The Brutal Telling

by Louise Penny

  “She asked the same thing of me,” Beauvoir said and saw Gamache smile. Then the smile dimmed.

  “Shall we?” The Chief gestured to the door to the bistro.

  The four men chose to sit away from the windows. In the cool and quiet interior. A small fire muttered in both open fireplaces, at either end of the room. Gamache remembered the first time he’d walked into the bistro years before and seen the mismatched furniture, the armchairs and wing chairs and Windsor chairs. The round and square and rectangular tables. The stone fireplaces and wooden beams. And the price tags hanging from everything.

  Everything was for sale. And everyone? Gamache didn’t think so, but sometimes he wondered.

  “Bon Dieu, are you saying you haven’t told your father about me?” Gabri asked.

  “I did. I told him I was with a Gabriel.”

  “Your father thinks it’s a Gabrielle you’re with,” said Beauvoir.

  “Quoi?” said Gabri, glaring at Olivier. “He thinks I’m a woman? That means . . .” Gabri looked at his partner, incredulous. “He doesn’t know you’re gay?”

  “I never told him.”

  “Maybe not in so many words, but you sure told him,” said Gabri, then turned to Beauvoir. “Almost forty, not married, an antiques dealer. Good God, he told me when the other kids would dig for China he dug for Royal Doulton. How gay is that?” He turned back to Olivier. “You had an Easy Bake oven and you sewed your own Halloween costumes.”

  “I haven’t told him and don’t plan to,” Olivier snapped. “It’s none of his business.”

  “What a family,” sighed Gabri. “It’s actually a perfect fit. One doesn’t want to know and the other doesn’t want to tell.”

  But Gamache knew it was more than simply not wanting to tell. It was about a little boy with secrets. Who became a big boy with secrets. Who became a man. He brought an envelope out of his satchel and placed seven photographs on the table in front of Olivier. Then he unwrapped the carvings and put them on the table too.

  “What order do they go in?”

  “I can’t remember which he gave me when,” said Olivier. Gamache stared at him then spoke softly.

  “I didn’t ask you that. I asked what order they go in. You know, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” Olivier looked confused.

  Then Armand Gamache did something Beauvoir had rarely seen. He brought his large hand down so hard on the table the little wooden figures jumped. As did the men.

  “Enough. I’ve had enough.”

  And he looked it. His face was hard, carved and sharp and burnished by lies and secrets. “Do you have any idea what trouble you’re in?” His voice was low, strained, forced through a throat that threatened to close. “The lies must stop now. If you have any hope, any hope at all, you must tell us the truth. Now.”

  Gamache moved his splayed hand over the photographs and shoved them toward Olivier, who stared as though petrified.

  “I don’t know,” he stumbled.

  “For God’s sake, Olivier, please,” Gabri begged.

  Gamache radiated anger now. Anger, frustration and fear that the real murderer would slip away, hiding in another man’s lies. Olivier and the Chief Inspector stared at each other. One man who spent his life burying secrets and the other who spent his life unearthing them.

  Their partners stared, aware of the battle but unable to help.

  “The truth, Olivier,” Gamache rasped.

  “How did you know?”

  “The place of wonders. Ninstints on the Queen Charlotte Islands. The totem poles told me.”

  “They told you?”

  “In their way. Each image built on the last. Each told its own story and was a wonder unto itself. But when taken as a whole they told a larger story.”

  Beauvoir, listening to this, thought about Ruth’s couplets. The Chief had told him they did the same thing. If put together, in the right order, they too would tell a story. His hand slipped into his pocket and touched the scrap of paper shoved under his door that morning.

  “What story do these tell, Olivier?” Gamache repeated. It had actually come to him on the plane as he’d listened to the little boy and the intricate GI Joe world he created. He’d thought about the case, thought about the Haida, the Watchman. Who, driven by his conscience, had finally found peace. In the wilderness.

