by Louise Penny
‘And the smell,’ Clara inhaled deeply and passionately, ignoring Nichol, ‘every artist responds to this smell. Gets the heart going. Like walking into Grandma’s and smelling fresh chocolate-chip cookies. For us it’s that combination of varnish, oils and fixative. Even acrylics have a scent, if you’ve got a good shnozz. You must have smells like that, that cops respond to.’
‘Well,’ Gamache said, laughing, and remembering yesterday morning, ‘when Agent Nichol here picked me up at my home, she brought along Tim Horton’s coffee. Double double. That gets my heart racing’ - here he brought his hand to his chest and held it there—‘totally and exclusively associated with investigations. I can walk into a concert hall, but if I smell Tim Horton’s double double I’ll start looking at the floor for a body.’
Clara laughed. ‘If you like chalk outlines you’re going to love Jane’s work. I’m glad you’ve come to see it.’
‘Is this it?’ Gamache looked around the vibrant room.
‘Not even close. This is another artist. Their show is ending in a week, then we hang the members’ exhibition. That opens in about ten days. Not this Friday, but next.’
‘That’s the vernissage?’
‘Exactly. Two weeks after the judging.’
‘May I see you for a moment?’ Beauvoir steered Gamache a few steps away.
‘I spoke with Lacoste. She just got off the phone with Timmer Hadley’s doctor. Her death was completely natural, as far as he’s concerned. Kidney cancer. It spread to the pancreas and liver and then it was just a matter of time. She actually survived longer than he expected.’
‘Did she die at home?’
‘Yes, on September second of this year.’
‘Labour day,’ said Nichol, who’d wandered over and been listening in.
‘Ms Morrow,’ Gamache called to Clara who had been keeping a respectful distance, one that allowed her to appear to be out of earshot, while actually hearing their entire conversation, ‘what do you think?’
Oh, oh. Copped. Literally, this time. No use, she realised, being coy.
‘Timmer’s death was expected, but still a bit surprising,’ said Clara, joining their little circle. ‘Well, no, that’s overstating it. It’s just that we took turns sitting with her. That day it was Ruth’s turn. They’d arranged beforehand that if Timmer was feeling good Ruth would steal away to the closing parade of the County Fair. Ruth said Timmer told her she was feeling fine. Ruth gave her her meds, brought a fresh glass of Ensure and then left.’
‘Just left a dying woman alone,’ Nichol stated. Clara answered quietly.
‘Yes. I know it sounds uncaring, even selfish, but we’d all been looking after her for so long and we’d gotten to know her ups and downs. We all slipped away for a half hour at a time, to do her laundry, or shopping, or to cook a light meal. So it wasn’t as unusual as it sounds. Ruth would never have left’—now Clara turned to Gamache - ‘had she had the slightest hint Timmer was in trouble. It was terrible for her when she came back and found Timmer dead.’
‘So it was unexpected,’ said Beauvoir.
‘In that sense, yes. But we since found out from the doctors that it often happens that way. The heart just gives out.’
‘Was there an autopsy?’ Gamache wanted to know.
‘No. No one saw any need. Why are you interested in Timmer’s death?’
‘Just being thorough,’ said Beauvoir. ‘Two elderly women dying within a few weeks of each other in a very small village, well, it begs some questions. That’s all.’
‘But as you said, they were elderly. It’s what you’d expect.’
‘If one hadn’t died with a hole in her heart,’ said Nichol. Clara winced.
‘May I see you for a moment?’ Gamache led Nichol outside. ‘Agent, if you ever treat anyone the way you’ve been treating Mrs Morrow, I’ll have your badge and send you home on the bus, is that clear?’
‘What’s wrong with what I said? It’s the truth.’
‘And do you think she doesn’t know that Jane Neal was killed with an arrow? Do you really not know what you’ve done wrong?’
‘I only spoke the truth.’
‘No, you only treated another human being like a fool, and from what I can see deliberately hurt her. You are to take notes and remain silent. We’ll talk about this further tonight.’
‘But—’
‘I’ve been treating you with courtesy and respect because that’s the way I choose to treat everyone. But never, ever mistake kindness for weakness. Never debate with me again. Got it?’
