know she was here. Why would I? Look, this party was planned long ago. I was hired weeks ago.”

“Did you mention it to Lillian?” asked Beauvoir.

“Of course not. I don’t tell her about every party I’m working.”

“Did you know who it was for?”

“Not a clue. I knew it was an artist, but most of them are. The caterers I work for do mostly vernissages. I didn’t decide to come here, it was the party I was assigned. I had no idea who it was for, and I didn’t care. All I cared about was that no one complained, and that I got paid.”

“When we told you that Lillian had died at a party in Three Pines you must have known then,” Beauvoir pressed. “Why didn’t you tell us then?”

“I should have,” she admitted. “I know that. In fact, that was one of the reasons I came down. I knew I had to tell you the truth. I was just getting my courage up.”

Beauvoir looked at her with a mixture of disgust and admiration.

It was a masterful display of deceit. He glanced over to the Chief, who was also pondering the woman. But his face was indecipherable.

“Why didn’t you tell us this last night?” Beauvoir demanded again. “Why lie?”

“I was shocked. When you said Three Pines at first I thought I must have heard wrong. It was only after you left it really sank in. I was here that night. Maybe even here when she died.”

“And why didn’t you tell us as soon as you arrived today?” asked Beauvoir.

She shook her head. “I know. It was stupid. But the longer it went on the more I realized how bad it looked. And then I convinced myself it didn’t matter since I hadn’t been out of the bistro kitchen all night. I hadn’t seen anything. Really.”

“Do you have a beginner’s chip?” Gamache asked.

“Pardon?”

“An AA beginner’s chip. Bob told me everyone takes one. Do you have one?”

Suzanne nodded.

“May I see it?”

“I forgot. I gave it away.”

The two men stared and her color rose.

“To who?” Gamache asked.

Suzanne hesitated.

“To who?” Beauvoir demanded, leaning forward.

“I don’t know, I can’t think.”

“What you can’t think of is a lie. We want the truth. Now,” snapped Beauvoir.

“Where is your beginner’s chip?” asked Gamache.

“I don’t know. I gave it to one of my sponsees, years ago. We do that.”

But the Chief Inspector thought the chip was much closer than that. He suspected it was in an evidence bag, having been found caked in dirt where Lillian fell. He suspected that was one of the many reasons Suzanne Coates had come to Three Pines. To try to find her missing chip. To see how the investigation was going. To perhaps try to derail it.

But not, certainly, to tell them the truth.

Peter walked down the dirt road and noticed their car parked a little askew, on the grass border.

Clara was home.

He’d sat in St. Thomas’s Anglican Church for much of the afternoon. Repeating the prayers he remembered as a child, which pretty much boiled down to the Lord’s Prayer, the dinner prayer, “Bless, oh Lord, this food to our use…,” and Vespers, but then he remembered that was Christopher Robin and not one of the apostles.

He’d prayed. He’d sat quietly. He’d even sung something from the hymnal.

His bottom hurt and he felt neither joyful nor triumphant.

And so he left. If God was in St. Thomas’s He was hiding from Peter.

God and Clara both avoiding him. It was not, by most standards, a good day. Though as he walked down into the village he had to think Lillian would have traded places with him.

There were worse things than not meeting God. Meeting Him, for instance.

As he approached their home he noticed Denis Fortin just leaving. The two men waved to each other as Peter walked up the path.

He found Clara in the kitchen, staring at a wall.

“I just saw Fortin,” said Peter, coming up behind her. “What did he want?”

Clara turned around and the smile froze on Peter’s face.

“What is it? What’s the matter?”

“I’ve done something terrible,” she said. “I need to speak to Myrna.”

Clara went to walk around him, making for the door.

“No, wait, Clara. Talk to me. Tell me about it.”

“Did you see her face?” Beauvoir asked, as he hurried to catch up with Gamache.

The two men were walking across the village green, having left Suzanne sitting on the verandah. The rocking chair stilled. The watercolor on her lap, of Gabri’s exuberant garden, crunched and ruined. By her own hand. The hand that made it had destroyed it.

