The Cruelest Month

FORTY-ONE

Clara’s heart was in her throat, in her wrists, at her temples. Her whole body was throbbing with the pounding of her heart. She couldn’t believe they were back in the old Hadley house.

In the darkness, except for the puny candlelight.

When Inspector Beauvoir had called and told her what Gamache wanted she’d thought he must be kidding, or drunk. Certainly delusional.

But he’d been serious. They were to meet at nine in the old Hadley house. In the room where Madeleine died.

All evening she’d watched the clock creep forward. At first excruciatingly slowly, then it had seemed to race, the hands flying round the face. She’d been unable to eat and Peter had begged her not to go. And finally her terror had found purchase, and she’d agreed to stay behind. In their little cottage, by the fire, with a good book and a glass of Merlot.

Hiding.

But Clara knew if she did that she’d carry this cowardice for the rest of her life. And when the clock said five to nine she’d risen, as though in someone else’s body, put on her coat, and left. Like a zombie from one of Peter’s old black and white movies.

And she’d found herself in a black and white world. Without street lamps or traffic lights, Three Pines became bathed in black once the sun set. Except for the points of light in the sky. And the lights of the homes around the green that tonight seemed to warn her, beg her not to leave them, not to do this foolishness.

Through the darkness Clara joined the others. Myrna, Gabri, Monsieur Béliveau, the witch Jeanne, all trudging, as though they’d given up their own will, toward the haunted house on the hill.

Now she was back in that room. She looked at the faces, all staring at the flickering candle in the center of their circle, its light reflected in their eyes, like the pilot light for the fear they carried. It struck Clara how threatening the simple flicker of a candle can be when that’s all you have.

Odile and Gilles were across from her, as were Hazel and Sophie.

Monsieur Béliveau sat beside Clara and Jeanne Chauvet took her seat beside Gabri, who was festooned with crucifixes, Stars of David and a croissant in his pocket. Myrna asked because it looked like something else.

But still their circle was broken. One chair was on its side, having tumbled into the center almost a week ago, and there it sat like a memorial, though in the uncertain light it looked like a skeleton with its wooden arms and legs and ribbed back throwing distorted shadows against the wall.

It was a calm and tranquil night, outside the old Hadley house. But inside the house had its own atmosphere, its own gravity. It was a world of groans and creaks, of sorrow and sighs. The house had taken another life, two if you count the bird, and it was hungry again. It wanted more. It felt like a tomb. Worse, thought Clara, it felt like limbo. In stepping into the house, into this room, they’d walked into a netherworld, somewhere between life and death. A world where they were about to be judged, and separated.

Out of the dark a hand reached into their circle and grabbed the skeletal chair. Then Armand Gamache joined them, sitting silently for a moment, leaning forward, elbows on his legs, his large powerful hands together, his fingers intertwined as though in prayer. His deep brown eyes were thoughtful.

She heard an exhale. The candle flickered violently, from the force of their stress released.

Gamache looked at them. At Clara he seemed to pause and smile, but Clara thought everyone probably had that impression. She wondered how he managed to make time disobey its own rules. Though she also knew Three Pines itself was like that, a village where time seemed flexible.

‘This is a tragedy of secrets,’ said Gamache. ‘It’s a story of hauntings, of ghosts, of wickedness dressed as valor. It’s a story of things hidden and buried. Alive. When something not quite dead is buried it eventually comes back,’ he said after a moment’s pause. ‘It claws its way out of the dirt, rancid and fetid. And hungry.

‘That’s what happened here. Everyone in this room has a secret. Something to hide. Something that came alive a few days ago. When Agent Lacoste told me about her interview with Madeleine’s husband I started to get some insight into this murder. He described Madeleine as the sun. Life-giving, joyous, bright and cheerful.’

Around the circle the glowing faces nodded.

‘But the sun also scalds. It burns and blinds.’ He looked at each of them again. ‘And it creates strong shadows. Who can live close to the sun? I thought of Icarus, the beautiful boy who with his father made wings to fly. His father gave him one warning, though. Do not fly too close to the sun. But, of course, he did. Anyone with children will understand how that can happen.’