  The Chief Inspector suspected the same thing had happened to the Hermit. He’d gone into the forest a greedy man, to hide. But he’d been found. Years ago. By himself. And so he used his money as insulation and toilet paper. He used his first editions for knowledge and companionship. He used his antiquities as everyday dishes.

  And in that wilderness he found freedom and happiness. And peace.

  But something still eluded him. Or, perhaps more to the point, something still clung to him. He’d unburdened himself of the “things” of his life, but one more burden remained. The truth.

  And so he decided to tell it to someone. Olivier. But he couldn’t go quite that far. Instead, he hid the truth in a fable, an allegory.

  “He made me promise never to tell.” Olivier had dropped his head and spoke into his lap.

  “And you didn’t. Not while he was alive. But you need to tell now.”

  Without another word Olivier reached out and moved the photographs about, hesitating briefly over a couple, switching the order at least once. Until finally, spread in front of them, was the Hermit’s story.

  And then Olivier told them, placing his hand over each image as he spoke. And as Olivier’s soft, almost hypnotic voice filled the space between them Gamache could see the dead man, alive again. In his cabin late at night. His one visitor sitting across the flickering fireplace. Listening, to this tale of hubris, of punishment and love. And betrayal.

  Gamache watched as the villagers, happy in their ignorance, left their homes. And the young man raced ahead, clutching his small package, encouraging them to hurry. Toward paradise, they thought. But the boy knew differently. He’d stolen the Mountain’s treasure.

  And worse.

  He’d stolen the Mountain’s trust.

  Now each figure the Hermit had carved took on a significance. The men and women waiting by the shore, having run out of land. And the boy, cowering, having run out of hope.

  Then the ship arrived, sent by gods jealous of the Mountain.

  But behind was the ever-present shadow. And the threat of something unseen but very real. The ghastly army, assembled by the Mountain. Made up of Fury and Vengeance, promising catastrophe. Fueled by Rage. And behind them the Mountain itself. That couldn’t be stopped and wouldn’t be denied.

  It would find all the villagers and it would find the young man. And it would find the treasure he’d stolen.

  As this army pressed forward it provoked wars and famine, floods and plagues. It laid waste to the world. Chaos led the army and chaos was left behind.

  Beauvoir listened to this. His hand in his pocket scrunched Ruth’s latest couplet and he could feel it damp with sweat. He looked down at the photos of the carvings and saw the happy, ignorant villagers slowly transformed as they too first sensed something approaching, then knew it.

  And he shared their horror.

  Finally the wars and famine arrived on the shores of the New World. For years the wars raged around their new home, not quite touching it. But then . . .

  They all looked at the final image. Of the villagers bunched together. Emaciated, their clothing in tatters. Looking up. In terror.

  At them.

  Olivier’s voice stopped. The story stopped.

  “Go on,” whispered Gamache.

  “That’s it.”

  “What about the boy?” asked Gabri. “He’s not in the carvings anymore. Where’d he go?”

  “He buried himself in the forest, knowing the Mountain would find the villagers.”

  “He betrayed them too? His own family? His friends?” asked Beauvoir.

  Olivier nodded. “But there was some
thing else.”

  “What?”

  “Something was behind the Mountain. Something driving it on. Something that terrified even the Mountain.”

  “Worse than Chaos? Worse than death?” asked Gabri.

  “Worse than anything.”

  “What was it?” Gamache asked.

  “I don’t know. The Hermit died before we got that far. But I think he carved it.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Beauvoir.

  “There was something in a canvas sack that he never showed me. But he saw me looking at it. I couldn’t help myself. He’d laugh and say one day he’d show it to me.”

  “And when you found the Hermit dead?” asked Gamache.

  “It was gone.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us this before?” snapped Beauvoir.

  “Because then I’d have to admit everything. That I knew him, that I’d taken the carvings and sold them. It was his way of ensuring I’d come back, you know. Parceling out bits of his treasure.”