But Beauvoir had also seen Gamache’s face. The hardening, the chill in his eyes.

“Do you think that beginner’s chip was hers?” asked Beauvoir, falling into step beside the Chief.

Gamache slowed. They were almost on the bridge once again.

“I don’t know.” His face was set. “Thanks to you we know she lied about being in Three Pines on the night Lillian died.”

“She says she never left the kitchen,” said Beauvoir, surveying the village. “But it would’ve been easy for her to sneak around back of the shops and into Clara’s garden.”

“And meet Lillian there,” said Gamache. He turned and looked toward the Morrow home. They were standing on the bridge. A few trees and lilac bushes had been planted, to give Clara and Peter’s garden privacy. Even guests on the bridge wouldn’t have seen Lillian there. Or Suzanne.

“She must have told Lillian about Clara’s party, knowing that Clara was on Lillian’s apology list,” said Beauvoir. “I bet she even encouraged Lillian to come down. And arranged to meet her in the garden.” Beauvoir looked around again. “It’s the closest garden to the bistro, the most convenient. That explains why Lillian was found there. It could’ve been anyone’s, it just happened to be Clara’s.”

“So she lied about telling Lillian about the party,” said Gamache. “And she lied about not knowing who the party was for.”

“I can guarantee you, sir. Everything that woman says is a lie.”

Gamache nodded. It was certainly beginning to look like that.

“Lillian might have even gotten a lift with Suzanne—” said Beauvoir.

“That won’t work,” said Gamache. “She had her own car.”

“Right,” said Beauvoir, thinking, trying to see the sequence of events. “But she might have followed Suzanne down.”

Gamache considered that, nodding. “That would explain how she found Three Pines. She followed Suzanne.”

“But no one saw Lillian at the party,” said Beauvoir. “And in that red dress, if she was here someone would have seen her.”

Gamache considered that. “Maybe Lillian didn’t want to be seen, until she was ready.”

“For what?”

“To make an amend to Clara. Maybe she stayed in her car until an appointed hour, when she’d arranged to meet her sponsor in the garden. Perhaps with the promise of a final word of support before going out to make a difficult amend. She must have thought Suzanne was doing her a great favor.”

“Some favor. Suzanne killed her.”

Gamache stood there and thought, then shook his head. It fit, maybe. But did it make sense? Why would Suzanne kill her sponsee? Kill Lillian? And in a way that was so premeditated. And so personal. To wrap her hands around Lillian’s neck, and break it?

What could have driven Suzanne to do that?

Was the victim not quite the woman Suzanne described? Was Beauvoir right again? Maybe Lillian hadn’t changed, but was the same cruel, taunting, manipulative woman Clara had known. Had she pushed Suzanne over the edge?

Did Suzanne have a great fall, but this time did she reach up and take Lillian with her? By the throat.

Whoever killed Lillian had hated her. This was not a dispassionate crime. This was thought out and deliberate. As was the weapon. The murderer’s own hands.

“I made such a terrible mistake, Peter.”

Gamache turned toward the voice, as did Beauvoir. It was Clara, and it came from behind the lush screen of leaves and lilacs.

“Tell me, you can tell me,” said Peter, his voice low and reassuring, as though trying to coax a cat from under the sofa.

“Oh, God,” said Clara, taking rapid, shallow breaths. “What’ve I done?”

“What did you do?”

Gamache and Beauvoir exchanged looks and both edged quietly closer to the stone wall of the bridge.

“I went to visit Lillian’s parents.”

Neither Sûreté officer could see Peter’s face, or Clara’s for that matter, but they could imagine it.

There was a long pause.

“That was kind,” said Peter, but his voice was uncertain.

“It wasn’t kind,” snapped Clara. “You should’ve seen their faces. It was like I’d found two people almost dead and then decided to skin them. Oh, God, Peter, what’ve I done?”