‘Yes, sir.’ And Nichol pledged to keep her opinions to herself if that was the thanks she got for having the courage to say what everyone was thinking. When asked directly she’d answer in monosyllables. So there.
‘So there’s Jane’s picture,’ said Clara, hauling a medium-size canvas out from the storage room and putting it on an easel. ‘Not everyone liked it.’
Nichol was on the verge of saying, ‘No kidding’, but remembered her pledge.
‘Did you like it?’ Beauvoir asked.
‘Not at first, but the longer I looked the more I liked it. Something sort of shimmered into place. It went from looking like a cave drawing to something deeply moving. Just like that.’ And Clara snapped her fingers.
Gamache thought he’d have to stare at it for the rest of his life before it looked anything other than ridiculous. And yet, there was something there, a charm. ‘There are Nellie and Wayne,’ he said pointing, surprised, to two purple people in the stands.
‘Here’s Peter.’ Clara pointed to a pie with eyes and a mouth, but no nose.
‘How’d she do it? How could she get these people so accurately with two dots for eyes and a squiggly line for a mouth?’
‘I don’t know. I’m an artist, have been all my life, and I couldn’t do that. But there’s more to it than that. There’s a depth. Though I’ve been staring at it for more than an hour now and that shimmering thing hasn’t happened again. Maybe I’m too needy. Maybe the magic only works when you’re not looking for it.’
‘Is it good?’ Beauvoir asked.
‘That’s the question. I don’t know. Peter thinks it’s brilliant, and the rest of the jury, with one exception, was willing to risk it.’
‘What risk?’
‘This might surprise you, but artists are temperamental so-and-sos. For Jane’s work to be accepted and shown, someone else’s had to be rejected. That someone will be angry. As will his relatives and friends.’
‘Angry enough to kill?’ Beauvoir asked.
Clara laughed. ‘I can absolutely guarantee you the thought has crossed and even lodged in all our artistic brains at one time or another. But to kill because your work was rejected at Arts Williamsburg? No. Besides, if you did, it would be the jury you’d murder, not Jane. And, come to think of it, no one except the jury knew this work had been accepted. We’d only done the judging last Friday.’ It seems so long ago now, thought Clara.
‘Even Miss Neal?’
‘Well, I told Jane on Friday.’
‘Did anyone else know?’
Now Clara was getting a little embarrassed. ‘We talked about it over dinner that night. It was a sort of pre-Thanksgiving dinner with our friends at our place.’
‘Who was at the dinner?’ Beauvoir asked, his notepad out. He no longer trusted Nichol to take proper notes. Nichol saw this and resented it almost as much as she’d resented it when they’d asked her to take notes. Clara ran down the list of names.
Gamache, meanwhile, was staring at the picture.
‘What’s it of?’
‘The closing parade at the county fair this year. There,’ and Clara pointed to a green-faced goat with a shepherd’s crook, ‘that’s Ruth.’
‘By God, it is,’ said Gamache, to Beauvoir’s roar of laughter. It was perfect. He must have been blind to miss it. ‘But wait,’ Gamache’s delight suddenly disappeared, ‘this was painted the very day, at the very time, Timmer Hadley was dying.’
‘What does she call it?’
‘Fair Day.’
SIX
Even in the rain and wind Gamache could see how beautiful the countryside was. The maples had turned deep reds and oranges, and leaves blown down in the storm were spread along the road and gully like a tapestry. Their drive had taken them out of Williamsburg toward Three Pines, through the mountain range that separated the two. The road, like most sensible ones, followed the valleys and the river and was probably the old stagecoach route, until Beauvoir turned off on to an even smaller dirt road. Huge potholes jarred their car and Gamache could barely read his notes. He’d long since trained his stomach not to lurch with whatever vehicle he was in, but his eyes were proving more recalcitrant.
Beauvoir slowed down at a large metal mailbox painted sunny yellow. Hand printed in white was the number and the name, ‘Croft’. He turned in. The huge maples continued up the drive, creating a Tiffany tunnel.