  “A pusher to an addict,” said Gabri, with no rancor, but with no surprise either.

  “Like Sheherazade.”

  Everyone turned to Gamache.

  “Who?” Gabri asked.

  “It’s an opera, by Rimsky-Korsakov. It tells the story of the Thousand and One Nights.”

  They looked blank.

  “The king would take a wife at night and kill her in the morning,” said the Chief Inspector. “One night he chose Sheherazade. She knew his habits and knew she was in trouble so she came up with a plan.”

  “Kill the king?” asked Gabri.

  “Better. Every night she told him a story, but left it unfinished. If he wanted to know the ending he had to keep her alive.”

  “Was the Hermit doing it to save his life?” asked Beauvoir, confused.

  “In a way, I suppose,” said the Chief. “Like the Mountain, he longed for company, and perhaps he knew Olivier well enough to realize the only way to get him to keep coming back was to promise more.”

  “That’s not fair. You make me sound like a whore. I did more than take his things. I helped him garden and brought supplies. He got a lot out of it.”

  “He did. But so did you.” Gamache folded his large hands together and looked at Olivier. “Who was the dead man?”

  “He made me promise.”

  “And secrets are important to you. I understand that. You’ve been a good friend to the Hermit. But you have to tell us now.”

  “He was from Czechoslovakia,” said Olivier at last. “His name was Jakob. I never knew his last name. He came here just as the Berlin wall was falling. I don’t think we understood how chaotic it was. I remember thinking how exciting it must have been for the people. To finally have freedom. But he described something else. Every system they knew collapsed. It was lawless. Nothing worked. The phones, the rail service. Planes fell out of the air. He said it was horrible. But it was also a perfect time to run. To get out.”

  “He brought everything in that cabin with him?”

  Olivier nodded. “For American money, hard currency he called it, you could arrange anything. He had contacts with antiques dealers here so he sold them some of his stuff and used the money to bribe officials in Czechoslovakia. To get his things out. He put them on a container ship and got them to the Port of Montreal. Then he put them all in storage and waited.”

  “For what?”

  “To find a home.”

  “He first went to the Queen Charlotte Islands, didn’t he?” said Gamache. After a pause Olivier nodded. “But he didn’t stay there,” Gamache continued. “He wanted peace and quiet, but the protests began and people came from all over the world. So he left. Came back here. Close to his treasures. And he decided to find a place in Quebec. In the woods here.”

  Again Olivier nodded.

  “Why Three Pines?” Beauvoir asked.

  Olivier shook his head, “I don’t know. I asked, but he wouldn’t tell me.”

  “Then what happened?” Gamache asked.

  “As I said before, he came down here and started to build his cabin. When it was ready he got the things out of storage and put them there. It took a while, but he had the time.”

  “The treasures that he got out of Czechoslovakia, were they his?” Gamache asked.

  “I never asked, and he never told me, but I don’t think they were. He was just too afraid. I know he was hiding from something. Someone. But I don’t know who.”

  “Do you have any idea how much time you’ve wasted? My God, what were you thinking?” demanded Beauvoir.

  “I just kept thinking you’d find who’d killed him and none of this other stuff needed to come out.”

  “Other stuff?” said Beauvoir. “Is that how you think of it? As though it was all just details? How’d you think we’d find the murderer with you lying and letting us hare off all over the place?”

  Gamache raised his hand slightly and with an effort Beauvoir pulled back, taking a deep breath.

  “Tell us about Woo,” Gamache asked.

  Olivier lifted his head, his eyes strained. He was pale and gaunt and had aged twenty years in a week. “I thought you’d said it was that monkey that belonged to Emily Carr.”

  “I thought so too, but I’ve been thinking about it. I think it meant something else to the dead man. Something more personal. Frightening. I think it was left in the web, and carved, as a threat. Something maybe only he and his murderer understood.”

  “Then why ask me?”

  “Because Jakob might have told you. Did he, Olivier?”

