Kingdom of the Blind (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #14)

by Louise Penny

  “Two out front,” Gamache whispered. “Two on the fire escape opposite and three on the roofs.”

  He gestured, and the commander nodded.

  “Got it.” He handed Gamache a mask. “Do you have a weapon?”

  “No,” said Gamache.

  “I might get shit for doing this, but—”

  He pressed an automatic into Gamache’s hand.

  “Merci.”

  “Let us go in first.”

  “Of course.”

  The commander signaled behind him. Weapons were raised, and with a few rapid silenced shots the guards dropped.

  Gamache was about to move forward, right behind the commander, when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  It was Beauvoir, his own gun drawn.

  “Patron,” Jean-Guy whispered.

  “Lacoste?”

  “On her way to the girl.”

  As he spoke, his sharp eyes were on the door, with the tactical team pouring through.

  He started to move forward, but Gamache stopped him. “Amelia Choquet’s in there.”

  “So she did lead you to the stuff,” said Beauvoir. “Fucking junkie. What did I—”

  “She’s with us. She’s following my orders. We have to find her. Here.” He handed Jean-Guy the mask. “Put this on.”

  * * *

  The fight was brutal.

  The tactical team arrived in force and didn’t hesitate to use that force, firing on the armed guards with precision.

  They moved swiftly through the lab, the first wave targeting those with weapons, the next wave of armed officers shoving workers away from the tables. Pushing them against the wall. Frisking those who complied. Subduing those who did not.

  Beauvoir, gas mask on, went through ahead of Gamache and almost fell over the body.

  He gestured to Gamache to back out, and, grabbing the collar of Amelia’s coat, he dragged her back through the door. Away from any drug that might be floating in the air. Kicked up by the attack.

  Once out the door, Beauvoir ripped off his mask and knelt by Gamache, who was on his knees beside Amelia.

  Beauvoir kept his gun trained on the open door as automatic fire burst out. Ignoring it, Gamache wasted no time feeling for a pulse. He pulled the syringe from his pocket and plunged it into Amelia.

  Her eyes were open. Glassy. Red. As though possessed.

  Only then did he feel for a pulse as Beauvoir, still focused on the open door, called for medics.

  “How is she?”

  “No pulse.”

  Gamache tore open her coat as bullets hit the bricks above them. Beauvoir ducked, instinctively, but Gamache kept on with the compressions. Counting. Under his breath, his face fixed, his focus complete. Ignoring the gunshots all around.

  “Three. Four. Five.”

  Beauvoir sensed movement through the door into the lab at the same moment he heard a click. Turning quickly, he saw the gun rising. Pointing at them.

  A young guy held the weapon like an expert.

  But Beauvoir was more expert. He fired. Three quick shots. Boom, boom, boom. And the man dropped.

  When the ringing from the shot stopped bouncing off the walls, he heard Gamache beside him, still counting. Not losing a beat.

  “Twenty-nine. Thirty.”

  The medics arrived.

  Gamache bent lower and gave Amelia two breaths.

  “Carfentanil,” he said, continuing the compressions while Beauvoir watched the door into the lab and counted for him.

  “Seven. Eight. Nine.”

  “I gave her the antagonist,” said Gamache as he rocked back and forth, keeping the rhythm of the compressions.

  “Which one?” asked the medic, kneeling beside him and preparing the defibrillator.

  “Naltrexone. Less than a minute ago.”

  “Okay,” said the medic. “Step aside.”

  Gamache did, watching as the medics worked on Amelia. And other medics moved forward into the factory. To care for the wounded. Even as the shots continued. And more wounded were made.

  Gamache looked over at Jean-Guy, who was now kneeling beside the young man he’d shot. And killed.

  CHAPTER 37

  “You look awful,” said Isabelle’s husband with a sympathetic smile. “Here.”

  He handed Gamache a scotch and offered Beauvoir a coffee.

  “Merci,” said Armand, accepting the drink but putting it down. “Where is she?”

  It was well past midnight, and he felt like he’d been hit by a truck, but the evening wasn’t over yet.