Through the furious windscreen wiper Gamache saw a white clapboard farmhouse. The home had a comfortable, lived-in look. Tall, end-of-season sunflowers and hollyhocks leaned against it. Woodsmoke whispered out of the chimney to be grabbed away by the wind and taken home to the woods beyond.
Homes, Gamache knew, were a self-portrait. A person’s choice of color, furnishing, pictures. Every touch revealed the individual. God, or the Devil, was in the details. And so was the human. Was it dirty, messy, obsessively clean? Were the decorations chosen to impress, or were they a hodgepodge of personal history? Was the space cluttered or clear? He felt a thrill every time he entered a home during an investigation. He was desperate to get into Jane Neal’s home, but that would have to wait. For now the Crofts were about to reveal themselves.
Gamache turned to look at Nichol. ‘Keep your eyes open and take detailed notes of what’s being said. And just listen, got it?’
Nichol glared back.
‘I asked you a question, Agent.’
‘Got it.’ Then after a significant pause, she added, ‘Sir.’
‘Good. Inspector Beauvoir, will you take the lead?’
‘Right,’ replied Beauvoir, getting out of the car.
Matthew Croft was waiting at the screen door. After taking their sodden coats he led them straight into the kitchen. Bright reds and yellows. Cheery tableware and dishes in the hutch. Clean white curtains with flowers embroidered on the border. Gamache looked across the table at Croft who was straightening the rooster salt and pepper shakers. His clever eyes couldn’t seem to rest and he held himself as though waiting. Listening. It was all very subtle, hidden below the friendly exterior. But it was there, Gamache was sure of it.
‘I’ve got the archery set in the screen porch. It’s wet out, but if you’d still like a demonstration I could show you how they’re fired.’ Croft had said this to Gamache but Beauvoir answered, dragging Croft’s eyes away from his chief.
‘That would be very useful, but I have a few questions first, just some background I’d like to get straight.’
‘Sure, anything.’
‘Tell me about Jane Neal, your relationship with her.’
‘We weren’t that close. I’d sometimes go over to her place to visit. It was quiet. Peaceful. She was my teacher, long ago now, up at the old schoolhouse.’
‘What was she like as a teacher?’
‘Remarkable. She had this really amazing ability to look at you and make you feel you were the only person on earth. You know?’
Beauvoir knew. Armand Gamache had the same ability. Most people when talking are also watching the rest of the room, and nodding to others, waving. Never Gamache. When he looked at you, you were the universe. Though Beauvoir knew the boss was also taking in every detail of what was happening. He just didn’t show it.
‘What do you do for a living?’
‘I work for the township of St Rémy in the road department.’
‘Doing what?’
‘I’m the head of road maintenance. I assign crews, assess problem areas. Sometimes I just drive, looking for problems. Don’t want to find a problem at the same time as I find an overturned car.’
It happened far too often. Normally death came at night, taking a person in their sleep, stopping their heart or tickling them awake, leading them to the bathroom with a splitting headache before pouncing and flooding their brain with blood. It waits in alleys and metro stops. After the sun goes down plugs are pulled by white-clad guardians and death is invited into an antiseptic room.
But in the country death comes, uninvited, during the day. It takes fishermen in their longboats. It grabs children by the ankles as they swim. In winter it calls them down a slope too steep for their budding skills, and crosses their skies at the tips. It waits along the shore where snow met ice not long ago but now, unseen by sparkling eyes, a little water touches the shore, and the skater makes a circle slightly larger than intended. Death stands in the woods with a bow and arrow at dawn and dusk. And it tugs cars off the road in broad daylight, the tires spinning furiously on ice or snow, or bright autumn leaves.
Matthew Croft was always called to road accidents. Sometimes he was the first there. As he worked to free the body Matthew Croft’s bruised heart and brain would go home to poetry. He would recite poems learned by heart from books borrowed from Miss Neal. And Ruth Zardo’s poetry was his favorite.
On quiet days off he would often visit Miss Neal and sit in her garden in an Adirondack chair looking across the phlox to the stream beyond, and memorise poems, to be used to ward off the nightmares. As he memorised, Miss Neal would make pink lemonade and deadhead her perennial borders. She was aware of the irony of deadheading while he banished death from his head. For some reason Matthew was loath to tell the police about this, to let them that far in.