His eyes flickered to Hazel. Her face was blank. Empty. Where once there’d been anxiety, pain, anger, now there was nothing. The horsemen had ridden through, leaving nothing standing. But Gamache thought maybe they hadn’t brought grief. The horsemen Hazel had been desperate to keep at bay carried something far more terrifying. Their burden was loneliness.

‘The most obvious suspect is Sophie. Poor Sophie, as everyone calls her. Always getting hurt, always getting sick. Though things started to get better when Madeleine arrived.’

Sophie stared at him, her brows low and glowering.

‘The house that had been so full of things and yet so empty was suddenly full of life. Can’t you just imagine?’

Suddenly they were transported to a day in their imaginations when the drab home of Hazel and Sophie was visited by sunshine. When the curtains were thrown open. When laughter stirred the decay in the rooms and sent it twirling into the rays of light.

‘But the price you paid was that your shadows were revealed. You fell in love with Madeleine, didn’t you?’

‘Love isn’t a shadow,’ said Sophie defiantly.

‘You’re quite right. Love isn’t. But attachment is. Myrna, you talked about the near enemy.’

‘Attachment masquerading as love,’ nodded Myrna. ‘But I wasn’t thinking of Sophie.’

‘No, you were thinking of someone else. But it applies here.’ He turned back to Sophie. ‘You wanted Madeleine for yourself. You went to her university, Queens, to impress her. To get her to pay more attention to you. It was bad enough to share Madeleine with your mother, but when you returned home recently and found Madeleine in a relationship with Monsieur Béliveau, that was too much.’

‘How could she? I mean look at him. He’s old and ugly and poor. He’s just a grocer for God’s sake. How could she love him? I’d gone all the way to fucking Queens for her and when I come back she’s not even around. She’s at a séance with him.’

She jabbed her crutch at Béliveau, who seemed beyond the insults.

‘When the next séance came you saw your chance. You’ve fought your weight all your life, even taking ephedra a few years ago, until it was found and taken away. But eventually the weight crept back and you ordered more pills from the internet. This photograph shows a plump girl, just two years ago.’ Gamache handed round the picture from the fridge. Each person looked at it. It seemed to have been taken on another planet. One where people laughed, and loved, and celebrated. One where Madeleine was still alive.

‘You found the pill bottle. You knew your mother threw nothing away. Inspector Beauvoir described the cupboard filled with old pills, most long out of date. We know from the lab that you didn’t use your current ephedra pills. Instead, you found the old ones. You knew Madeleine had a heart damaged by her chemotherapy treatments –’

A small murmur went around the circle.

‘– and you knew a high enough dose, combined with the bad heart, could kill her. All you needed was a scare. Something to challenge her heart, to get it pounding and racing. And one was handed to you. A séance in the old Hadley house.’

‘This is stupid,’ said Sophie, though she was looking far from confident.

‘You made sure you sat beside Madeleine at dinner, and you slipped the pills into her food.’

‘I didn’t. Mom, tell him I didn’t.’

‘She didn’t,’ said Hazel, finding the energy to come, feebly, to Sophie’s defense.

‘Of course, everything I’ve said about Sophie applies to Hazel as well.’ Gamache turned to the woman beside Sophie. ‘You loved Madeleine. Have never tried to hide it. A platonic love, almost certainly, but a deep one. You probably loved her since you were children together. And then she comes to live with you, recovers from her chemo, and your lives start again. No more dullness. No more loneliness.’

Hazel nodded.

‘If Sophie could find the ephedra so could you. You were on Madeleine’s other side at dinner. You could have slipped it to her. But one nagging question was why not kill Madeleine at the first séance? Why wait?’

He let the question sink in. There seemed now to be no world beyond their circle of light. The known world had disappeared over the edge of the darkness.

‘The séances were different in three ways.’ Gamache counted them on his fingers. ‘The dinner at Peter and Clara’s, the old Hadley house, and the Smyths’.’

‘But why would Hazel kill Madeleine?’ Clara asked.

