The Nature of the Beast

by Louise Penny

  Lacoste could see exactly what Madame Proulx was thinking. It could’ve been me. Followed closely by, Thank God it was the woman next door.

  “What did you think of Antoinette?” Lacoste asked.

  “She was okay. She’s friendly without being overly familiar, if you know what I mean.”

  “Did you like her?” Lacoste asked.

  There was a hesitation and Madame Proulx shifted in her La-Z-Boy. “I warmed to her. I liked her uncle, Guillaume. We’d chat over the fence in the summer while he gardened.”

  “Sounds like you didn’t really like her, though,” Lacoste gently pushed, though it didn’t take much.

  “She was difficult,” Madame Proulx admitted. “As soon as she moved in she started complaining. About the kids playing street hockey and the noise from family barbeques. She behaved like it was her seigneurie and we were all habitants, if you know what I mean.”

  Lacoste did. Les Filles de Caleb was having its effect, down to the old-fashioned description of lord and peasant. But while the words were from a TV script, the emotions seemed genuine. Madame Proulx did not take kindly to the city woman bossing them around. It was what they’d heard, in various versions, from the other neighbors, once they’d gotten past being polite about the recently, and violently, deceased.

  “Can you think of anyone who might’ve done this?” Lacoste asked, and saw Madame Proulx’s eyes widen.

  “No. Can’t you? Isn’t that your job? You have no ideas?”

  “We have some,” said Lacoste, bringing out the reassurance yet again, and yet again it had a marginal effect. “But I need to ask. No especially violent feuds with neighbors?”

  “None. It was annoying, nothing more. And she looked odd. Those clothes. She was like a spoiled child.”

  She turned shrewd eyes on the investigators.

  “You don’t think it was just a robbery?”

  “We’re looking at all possibilities.”

  Madame Proulx took in, apparently for the first time, the script in Beauvoir’s hand, and she rose to her feet. Not swiftly, not even struggling out of the comfortable chair. There was a grace and ease about all her movements. And there was also certainty.

  “I would like you to leave, and take that with you.”

  There was no need to ask what “that” was.

  “You’re aware of the play?” Beauvoir asked, holding it up. He thought for a moment Madame Proulx was going to cross herself again. But she didn’t. Instead she straightened up completely and stood, tall and formidable, facing both him and John Fleming’s creation.

  “We all were. It’s a travesty. How she couldn’t see that is beyond me. I’m not a prude, if that’s what you’re thinking. But it’s not right.”

  No philosophical debate, no discussion of the evils of censorship. Just a clear statement of fact. Producing the Fleming play wasn’t right. But exactly how wrong it was wasn’t yet clear.

  At the door Beauvoir asked about Brian.

  “We liked him,” said Madame Proulx, apparently speaking for the whole neighborhood. “Now if he killed her we could understand. But he seemed to really care for her.” She shook her head. “Happens a lot, doesn’t it? You look at a couple and wonder what they see in each other. You never know, if you know what I mean.”

  Beauvoir did know. You never knew.

  They got in the car and headed back to Three Pines.

  “Why did you take the play with you?” Lacoste asked Beauvoir as he drove.

  “It’s been nothing but trouble,” he explained. “And whoever killed Antoinette was looking for something. Maybe it was the play.”

  “But there’re lots of copies out there.”

  “True, but that’s the original. I thought it was worth a read.”

  Isabelle Lacoste nodded. He was right. She wished she’d thought of that.

  There were times when she felt completely up to the job of Chief Inspector. And times when she knew it should have gone to this man.

  “Is there anything else I missed?” she asked him.

  “You don’t miss much, Isabelle,” said Beauvoir. “And what you do, I pick up. And vice versa. It’s what makes us a strong team.”

  “Do you miss Monsieur Gamache?” she asked.

  “It’s no reflection on you, but I’ll always miss Chief Inspector Gamache.”

  “So will I,” she said. They drove a few more miles before she got up the courage to ask a question that had been bothering her since her appointment.