  “In our daughter’s room,” said Isabelle. “Would you like to see?”

  “Please. Do you know her name?”

  “No. She hasn’t spoken.”

  “Social services?”

  “I thought I’d wait ’til morning.”

  “Good.”

  Gamache and Jean-Guy followed Isabelle down the hall.

  Her husband stayed behind in the living room, watching the three of them go. Recognizing that while he and the children would always be the most important parts of Isabelle’s lives, these three also formed a family.

  The door was open, and a night-light was on. In one bed lay Sophia, Isabelle’s daughter. Fast asleep.

  In the other was the little girl. On her side, curled into a tight ball under the comforter. Eyes staring. Her hands clutching the pillow at her head.

  Armand walked in quietly and knelt down.

  When last he’d seen the girl, her hair was matted and caked with filth. Now it was clean and brushed. She’d had a bath and smelled very faintly of lavender.

  “It’s Armand,” he spoke softly. “We met earlier. I’m the police officer.”

  She cringed away, her eyes widening.

  “It’s all right. I won’t hurt you. None one will. You’re safe.” He was careful not to approach further. Not to touch her. “You can go to sleep now.”

  He smiled in a way that, he hoped and prayed, didn’t betray how his heart ached for her.

  But she continued to stare at him, in terror.

  “May I?” he asked, turning to Isabelle and indicating a book on the bedside table.

  Isabelle nodded.

  Armand brought over a chair and opened the book.

  “‘ . . . in which we are introduced to Winnie-the-Pooh and some bees,’” he read, his voice deep and soft and tranquil. He looked up then, into her wide eyes. “‘And the stories begin.’”

  * * *

  “Amelia?” Isabelle asked Jean-Guy.

  They’d left the Chief Superintendent reading to the girl and had returned to the living room.

  “We just came from the hospital,” said Jean-Guy, dropping into an armchair. “They got her heart going, and she’s breathing on her own.”

  “Brain damage?” asked Isabelle.

  “They’re doing tests, but we won’t know until she wakes up. We’re going back there right after we leave here.”

  She nodded. “If there’s anything I can do.”

  “There may be. Thank you. I’ll let you know.”

  “So she was working with the Chief all along? Did . . . anyone know?”

  “No.”

  “Not even you?”

  “No. I knew he’d expelled Amelia in hopes she’d lead him to the carfentanil, but I had no idea she was in on it.”

  Isabelle looked at Jean-Guy closely. “Are you okay with that? With not being told?”

  He lifted his fingers off the arms of the chair, then dropped them. What could he say? What could he do? It was, he knew, the nature of the job.

  Secrecy. Secrets.

  Lacoste had them. All senior officers had things they kept close to the chest.

  God knows, he himself had his secrets. One in particular.

  He knew he’d have to tell his father-in-law soon. And this one hit closer to home and was far more personal than the secret Gamache had kept from him.

  “The carfentanil?” asked Isabelle.

  “Looks like we got it a
ll, except for what was used in the experiments.”

  “What experiments?” Isabelle’s husband asked.

  “This particular opioid’s so new that no one really knows the safe dose. And, of course, that also depends on weight, body type. Health. So many addicts have weak hearts, and very little will push them over the edge. This guy—”

  Boom, boom, boom. Beauvoir saw, in a flash, the man drop. Dead.

  Something he would never unsee. Another ghost for his longhouse.

  “—experimented on junkies. Giving out different doses and writing on their arms the amount. A milligram. Two. To see who survived and who died.”

  Isabelle shook her head, and then her brow furrowed. “Why did he call it David?”

  “It’s his father’s name.”

  Isabelle took that in. Not sure what it meant. Was it meant as a tribute or an attack, an accusation? Was it meant to thank or to hurt?

  She suspected the latter.

  “You okay?” she asked Jean-Guy. She could guess what he was thinking.

  That he’d just killed a young man. Troubled. Criminal. A killer. It was self-defense. But he was still dead. And one day soon, Jean-Guy would have to face the boy’s father. David.