‘Jealousy. That picture?’ He gestured to the photo, now in Gabri’s hand. ‘Madeleine was looking with great affection at Hazel and Hazel was looking with even more open affection. But not at Madeleine or Sophie. She was looking off camera. And I remembered something Olivier said. He said how kind Hazel had been to Monsieur Béliveau after his wife died. He was invited to all celebrations, especially the big ones. The hat Hazel wore was white and blue, the cake had blue frosting. It was a man’s birthday. It was yours.’

He turned to Béliveau, who looked perplexed. Gabri handed him the photograph and the grocer studied it for a few moments. In the silence they heard more creaks. Something seemed to be coming up the stairs. Clara knew it was all in her mind. Knew what she’d felt before had only been the baby bird, not the monster of her imagination. That bird was dead now. So nothing could be coming up the stairs. Nothing could be on the landing. Nothing could be creaking along the corridor.

‘Hazel’s always been very kind,’ Monsieur Béliveau finally said, looking over at Hazel who’d all but disappeared.

‘You fell in love with him,’ said Gamache. ‘Didn’t you?’

Hazel shook her head slightly.

‘Mom? Did you?’

‘I thought he was nice. I once thought maybe…’

Hazel’s voice petered out.

‘Until Madeleine showed up,’ said Gamache. ‘She didn’t mean to, almost certainly had no idea how you felt about him, but she stole Monsieur Béliveau from you.’

‘He wasn’t mine to steal.’

‘We say that,’ said Gamache, ‘but saying and feeling are very different. You were two lonely people, you and Monsieur Béliveau. In many ways a much more natural match. But Madeleine was this magnificent, lovely, laughing magnet and Monsieur Béliveau was mesmerized. I don’t want to give the impression Madeleine was malicious or mean. She was just being herself. And it was hard not to fall in love with her. Am I right, Monsieur Sandon?’

‘Moi?’

At the sound of his own name Sandon’s head jerked up.

‘You loved her too. Deeply. As deeply and totally as unrequited love can be. In many ways it’s the deepest because it’s never tested. She remained the ideal for you. The perfect woman. But then the perfect woman faltered. She fell in love with someone else. And worse. The one man you despise. Monsieur Béliveau. The bringer of death. The man who allowed a venerable old oak to die in agony.’

‘I could never kill Madeleine. I can’t even cut down a tree. Can’t step on a flower, can’t crush an earwig. I can’t take a life.’

‘But you can, Monsieur Sandon.’ Armand Gamache grew very silent and leaned forward again, staring at the huge lumberjack. ‘You said so yourself. Better to put something out of its misery than allow it to die a long and painful death. You were talking about the oak. But you were prepared to kill it. Put it out of its misery. If you knew Madeleine was dying, perhaps you’d do the same for her.’

Sandon was speechless, his eyes wide, his mouth wide.

‘I loved her. I couldn’t kill her.’

‘Gilles,’ Odile whispered.

‘And she loved someone else.’ Gamache moved in closer, thrusting his words home. ‘She loved Monsieur Béliveau. Every day you saw it, every day it was in your face, undeniable, even for you. She didn’t love you at all.’

‘How could she?’ He rose from his chair, his massive hands clenched like mallets. ‘You don’t know what it was like, to see her with him.’ He turned to look at meek Monsieur Béliveau. ‘I knew she couldn’t care for someone like me, but…’

He faltered.

‘But if she couldn’t love you, she couldn’t love anyone?’ said Gamache softly. ‘It must have been horrible.’

The lumberjack collapsed into his chair. They waited for the crack as the wood gave way, but instead it held him, as a mother might a hurt child.

‘But the stuff that killed her was in the Smyths’ medicine cabinet,’ said Odile wildly. ‘He couldn’t get it.’

‘You’re right. He didn’t have access to their home.’ Gamache turned to Odile. ‘I mentioned the lab report. It said the ephedra that killed Madeleine wasn’t from a recent batch. It was much more natural. I’d been a fool. Over and over people had told me and it never registered. Ephedra’s an herb. A plant. Used for centuries in Chinese medicines. Maybe Gilles didn’t need access to their home. Maybe you didn’t either. You know what I took from your store?’