  “Should you have been made Chief Inspector?”

  She immediately regretted asking. Suppose he said yes?

  “I would’ve liked it,” he said at last. “But I wasn’t expecting it. Not after all that happened.”

  “You mean the drinking?” she asked. “And the drugs? Or when you shot Chief Inspector Gamache?”

  “When you say it like that it sounds pretty bad,” said Beauvoir, but he smiled as he said it. They both knew pulling the trigger was the one thing he did right. He’d saved Gamache’s life, by almost taking it.

  Few, if any, would have had the courage to shoot. Lacoste wasn’t sure she would have.

  “You could’ve stopped me, you know,” he said. “You had me in your sights, just as I had him. You had no idea why I was about to gun down the Chief. Why didn’t you stop me?”

  “By shooting you?” she asked.

  “Yes. Others would have. Anyone else would have.”

  “I almost did. But you pleaded with me to trust you.”

  “That’s it?”

  “It wasn’t your words, it was your voice. You weren’t angry or deranged. You were desperate.”

  “You trusted your instincts?”

  She nodded, gripping her hands together to stop the trembling that always overcame her when she thought of that horrific day. Having Beauvoir in her sights, her finger on the trigger. And hesitating. And watching him not hesitate. Watching him gun down Chief Inspector Gamache.

  It had felt as though she herself had been shot.

  Then seeing Chief Inspector Gamache’s body leave the ground. Then hit the ground.

  “You trust your instincts,” Jean-Guy said. “That’s why you’ll make one of the great leaders in the Sûreté, Isabelle. And why I will be your loyal right hand for as long as you need me.”

  “And would you shoot me?”

  “In an instant, patron.”

  She laughed. Then realized it was the first time he’d called her patron.

  The Fleming play sat in the backseat like a passenger. Listening to them. Absorbing the talk of murder.

  CHAPTER 24

  “Bonjour,” said Armand Gamache.

  He’d found Mary Fraser alone in the small library at the back of the B and B. She was in a comfortable chair, her back to the corner bookshelves and her feet on a hassock, stretched out toward the mumbling fire in the grate.

  Her sweater was pilled and her big toe stuck out of one stocking. She did not bother to conceal it, nor did she seem at all embarrassed by this sartorial underachievement.

  What she clearly did not want him to see, though, was the file she was reading. She closed it as soon as Gamache entered and splayed her hand over it. It was done without haste, almost languidly. But still the result was a closed and secret document.

  “Old school?” he asked, indicating the dossier. “Before everything was put on computer? Or maybe some things are best left as hard copies. More easily managed. And destroyed.”

  He sat down in the other comfortable chair in the library.

  Mary Fraser took her feet off the hassock and replaced them in her shoes. She crossed her legs and looked at him.

  “What a funny thing to say, Monsieur Gamache,” she said, a cordial smile on her face. “Most of our files are still paper. To be honest, I prefer it that way.”

  “Fahrenheit 451?” he asked.

  She looked baffled, and then she caught the reference and looked at him as his third-grade teacher, Madame Arsenault, had when he’

d finally said something clever.

  “I wasn’t planning to burn it,” she said.

  “Though you could.”

  “Of course. Can I help you?”

  “I’m just wondering why you’re not more interested in the Supergun.”

  His voice was pleasant, matter-of-fact, but his sharp eyes studied her.

  Her indifferently dyed hair. Her face without makeup, except some lipstick and slightly clotted mascara. She didn’t wear contacts, preferring glasses in unfashionable frames. She hid nothing. Not wrinkles, not flawed eyesight, not even the hole in her pantyhose. And that was one of Mary Fraser’s great advantages, he was beginning to think. Being able to make artifice look genuine. Giving the impression all was revealed, when in fact very little of substance was revealed.

  This CSIS woman had appeared like Mary Poppins, descending on the village to make everything all right. Only everything wasn’t all right. He knew it. And she knew it.

  No, he didn’t trust Mary Fraser, but he did find her interesting.

  Now she was giving him an equally assessing look.