“Are you sure you don’t want a beer?”

“No, I don’t want a beer. I want Myrna. I want…”

Anybody but you.

It wasn’t said, but everyone heard it. The man in the garden and the men on the bridge. And Beauvoir found his heart aching for Peter. Poor Peter. So at a loss.

“No wait, Clara,” Peter’s voice called. It was clear Clara was walking away from him. “Just tell me, please. I knew Lillian too. I know that you were once good friends. You must’ve loved the Dysons too.”

“I did,” said Clara, stopping. “I do.” Her voice was clearer. She’d turned to face Peter, to face the officers hidden behind the trees. “They were only ever kind to me. And now I’ve done this.”

“Tell me,” said Peter.

“I asked a bunch of people before I went and they all said the same thing,” said Clara, walking back toward Peter. “Not to go. That the Dysons would be too hurt to see me. But I went anyway.”

“Why?”

“Because I wanted to say how sorry I was. About Lillian. But also about our falling out. I wanted to give them the chance to talk about old times, about Lillian as a kid. To exchange stories maybe, with someone who knew and loved her.”

“But they didn’t want to?”

“It was horrible. I knocked on the door and Mrs. Dyson answered. She’d obviously been crying for a long time. She looked all collapsed. It took her a moment to recognize me but when she did—”

Peter waited. They all waited. Imagining the elderly woman at the door.

“—I’ve never seen such hate. Never. If she could’ve killed me right there she would’ve. Mr. Dyson joined her. He’s tiny, barely there, barely alive. I remember when he was huge. He used to pick us up and carry us on his shoulders. But now he’s all stooped over and,” she paused, obviously searching for words, “tiny. Just tiny.”

There were no words. Or hardly any more.

“‘You killed our daughter,’ he said. ‘You killed our daughter.’ And then he tried to swing his cane at me but it got all caught in the door and he just ended up crying in frustration.”

Beauvoir and Gamache could see it now. Frail, grieving, gentlemanly Mr. Dyson reduced to a murderous rage.

“You tried, Clara,” said Peter, in a calming, comforting voice. “You tried to help them. You couldn’t have known.”

“But everyone else did. Why didn’t I?” demanded Clara with a sob. And once again Peter was wise enough to stay quiet. “I thought about it all the way back here and you know what I realized?”

Again Peter waited, though Beauvoir, hidden fifteen feet away, almost spoke, almost asked, “What?”

“I convinced myself it was somehow courageous, saintly even, to go and comfort the Dysons. But I really did it for myself. And now look what I’ve done. If they weren’t so old I think Mr. Dyson would’ve killed me.”

Gamache and Beauvoir could hear muffled sobs, as Peter hugged his wife.

The Chief Inspector turned away from the bridge, and started walking toward the Incident Room, on the other side of the Rivière Bella Bella.

At the Incident Room they separated, Beauvoir to follow up the now promising leads and Gamache to head in to Montréal.

“I’ll be back by dinner,” he said, slipping behind the wheel of his Volvo. “I need to speak with Superintendent Brunel about Lillian Dyson’s art. About what it might be worth.”

“Good idea.”

Beauvoir, like Gamache, had seen the art on the victim’s walls. They just looked like weird, distorted images of Montréal streets. Familiar, recognizable, but where the streets and buildings in real life were angular, the ones in the paintings were rounded, flowing.

They made Beauvoir slightly nauseous. He wondered what Superintendent Brunel would make of them.

So did Chief Inspector Gamache.

It was late afternoon by the time he arrived in Montréal and made his way through rush hour traffic to Thérèse Brunel’s Outremont apartment.

He’d called ahead, making sure the Brunels were home, and as he climbed the stairs Jérôme opened the door. He was an almost perfect square, and was certainly a perfect host.

“Armand.” He extended his hand and grasped the Chief Inspector’s. “Thérèse is in the kitchen, preparing a little tray. Why don’t we sit on the balcony. What can I get you to drink?”