He stared at Odile, who stared back, frantic and frozen.

‘Ma Huang. An old Chinese herb. Also known as Mormon’s tea. And ephedra.’

‘I didn’t do it. He didn’t do it. He didn’t love her. She was a bitch, a horrible, horrible person. She tricked people into thinking she cared.’

‘You spoke to her, warned her, as you were walking here that night, didn’t you? You told her she could have anyone, but Gilles was the only man you ever wanted. You pleaded with her to stay away from him.’

‘She told me not to be so stupid. But I’m not stupid.’

‘By then it was too late. The ephedra was already in her.’ Gamache looked at the circle of staring faces. ‘You all had reason to kill her. You all had the opportunity to kill her. But there was one more necessary ingredient. What killed Madeleine Favreau was ephedra and a fright. Someone had to provide the fright.’

All eyes turned to Jeanne Chauvet. Her own were hooded, sunken and dark.

‘You were all trying to get me to consider Jeanne a suspect. You told me you didn’t trust her, didn’t like her. Were frightened of her. I’d put it down to a kind of hysteria. The stranger among you. The witch. Who else would you want to be guilty?’

Clara stared at him. Gamache had put it so simply, so clearly. Had they really thrown this mousy woman to the inquisition? Turned her in? Lit the pyre and warmed themselves by it like smug Puritans, confident the beast wasn’t one of them. No thought for the truth, no thought for the woman.

‘I’d all but dismissed her as being too obvious. But dinner last night changed my mind.’

Clara thought she heard creaking again, as though the house had woken up, could sense a kill. Her heart thudded and the candle began flickering as though trembling itself. There was something about in the old Hadley house. Something had come to life. Gamache seemed to sense it too. He cocked his head to one side, a puzzled look on his face. Listening.

‘Ruth Zardo was talking about the burning times and called you Joan of Arc,’ he said to Jeanne. ‘And I remembered that Jeanne is French for Joan. Joan of Arc becomes Jeanne d’Arc. A woman burned for hearing voices and seeing visions. A witch.’

‘A saint,’ corrected Jeanne, her voice detached, far away.

‘If you prefer,’ said Gamache. ‘That first séance you thought was a joke, but the next one you took seriously. You made sure it was as atmospheric, as frightening, as possible.’

‘I’m not responsible for other people’s fears.’

‘You think not? If you jump out of the dark and say boo, you can’t blame the person for being frightened. And that’s what you did. Deliberately.’

‘No one forced Mad to come that night,’ said Jeanne, then stopped.

‘Mad,’ said Gamache quietly. ‘A nickname. Used by people who knew her well, not by someone who’d only just met her. You knew her, didn’t you?’

Jeanne was silent.

Gamache nodded. ‘You knew her. I’ll come back to that in a moment. The final element for murder was the séance. But no one here was going to lead one, and who’d expect a psychic to show up for Easter? It seemed far too fortuitous to be chance. And it wasn’t. Did you send this?’

Gamache handed Gabri the brochure for the B. & B.

‘I’ve never sent these out,’ said Gabri, barely looking at the brochure. ‘Only made them to satisfy Olivier who said we weren’t doing enough advertising.’

‘You’ve never mailed any out?’ Gamache persisted.

‘Why would I?’

‘You’re a B. & B.,’ suggested Myrna. ‘A business.’

‘That’s just what Olivier says, but we get enough people. Why would I want more work?’

‘Being Gabri is work enough,’ agreed Clara.

‘It’s exhausting,’ said Gabri.

‘So you didn’t write that across the top of the brochure.’ Gamache pointed to the glossy paper in Gabri’s large hand. Leaning into the candlelight Gabri strained to see.

‘Where lay lines meet – Easter Special,’ he read, guffawing. ‘As if. Is that what you meant when you said I wouldn’t get laid?’ he asked Jeanne, shifting his croissant.

‘I didn’t say that. I said ley lines don’t meet here.’