  Gamache’s eyes bored into Olivier’s, insisting on the truth.

  “He told me nothing,” said Olivier at last.

  Disbelief met this remark.

  Gamache stared at him, trying with his considerable might to look beyond the mist of lies. Was Olivier finally telling the truth?

  Gamache got up. At the door he turned and looked back at the two men. Olivier drained, empty. Nothing left. At least, Gamache hoped there was nothing left. Each lie was like ripping off a piece of Olivier’s skin, until finally he sat in the bistro, torn to pieces.

  “What happened to the young man?” asked Gamache. “The one in the story. Did the Mountain find him?”

  “It must have. He’s dead, isn’t he?” said Olivier.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  At the B and B Gamache showered and shaved and changed his clothing. He glanced briefly at his bed, with its clean, crisp sheets and the duvet turned back. Waiting for him. But he avoided that siren song and before long he and Beauvoir were back across the village green and at the Incident Room, where Agents Lacoste and Morin waited.

  They sat round the conference table, mugs of strong coffee and the Hermit’s carvings in front of them. Succinctly the Chief Inspector told them about his trip to the Queen Charlottes and their interview with Olivier.

  “So the dead man was telling a story all along. With his carvings,” said Lacoste.

  “Let’s walk through this,” said Beauvoir, going over to the sheets of paper on the wall. “The Hermit gets out of Czechoslovakia with the treasures just as the Soviet Union’s crumbling. It’s chaos there so he bribes port officials to get the goods shipped to the Port of Montreal. Once there he puts them into storage.”

  “If he was a refugee or an immigrant his fingerprints would’ve shown up on record,” said Agent Morin.

  Agent Lacoste turned to him. He was young, she knew, and inexperienced. “There’re illegal immigrants all over Canada. Some hiding, some with false papers that pass for real. A little money to the right people.”

  “So he snuck in,” said Morin. “But what about the antiques? Were they stolen? Where’d he get them? Like the violin, and that Amber Room thing?”

  “Superintendent Brunel says the Amber Room disappeared in the Second World War,” said Gamache. “There’re a lot of theories about what happened to it, including that it was hidden by Albert Speer in a mountain range. Between Germany and Czechoslovakia.”

>   “Really?” said Lacoste, her mind working rapidly. “Suppose this Jakob found it?”

  “If he found it he’d have the whole thing,” said Beauvoir. “Suppose someone else found it, or part of it, and sold it to the Hermit.”

  “Suppose,” said Morin, “he stole it.”

  “Suppose,” said Gamache, “you’re all right. Suppose someone found it, maybe decades ago. And split it up. And all that was left to one family was the one pane. Suppose that pane was entrusted to the Hermit, to smuggle out of the country.”

  “Why?” asked Lacoste, leaning forward.

  “So they could start a new life,” Beauvoir jumped in. “They wouldn’t be the first who smuggled a family treasure out and sold it to start a business or buy a home in Canada.”

  “So they gave it to the Hermit to get out of the country,” said Morin.

  “Did it all come from different people?” wondered Lacoste. “A book here, a piece of priceless furniture or glass or silver there? Suppose all his things came from different people, all hoping to start a new life here? And he smuggled it all out.”

  “It would answer Superintendent Brunel’s question about why there’s such a range of items,” said Gamache. “It’s not from one collection, but many.”

  “No one would trust anyone with things that valuable,” said Beauvoir.

  “Maybe they had no choice,” said the Chief. “They needed to get them out of the country. If he was a stranger they might not have trusted him. But if he was a friend . . .”

  “Like the boy in the story,” said Beauvoir. “Betraying everyone who trusted him.”

  They stared ahead. Silent. Morin had never realized murderers were caught in silence. But they were.

  What would have happened? Families waited in Prague, in smaller cities and towns and villages. Waiting for word. From their trusted friend. At what stage did hope turn to despair? And finally to rage? And revenge?