  “I’m tired,” said Jean-Guy, and she could see that it would take much more than a shower and a good night’s sleep for him to recover.

  “The sound of maple logs in an open fire,” she said quietly. “A hot dog at a Canadiens game. Honoré’s hand . . . holding yours.”

  “These things I’ve loved,” Jean-Guy whispered. “Merci.”

  She glanced down the hall to where the children were sleeping. A delicate, almost reedy sound was coming from there.

  Jean-Guy and Isabelle went quietly down and looked in.

  Armand had closed the book and was leaning toward the child, his elbows on the torn and filthy knees of his slacks.

  He was humming. While, in the bed, the little girl’s eyes were closed.

  Edelweiss. Edelweiss.

  * * *

  Hours later Amelia Choquet opened her eyes, squinting into the bright light.

  She felt a hand on her shoulder and startled.

  “It’s all right, you’re in the hospital. My name’s Dr. Boudreau. I’ll be looking after you.”

  He spoke slowly. Clearly.

  “Can you tell me your name?”

  There was a pause.

  “Amelia . . . Choquet.”

  “That’s right. And do you know who this is?”

  Dr. Boudreau looked at the man standing beside him.

  “Shit. Head,” she mumbled.

  “Wha—” the doctor began, but Gamache gave a gruff laugh.

  “She got that right too,” he said, and looked across the bed to Jean-Guy, who was smiling with relief.

  “I’m sorry, Amelia,” said Gamache. “For this.”

  “Did you—”

  “Yes, we got it all.”

  She closed her eyes, and Gamache thought she’d drifted off. But she spoke again, her eyes still closed.

  “Girl.”

  “We have her. She’s safe,” said Jean-Guy. “Your friend Marc is here in the hospital too. They’re looking after him.”

  Amelia nodded, then went silent.

  Gamache took the doctor aside. “Will she be all right?”

  “I think so. She’s healthy, and you got the rescue med to her in time. She’s lucky.”

  “Yeah, well,” said Jean-Guy, “I can hardly wait to hear her version of that when she’s fully awake.”

  Before he left, Armand took the worn little book from his pocket and pressed it into her hands.

  “Erasmus,” he whispered, though he wasn’t sure she could hear him. “For company.”

  * * *

  They left the hospital, but there was one more stop they had to make before the day, or night, was over.

  Agent Cloutier was asleep in her chair but awoke quickly and stood up at her desk when she saw the Chief Superintendent come in with Chief Inspector Beauvoir.

  Both men looked exhausted. Unshaved and disheveled.

  She’d heard what had happened and had begun toward them when she stopped. And smiled. Broadly. On seeing who walked slowly in behind them.

  “Chief Inspector,” said Cloutier, going over to Lacoste and hugging her.

  “Is that how we greeted each other, patron, when you were head of homicide?” asked Jean-Guy.

  “Only in private.”

  Beauvoir laughed and pulled over two chairs to join the two already in front of the laptop on Cloutier’s desk.

  Isabelle sat and took a moment to look at Ruth glaring back at her.

  “Amazing,” she said. “I keep expecting her to say ‘numbnuts.’”

  “Why would the Virgin Mary say that?” asked Cloutier.

  “Not important,” said Beauvoir. “Show us what you have.”

  As Agent Cloutier walked them through the files they’d found on Anthony Baumgartner’s computer, a pattern emerged.

  The three of them stared at the screen. Then at each other. Then at Agent Cloutier.

  Beauvoir had known some of this when he’d been called away. But most of it Cloutier had uncovered on her own.

  “It’s genius,” Cloutier said in admiration. “Almost too simple to believe, and that made it hard to find.” She shook her head. “Incredible.”

  The other three were leaning forward. Examining the details.

  “It’s suggestive,” said Gamache.

  “It’s more than that, sir,” she said. “It says it all.”

  “No. It says one thing, but there’s no proof this is what actually happened,” said Gamache.

  “We need proof, Agent Cloutier,” said Jean-Guy. “But this at least tells us where to look.”

  “I have proof,” she said. “Follow the money.”