‘I thought you said they don’t work here,’ said Gabri, relieved. ‘But I never wrote that.’ He handed the brochure back to Gamache. ‘Don’t even know what it means.’

‘You didn’t type those words and you didn’t send it. So who did?’ It was clear he wasn’t expecting an answer. He was talking to himself. ‘Someone who wanted to lure Jeanne to Three Pines. Someone who knew her well enough to know talk of ley lines would pique her interest. But someone who doesn’t themselves know enough about ley lines to spell it correctly.’

‘I’d have to say that means all of us,’ said Clara. ‘Except one.’ She looked at Jeanne.

‘You’re thinking I wrote it myself? So that it only looks as though someone tried to trick me into coming? And even misspelled the word? I’m not that clever.’

‘Maybe,’ said Gamache.

‘That first séance, Gabri,’ said Clara, ‘you put up posters saying Madame Blavatsky would be contacting the dead. You lied about her name –’

‘Artistic license,’ explained Gabri.

‘It must be exhausting being him,’ said Myrna.

‘– but you knew Jeanne was a psychic. How’d you know?’

‘She told me.’

After a moment Jeanne spoke. ‘It’s true. I keep telling myself not to say anything, and of course it’s the first thing out of my mouth. I wonder why?’

‘You want to be special,’ said Myrna, not unkindly. ‘We all do. You’re just more open about it.’

‘Well,’ said Gabri, in a voice uncharacteristically small, ‘I did kinda wheedle it out of her. I ask all my guests what they do. What passions they have. It’s interesting.’

‘And then you put them to work,’ said Sandon, still smarting from the time he lost two hundred dollars to Gabri’s poker champ guest.

‘A village gets quiet,’ Gabri explained to Gamache with dignity. ‘I bring culture to Three Pines.’

No one chose to mention the shrieking opera singer.

‘When Jeanne checked in she read my palm,’ Gabri continued. ‘In my past life I was the Keeper of the Light at the Acropolis, but don’t tell anyone.’

‘I promise,’ said Clara.

‘But before that I walked around the village,’ said Jeanne. ‘Sensing the energy of the place. The funny thing is, whoever wrote that,’ she pointed to the brochure in Gamache’s hand, ‘was almost right. There are ley lines here, but they run parallel to Three Pines. It’s quite unusual to have them so close together. But they don’t meet. You don’t actually want them to meet. Too much energy. Good for sacred places, but you notice no one actually lives in Stonehenge.’

‘Not that we can see anyway,’ said Gamache, to everyone’s surprise. ‘Whoever sent the brochure knew that Gabri would find out that his guest was a psychic, and from there it was a guarantee he’d put her to work. A séance was a sure thing.

‘At Peter and Clara’s last night you brought me a book, Myrna. The Dictionary of Magical Places. I looked at it and do you know what I found?’

No one spoke. He turned to Jeanne. ‘I think you know what I found. You looked upset when the book was produced, especially since it was the latest edition. Olivier asked if they were finding new magical places. He was joking, of course, but it turned out to be quite true. They did find a new magical place in the last twenty years. In France. A series of caves named after the region they were found. The Chauvet caves.’

Another creak was heard and Gamache knew time was running out. Something dark and personal was approaching.

‘Jeanne Chauvet. A psychic and self-proclaimed Wicca with the name of a medieval woman burned for witchcraft and a magical cave. There was no way it was your real name. But something else happened last night. Inspector Beauvoir and I couldn’t sleep for the frogs. We were in the living room looking at yearbooks from Hazel and Madeleine’s high school when Jeanne showed up. This morning the books were gone. There was only one person who could have taken them. Why did you, Jeanne?’

Jeanne stared off into the darkness then after a moment she spoke.

‘Something’s coming.’

‘Pardon?’ Gamache asked.

She turned to him, her eyes finally catching the candlelight. They were glowing now. It was unnatural, unnerving.

‘You can feel it, I know. It’s the thing I warned you about that morning in the church. It’s arrived.’