“Just a Perrier, si te plaît, Jérôme,” said Gamache, following his host through the familiar living room, past the piles of open reference books and Jérôme’s puzzles and ciphers. They walked onto the front balcony, which looked across the street and onto a leafy, green park. It was hard to believe that just around the corner was avenue Laurier, filled with bistros and brasseries and boutiques.

He and Reine-Marie lived just a few streets over and had been to this home many times, for dinner or for cocktails. And the Brunels had been to their home many times as well.

While this wasn’t exactly a social call the Brunels managed to make everything feel comfortable. If it was necessary to talk about crime, about murder, why not do it over drinks and cheese and spiced sausage and olives?

Armand Gamache’s feelings exactly.

“Merci, Jérôme,” said Thérèse Brunel, handing the tray of food to her husband and accepting a white wine.

They stood on the balcony in the afternoon sun, looking out over the park.

“Lovely time of year, isn’t it?” said Thérèse. “So fresh.”

Then she turned her attention to the man beside her. And he to her.

Armand Gamache saw a woman he’d known for more than ten years. Had trained, in fact. Had taught at the academy. She’d stood out from the rest of the cadets, not only for her obvious intelligence but because she was old enough to be their mother. She was, in fact, a full decade older than Gamache himself.

She’d joined the Sûreté after a distinguished career as the chief curator at the Musée des Beaux Arts in Montréal. A celebrated art historian and advocate, she’d been consulted by the Sûreté on the appearance of a mysterious painting. Not the disappearance, mind, but the sudden appearance of one.

In that instance, in that crime, she’d discovered a love of puzzles. After helping on a few cases she’d realized it was what she really wanted to do, was meant to do.

So she’d taken herself off to a quite astonished recruiting officer and signed up.

That had been twelve years ago. And now she was one of the senior officers in the Sûreté, outstripping her teacher and mentor. But only, they both knew, because he’d chosen, and been given, a different path.

“How can I help, Armand?” she asked, indicating one of their balcony chairs with an elegant, slender hand.

“Shall I leave you?” Jérôme asked, struggling out of his seat.

“No, no,” Gamache waved him down, “please stay if you’d like.”

Jérôme always liked. A retired emergency room doctor, he’d loved puzzles all his life and was more than amused that his wife, always gently poking fun at his endless ciphers, was now neck deep in puzzles herself. Of a more serious nature, to be sure.

Chief Inspector Gamache put his Perrier down and brought the dossier out of his satchel. “I’d like you to look at these and tell me what you think.”

Superintendent Brunel spread the photographs on the wrought iron table, using their glasses and food platter to pin them down against the slight breeze.

The men waited quietly as she studied them. She took her time. Cars drove by. Across the way, in the park, children kicked around a soccer ball and played on the swings.

Armand Gamache sipped his sparkling water, stirring the bubbly wedge of lime with his finger, and watched as she examined the paintings from Lillian Dyson’s apartment. Thérèse looked stern, a seasoned investigator handed an element in a murder case. Her eyes darted here and there, scanning the paintings. And then they slowed and rested first on one image then another. She moved the paintings about on the table, tilting her coiffured head to the side.

Her eyes never softened, but her expression did, as she began to lose herself in the paintings and the puzzle.

Armand hadn’t told her anything about them. About who’d done them, about what he wanted to know. He’d given her no information, except that they were from a murder investigation.

He wanted her to form her own opinion, unsullied by his questions or comments.

The Chief Inspector had taught her at the academy that a crime scene wasn’t simply on the ground. It was in people’s heads. Their memories and perceptions. Their feelings. And you don’t want to contaminate those with leading questions.

Finally she leaned away from the table and looked up, first as always at Jérôme, then to Gamache.

“Well, Superintendent?”

“Well, Chief Inspector, I can tell you I’ve never seen these works or this artist before. The style is singular. Like nothing else out there. Deceptively simple. Not primitive, but not self-conscious either. They’re beautiful.”

“Would they be valuable?”