Before he could say more he tensed, slightly. A moment later Gamache heard it too. Suzanne opened the door from the basement which led into the kitchen and came in.
Suzanne Croft didn’t look well at all. She’d looked strained at the public meeting, but nothing compared to this. Her skin was almost translucent, except for the blotches. And a thin layer of sweat lent it a sheen, not unlike a reptile. Her hand, when shaken by Gamache, was ice-cold. She was terrified, he realised. Scared sick. Gamache looked over at Croft, who now wasn’t even trying to hide his own fear. He was looking at his wife the way one might look at a specter, a ghost with a particularly awful and personal message.
Then the moment passed. Matthew Croft’s face fell back to ‘normal’, with only a pall to the skin evidence of what lay beneath. Gamache offered Mrs Croft his seat but Matthew had grabbed a stool and sat while his wife took his chair. No one spoke. Gamache was willing Beauvoir not to speak. To let the silence stretch to breaking. This woman was holding on to something horrible and her grip was slipping.
‘Would you like a glass of water?’ Nichol asked Suzanne Croft.
‘No, thank you, but let me make some tea.’ And with that Mrs Croft leapt from her chair and the moment was broken. Gamache looked at Nichol, perplexed. If she had wanted to sabotage the case and her career she couldn’t have done a better job.
‘Here, let me help,’ said Nichol, bouncing off her seat and grabbing the kettle.
Beauvoir had allowed his face to show a flash of fury when Nichol spoke, then it too was replaced by his familiar, reasonable, mask.
Stupid, stupid woman, he cursed to himself, even as his face took on a benevolent half-smile. He stole a glance at Gamache, and saw with satisfaction the boss was also staring at Nichol, but not angrily. To Beauvoir’s disgust, he saw a look he took to be tolerance on the chief’s face. Will he never learn? What in God’s name drives him to want to help such fools?
‘What do you do for a living, Mrs Croft? Do you work?’ Now that the silence was fractured, Beauvoir figured he might as well grab back control. Even as he asked the question he could hear the insult. The easy assumption motherhood wasn’t work. But he didn’t care.
‘I help out three times a week at the photocopy store in St Rémy. Helps make ends meet.’
Beauvoir felt badly for the question now it was asked. He wondered whether he’d balled up his anger at Nichol and pitched it into Mrs Croft’s face. He looked around the room and realised all the homey touches were made by hand, even the plastic covers of the chairs were inexpertly stapled on, a few coming loose. These people made a little go a long way.
‘You have two children, I believe,’ Beauvoir shook off his momentary shame.
‘That’s right,’ Matthew jumped in.
‘And what are their names?’
‘Philippe and Diane.’
‘Nice names,’ he said into the gathering stillness. ‘And how old are they?’
‘He’s fourteen, she’s eight.’
‘And where are they?’
The question hovered in the air, as the earth stopped turning. He had been marching inexorably toward this question, as the Crofts must have known. He hadn’t wanted to surprise them with it, not out of delicacy for their parental feelings, but because he wanted them to see it coming toward them from a great distance, and to have to wait, and wait. Until their nerves were taut to breaking. Until they both longed for and dreaded this instant.
‘They’re not here,’ said Suzanne, strangling a teacup.
Beauvoir waited, looking steadily at her. ‘When are you having your Thanksgiving dinner?’
The swift shift left Suzanne Croft gaping, as though he’d suddenly switched to Pig Latin. Xnay on the erdinnaye.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘One of the great things I’ve noticed in my home is that the smell of the turkey hangs around for a couple of days. Then of course, my wife and I make soup the next day, and that’s hard to miss too.’ He took a deep breath, and then slowly, slowly scanned the clean counters of the kitchen.
‘We were going to have Thanksgiving yesterday, Sunday,’ said Matthew, ‘but with the news of Miss Neal and all we’ve decided to put it off.’
‘For ever?’ Beauvoir asked, incredulous. Gamache wondered if it wasn’t a little overdone, but the Crofts were beyond critiquing his performance.
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