‘Why did you take the yearbooks, Jeanne?’ Gamache needed to remain focused, to not let his mind wander to the other thing. But he knew time was short. He needed to finish this now.

She stared openly at the door and remained silent.

‘I stopped at the high school on my way back this afternoon and picked up two things. Another yearbook and an alumni list. I’d like to read something from Hazel and Madeleine’s grad book.’ He reached down and brought a book onto his lap. He opened it to a spot marked by a Post-it. ‘Joan Cummings. Cheerleader. Joan of Arc plans to set the world on fire.’

He softly closed it.

‘You’re Joan Cummings?’ said Hazel, rousing herself. ‘From school?’

‘Didn’t recognize me, did you? Mad didn’t either.’

‘You’ve changed,’ said Hazel, sputtering a little in embarrassment.

‘But Mad hadn’t,’ said Jeanne.

Gamache turned the yearbook round and showed them the picture of the cheerleaders. In the uncertain light they saw a young woman, toned arms straining to the skies, a huge smile on her pretty face.

‘This was almost thirty years ago. But for all the make-up and smiles they still called you Joan of Arc, and talked about burning.’

Jeanne’s eyes flicked to the door then back again.

‘I knew Madeleine from the cheerleading squad. You were right about the sun, you know. She was all that and more. She was genuinely nice and that made it worse. After years of being teased and tormented for being different all I wanted was to fit in. I wore make-up, did my hair, learned to talk nonsense, and finally made the cheerleading squad. I wanted to be her friend, but she was oblivious. Not cruel, really, but dismissive.’

‘You hated her?’ asked Clara.

‘You’ve probably always been popular,’ snapped Jeanne. ‘Pretty, talented, lively.’ Clara heard the words but didn’t recognize herself in them. Jeanne continued, ‘I was none of those things. I just wanted a friend. One single friend. Do you have any idea how horrible it is to be on the outside, all the time? And finally I made the squad. The place where all the cool girls were. And do you know how I did it?’

Jeanne was almost hissing now.

‘I betrayed everything I was. I made myself silly and superficial. There’s a reason they call it “make-up”. I literally made up myself every day. I locked all the things I cared about inside and turned my back on people who might’ve been my friends. All in the pursuit of the one, perfect girl.’

‘Madeleine,’ said Gamache.

‘And she was perfect. The worst moment of my life was when I realized I’d betrayed everything I cared about, for nothing.’

‘So you changed your name to Chauvet. You made up yourself yet again.’

‘No, I finally accepted myself. Changing my name to Chauvet was a celebration, a declaration. For once I wasn’t hiding who I am.’

‘She’s a witch,’ whispered Gabri to Myrna.

‘We know, mon beau. So am I.’

‘I knew who I was, but not where I belonged. I felt a stranger everywhere. Until I came here. As soon as I drove down that road into Three Pines I knew I’d found home.’

‘But you also found Madeleine,’ said Gamache.

Jeanne nodded. ‘At the séance that Friday night. And I knew she’d steal my light again. Not because she was greedy, but because I’d hand it to her. I could feel it. I’d found myself, I’d found a home and the only thing missing was finding a friend. And as soon as I saw Mad I knew I’d do it all over again. Try to be her friend, and be rebuffed.’

‘But why kill her?’ asked Clara.

‘I didn’t kill her.’

There were murmurs of disbelief around the circle.

‘She’s telling the truth,’ said Gamache.

‘She didn’t kill Madeleine.’

‘Then who did?’ asked Gabri.

Jeanne stood up, staring into the darkness at the door.

‘Sir?’ The voice at the door was young, tentative, but that made it more frightening somehow, like discovering the devil was a family friend.

Gamache rose too and turned to the door. He could see nothing but black, then eventually an outline appeared. He’d run out of time. He turned back to the circle. All eyes were on him, their faces round and open like searchlights, probing for reassurance.

‘I’ll be back in a few minutes.’

‘You’re not leaving us?’ said Clara.

‘I’m sorry. I have to, but nothing bad will happen to you.’

Gamache turned and walked away from the flickering light, disappearing over the edge of the world.