  She smiled and started tapping rapidly on the keys. Different pages popped up and disappeared from the screen.

  “This is,” she said as she typed, “the same route Anthony Baumgartner took. Circuitous, but then it would have to be.”

  There, finally, on the screen was the home page of a corporation in the British Virgin Islands.

  “Is that where Baumgartner hid the rest of the money?” asked Beauvoir.

  “With Shaeffer’s help. But it’s a launch point, not the final stop,” said Cloutier. “People who want to hide money set up a corporation in a tax haven like BVI, then funnel it to a numbered account. Switzerland used to be the country of choice. But then came the crackdown. This”—she hit another page—“took over.”

  A bank in Singapore came up.

  “How do you know this’s where Baumgartner hid his money?” asked Beauvoir.

  “Because I found the account.”

  “How?” he asked.

  Agent Cloutier glanced over at Ruth. “A little help from the crazy lady.”

  Lacoste and Gamache looked puzzled, but Beauvoir’s brows cleared.

  “The number on the back of the painting,” said Beauvoir.

  “Yes. It wasn’t his password, it was the account number. He wrote it there so he wouldn’t forget it.”

  She put in the numbers, and up popped the account. Under the name Baumgartner.

  “Three hundred and seventy-seven million dollars,” Lacoste read off the screen.

  “A motive for murder,” said Beauvoir. He stood up and placed a call. Ordering agents to arrest Bernard Shaeffer.

  * * *

  The sun was up and flooding into the offices of Horowitz Investments when Beauvoir arrived. He’d had time to shower and change and had asked Hugo and Caroline Baumgartner to meet him in Hugo’s office.

  The office was as impressive as Hugo Baumgartner was unimpressive. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out over the city. It spoke of success but didn’t drip wealth. It was restrained, while saying all it needed to say.

  Jean-Guy took note. Wondering if he could make over his office like this.

  The siblings sat side by si
de, like a princess and a toad. Caroline self-contained and elegant. Hugo squat and disheveled. No tailor could ever make him look tailored. But his bulging eyes were warm and encouraging, and he rested his hand on his sister’s.

  “You have news, you said?”

  “We do,” said Beauvoir.

  He’d brought Agent Cloutier with him. He’d invited Gamache as well, but having also showered and changed, he had another meeting to go to. With the Premier Ministre du Québec.

  The review board had come down with its recommendations.

  Just before entering the meeting with the Baumgartners, Beauvoir had received a call from Gamache.

  “I’ve had a message from Kontrollinspektor Gund in Vienna. There’s been a decision on the will.”

  Beauvoir listened, and then, after wishing Gamache good luck, he hung up and entered his own meeting.

  “You know who killed Anthony?” asked Caroline.

  “Yes. Early this morning we arrested Bernard Shaeffer.”

  She closed her eyes and exhaled. “Oh, poor Anthony.”

  “But why would Shaeffer kill him?” asked Hugo. “Revenge for being fired? That was a couple of years ago.”

  “You’d be surprised how long people can hold on to things.”

  “Were they still seeing each other?” Caroline asked.

  “Not that we can tell,” said Beauvoir. “Not as lovers anyway. But there’s evidence that your brother got him a job after he was fired. He’s working at the Caisse Populaire.”

  “At a bank?” asked Hugo. “Why would Tony do that? It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It does if you need to set up false accounts and hide money.”

  Hugo opened his mouth to speak, then shut it and stared at the Chief Inspector.

  “You have proof?”

  Beauvoir nodded. “Shaeffer admitted he’d set up a shell company and a numbered account in Lebanon in your brother’s name, in exchange for the job and his silence. We found millions.”

  Caroline looked at Hugo. “What does this mean? Anthony really was stealing?”

  “It looks like it. Are you sure it was him, Chief Inspector? Maybe Shaeffer set up an account in Tony’s name but used the money himself. Tony found out, confronted him, and Shaeffer killed him.”

  “We considered that possibility,” said Beauvoir. “That your brother actually knew nothing about it. There was also the strange issue of the amount in the account. Slightly over seven million.”