  “And I’m just wondering why you’re so interested,” she said. “In the gun.”

  “Then we’re even, madame.” He sat back, crossing his legs. Settling in. “You know more about the Supergun than you’ve told us so far. I’d like to hear it.”

  “Why should I tell you anything?”

  “Because you’re afraid, and you need all the allies you can get.”

  “I’m not afraid.” She also sat back, wriggling a bit into the soft corner of the large chair. As a small creature might in a warm den.

  “You should be afraid. Someone’s found Bull’s gun and is almost certainly looking for the plans,” said Armand. “You’re afraid they’ve already been found.”

  “They haven’t been.”

  “How do you know?”

  “It’s been three days since the gun was found. If the plans had been there, the killer would have started sending out feelers, looking for buyers. Setting up an auction.”

  “How do you know he hasn’t?”

  It was just the two of them and the real Mary Fraser was beginning to appear, seeping out from the ladder in the stocking, the undyed roots of her hair, the clotted mascara. The file clerk was receding. But then, the real Armand Gamache was also appearing. The kindly retired cop was receding.

  She gave him a patient smile. “We know.”

  “You don’t know everything. You didn’t know about the gun.” But even as he said it he wondered if that was true.

  “We knew Dr. Bull was working on it, of course, but not that he’d actually built it. That came as a surprise.”

  “An unpleasant one, I’m guessing.”

  “Well, not necessarily. After all, we now have the world’s only Supergun. It might come in handy.”

  “Until another one’s built,” said Gamache. “Where are the plans?”

  “Nowhere. They were destroyed by Gerald Bull.”

  “Then why are you so worried?”

  “I’m not.”

  “Then why are you still here?” he asked.

  She had nothing to say to that.

  “And why are you reading a file on Dr. Bull?”

  Her hand splayed further, to better conceal the cover.

  “You’re not a fool, Madame Fraser, so why are you pretending to be?”

  “Am I?”

  “Word is spreading about the Supergun. The villagers now know, and while they’ve been asked to keep it quiet, it’s just a matter of time before it breaks out of this valley. And then journalists, gawkers, other scientists will arrive. And who knows who else might come out of the shadows. Come looking. Time is not on your side.”

  “It wasn’t ‘someone’ who leaked the news, Monsieur Gamache. It was Isabelle Lacoste.”

  Gamache sat absolutely still. Trying not to give anything away. Not a word, an expression, a twitch.

  “That was foolish of her,” said Mary Fraser. “She has no idea the world she’s entered, and neither do you. You think you do, but you don’t. There are no rules, monsieur. No laws. No gravity. Nothing binding us, holding us down or back.”

  “I thought you were a file clerk.”

  She looked at the manila folder on her lap. “I am. And what are files? They’re information. Knowledge. And what is knowledge?”

  He didn’t need to answer that, and neither did she.

  “Why are you here?” he asked. “Why you?”

  “Be careful” was all she would say.

  “Did you know Gerald Bull?” Gamache asked. “Did CSIS kill him?”

  There was silence. He leaned forward and looked into the bland, unremarkable face.

  “Did you?” he asked.

  “You have not been careful, Monsieur Gamache.”

  He got up and bowed slightly. She remained where she was. But as he leaned toward her she whispered, “Don’t think it’s escaped our notice how strange it is that a senior officer would take early retirement in the middle of nowhere, and shortly afterward Project Babylon is found.”

  Gamache straightened up, genuinely surprised. But the real surprise came next. Standing up and facing him, Mary Fraser’s soft face became rigid.

  “And don’t think it’s escaped our notice that a grown man claims to have been friends with a nine-year-old boy. You are either a pervert or you wanted something from that poor child. And I will find out which. I have my eye on you.”

  Gamache knew his mouth had just opened slightly, but he couldn’t help it.

  Was she really threatening him? Was this more artifice? A posture? Or did this woman genuinely believe he might be mixed up in this?