“Now there’s a question.” She considered the images again. “Beautiful isn’t in fashion. Edgy, dark, stark, cynical, that’s what galleries and curators want. They seem to think they’re more complex, more challenging, but I can tell you, they’re not. Light is every bit as challenging as dark. We can discover a great deal about ourselves by looking at beauty.”

“And what do these,” Gamache indicated the paintings on the table, “tell you?”

“About myself?” she asked with a smile.

“If you’d like, but I was thinking more about the artist.”

“Who is he, Armand?”

He hesitated. “I’ll tell you in a moment, but I’d like to hear what you think.”

“Whoever painted these is a wonderful artist. Not, I think, a young artist. There’s too much nuance. As I said, they’re deceptively simple, but if you look closely they’re made up of grace notes. Like here.” She pointed to where a road swept around a building, like a river around a rock. “That slight play of light. And over here, in the distance, where sky and building and road all meet and become difficult to distinguish.”

Thérèse looked at the paintings, almost wistfully. “They’re magnificent. I’d like to meet the artist.” She looked into Gamache’s eyes and held them for a moment longer than necessary. “But I suspect I won’t. He’s dead, isn’t he? He’s the victim?”

“Why do you say that?”

“Besides the fact you’re the head of homicide?” She smiled and beside her Jérôme gave a harrumph of amusement. “Because for you to bring these to me the artist would have to be either a suspect or the victim, and whoever painted these would not kill.”

“Why not?”

“Artists tend to paint what they know. A painting is a feeling. The best artists reveal themselves in their works,” said Superintendent Brunel, glancing again at the art. “Whoever painted this was content. Not, perhaps, perfect, but a content man.”

“Or woman,” said the Chief Inspector. “And you’re right, she’s dead.”

He told them about Lillian Dyson, her life and her death.

“Do you know who killed her?” Jérôme asked.

“I’m getting closer,” said Gamache, gathering up the photographs. “What can you tell me about François Marois and André Castonguay?”

Thérèse raised a finely shaped brow. “The art dealers? Are they involved?”

“Along with Denis Fortin, yes.”

“Well,” said Thérèse, sipping her white wine. “Castonguay has his own gallery, but most of his income comes from the Kelley contract. He landed it decades ago and has managed to hold on to it.”

“You make it sound tenuous.”

“I’m actually amazed he still has it. He’s lost a lot of his influence in recent years, with new, more contemporary galleries opening.”

“Like Fortin’s?”

“Exactly like Fortin. Very aggressive. Fortin’s taken a real run at the gentlemen’s club. Can’t say I blame him. They shut him out so he had no choice but to pound down the doors.”

“Denis Fortin doesn’t seem content with pounding down just the doors,” said Gamache, taking a thin slice of cured Italian sausage and a black olive. “I get the impression he wants everything to come crashing down around Castonguay’s ears. Fortin wants it all, and means to get it.”

“Van Gogh’s ear,” said Thérèse, and smiled as Gamache paused before putting the sliced sausage in his mouth. “Not the cold cut, Armand. You’re safe. Though I can’t vouch for the olives.”

She gave him a wicked look.

“Did you just say, ‘Van Gogh’s ear’?” asked the Chief Inspector. “Someone else used the same expression earlier in the investigation. Can’t remember who now. What does it mean?”

“It means scooping up everything for fear of missing something important. Like they missed Van Gogh’s genius in another era. Denis Fortin is doing just that. Grabbing up all the promising artists, in case one of them turns out to be the new Van Gogh, or Damien Hirst or Anish Kapoor.”

“The next big thing. He missed it with Clara Morrow.”

“He sure did,” agreed Superintendent Brunel. “Which must make him desperate not to do it again.”

“So he’d want this artist?” Gamache indicated the now closed dossier on the table.

She nodded. “I think so. As I said, beautiful isn’t in, but then if you’re going to find the next big thing it won’t be among all the people doing what everyone else’s doing. You need to find someone creating their own form. Like her.”