  Were they on the same side? He knew what his role was, and wasn’t, in this. But he could not figure her out. Mary Fraser appeared socially inept, a little bumbling, maladroit. Soft-spoken and bookish. But she was also fiercely intelligent, and strong.

  Armand Gamache never, ever, made the mistake of demonizing strong women. Indeed, he’d been raised by one, married one, promoted one. But he was far from certain he trusted this one.

  He took a few steps back and examined her, trying to figure out if she was sincere in her suspicions of him or just trying to toss the rock back.

  “What’s at Highwater?” he asked.

  “Are you threatening me?” she asked. And she looked genuinely alarmed.

  It was not the reaction he’d expected.

  He’d hoped to speak to Lacoste and Beauvoir first, but when he saw them leaving Three Pines that morning, he’d made the call himself to Agent Yvette Nichol, a former colleague in the Sûreté. He asked her to track the movements of the CSIS investigators the day before through their cell phones. She reported back half an hour ago.

  Instead of spending the day examining Gerald Bull’s Supergun, or searching for the plans, the pings from their cell phones indicated Mary Fraser and Sean Delorme had driven twenty miles away, to the village of Highwater, right on the Vermont border.

  “Is what I said threatening?” Gamache asked. “I had no idea. My apologies.”

  He left, feeling her eyes on his back until he was out the door of the small library.

  He knew where he was going next.

  * * *

  He didn’t get there.

  Armand Gamache got as far as the front porch of the bed and breakfast when he saw Lacoste and Beauvoir return. Their car slowed, pulled over, and Jean-Guy leaned.

  “We need to talk,” both men said at once.

  “I’ll come over to the Incident Room,” said Gamache. He could tell by their faces that something had happened.

  As the car pulled away, he noticed a copy of Fleming’s play on the backseat, its cover covered with scribbled notes.

  Lacoste and Beauvoir were waiting for him beside the car as he walked across the bridge to the old railway station.

  “What’s happened?” he asked.

  “You first,” said Lacoste as they went inside and took seats at the conference table.

  “I know where the CSIS agents went yesterday,” said Gamache. “I asked Agent Nichol to track their cell phones. I realize I was overstepping—”

  Lacoste smiled and held up a hand to stop the apology. “Please, don’t. We want your help.”

  Gamache gave a curt nod. “They went to a place called Highwater. It’s in Québec, close to the border with Vermont, about thirty kilometers from here.”

  “Do you know it?” Jean-Guy asked, getting up to consult the huge map tacked to the wall.

  “No,” he said, joining Beauvoir along with Lacoste. He pointed it out, having already looked it up. “I’ve never been there. I gather it’s pretty small.”

  “Hmmm,” said Lacoste. “Any idea what they were doing there? Meeting someone?”

  “Could be,” said Gamache, as they returned to their chairs. “They stayed in one place for most of the day, then came straight back. Your turn.”

  “Antoinette Lemaitre’s been murdered,” said Isabelle Lacoste, and saw the shock on Gamache’s face. “I know she was a friend of yours.”

  He sat back in his chair and stared at them. Taking it in. “What happened?”

  “The place was ransacked,” said Beauvoir. “Looks like she interrupted a robbery, or it was made to look like that. She seems to have fallen and hit her head on the corner of the fireplace. Dr. Harris says it happened last night between nine thirty and two thirty in the morning.”

  “She was supposed to be at Clara’s,” said Armand. “But she called to cancel. I wonder if the killer—”

  “—also thought she’d be at Clara’s and the place would be empty?” asked Lacoste. “Could be.”

  Beauvoir excused himself to make some calls while Lacoste told Gamache, succinctly, the story as they understood it so far. Gamache was quiet, focused. Not taking notes, but taking it all in.

  “We asked the neighbors if they saw anything but they were all watching Les Filles de Caleb.”

  “Maybe Antoinette asked her guests to come at that time for that very reason. She wanted to make sure no one saw them arrive,” said Beauvoir, returning.

  “But why would it be a secret if it was just members of the theater company?” asked Gamache.

  -->