She tapped the dossier with a manicured finger.

“And François Marois?” asked Gamache. “How does he fit in?”

“Ah, now there’s a good question. He gives every appearance of urbane disinterest, certainly in the infighting. Seems to live above the fray. Claims to only want to promote great art and the artists. And he certainly knows it. Of all the dealers in Canada, and certainly in this city, I’d say he’s most likely to recognize talent.”

“And then what?”

Thérèse Brunel looked at Gamache closely. “You’ve obviously spent time with him, Armand. What do you think?”

Gamache thought for a moment. “I think of all the dealers he’s the most likely to get what he wants.”

Brunel nodded slowly. “He’s a predator,” she finally said. “Patient, ruthless. As charming as can be, as you’ve probably noticed, until he spots what he wants. And then? Best to hide somewhere until the slaughter is over.”

“That bad?”

“That bad. I’ve never known François Marois not to get his way.”

“Has he ever broken the law?”

She shook her head. “Not the laws of man, anyway.”

The three friends sat quietly for a moment. Until finally Gamache spoke.

“I’ve come across a quote in this case and wonder if you know it. He’s a natural, producing art like it’s a bodily function.”

He sat back and watched their reactions. Thérèse, so serious a moment before, smiled a bit while her husband guffawed.

“I know that quote. From a critique, I believe. But many years ago,” said Thérèse.

“It was. A review in La Presse. Written by the dead woman.”

“By her or about her?”

“The review mentions a ‘he,’ Thérèse,” said her husband with amusement.

“That’s true, but Armand might have misquoted. He’s famous for shoddy work, you know,” she said with a smile, and Gamache laughed.

“Well, this time, by dumb luck, I got it right,” he said. “Do you remember who the line was written about?”

Thérèse Brunel thought, then shook her head. “I’m sorry, Armand. As I say, it’s become a famous line, but I suspect whoever it was written about didn’t become a famous artist.”

“Are reviews that important?”

“To Kapoor or Twombly, no. To someone just starting out, a first show, they’re crucial. Which reminds me, I saw the wonderful reviews of Clara’s show. We couldn’t make the vernissage, but I’m not surprised. Her works are genius. I called to congratulate her but couldn’t get through. I’m sure she’s busy.”

“Are Clara’s paintings better than these?” Gamache indicated the dossier.

“They’re different.”

“Oui. But if you were still the chief curator at the Musée, which artist would you buy, Clara Morrow or Lillian Dyson?”

Thérèse considered for a moment. “You know, I say they’re different, but they have one big thing in common. They’re both quite joyous, in their own way. How lovely if that’s where art’s heading.”

“Why?”

“Because it might mean that’s where the human spirit’s heading. Out of a period of darkness.”

“That would be good,” agreed Gamache, picking up his dossier. But before he rose he looked at Thérèse, then made up his mind.

“What do you know about Chief Justice Thierry Pineault?”

“Oh, God, Armand, don’t tell me he’s involved?”

“He is.”

Superintendent Brunel took a deep breath. “I don’t know him personally, only as a jurist. He seems very straight, upstanding. No blemishes on his judicial record. Everyone has their stumbles, but I haven’t heard anything against him as a sitting judge.”

“And off the bench?” pressed Gamache.

“I’d heard he liked his drink and could get pretty nasty at times. But then, he had reason to. Lost a grandson, or was it a little girl? A DUI. He quit drinking after that.”

Gamache got up and helped clear the table, carrying the tray into their kitchen. Then he made for the door. But there he paused.

He’d been debating saying anything to Thérèse and Jérôme. But if there was ever a time, it was now. And if there was ever a couple, it was them.

As they stood on the threshold, Gamache slowly closed the door and looked at them. “I have another question for you,” he said quietly. “Nothing to do with the case. It’s about something else.”

“Oui?”

“The video of the attack,” he said, watching them closely. “Who do you really think released it onto the Internet?”

Jérôme looked perplexed, but Superintendent Brunel didn’t.

She looked angry.