by Louise Penny
“D’accord, patron.”
Gamache gave a curt nod, then turned to Beauvoir. “A word?”
Once back in his office, with the door firmly closed, he turned square to Beauvoir.
“Sir?” said the younger man.
“You agree with Superintendent Toussaint, don’t you.”
It was not a question.
“I think there must be a way to stop the shipment without letting them know that we’ve worked it out.”
“There might be,” agreed Gamache.
“We’ve seized smaller shipments,” said Beauvoir, taking advantage of what he saw as an opening, a softening of his boss’s position.
“That’s true. But they were headed through the traditional routes, crossing the border at a predictable place. If all seizures stopped, the cartels would know something was up. This one is huge and almost certainly headed right to the place they think we don’t know about. If they trust the route with this much fentanyl, it means they feel it’s safe, Jean-Guy. But it only works if we allow them to believe it.”
“You’re not saying this is good news.”
“It’s what we hoped would happen. You know that. Look, I know this is particularly difficult for you—”
“Why does it always come down to that?” demanded Beauvoir.
“Because we can’t separate our personal experiences from our professional choices,” said Gamache. “If we think we can, we’re deluding ourselves. We have to admit it, examine our motives, and then make a rational decision.”
“You think I’m being irrational? You’re the one who’s always accusing me of not trusting my instincts. Well, you know what they’re telling me now? Not just my instincts, but yes, my experience?”
Beauvoir was all but shouting at Gamache.
“This is a huge mistake,” said Beauvoir, lowering his voice to a growl. “Allowing that much fentanyl into the U.S. could change the course of a generation. You want to know about my personal stake? Here it is. You’ve never been addicted,” he said. “You have no idea what it’s like. And opioids? Designer drugs? They get right into you. Change you. Turn you into something horrible. Everyone keeps repeating, ‘eighty kilos.’” He waved toward the door and the conference room across the hall. “What’s heading for the border isn’t a weight, isn’t a number. There’s no measure for the misery that’s heading our way. A slow and wretched death. And not just for the addicts you’re about to create, but how about all the other lives that’ll be ruined? How many people, alive today, healthy today, will die, sir, or kill? Because of your ‘rational’ decision?”
“You’re right,” said Gamache. “You’re absolutely right.”
He waved toward the sitting area of his office. After a moment’s hesitation, as though weighing if it was a trap, Jean-Guy took his usual chair, sitting stiffly on the edge.
Gamache sat back, trying to get comfortable. Abandoning that, he too sat forward.
“There’s a theory that Winston Churchill knew about the German bombing of the English city of Coventry before it happened,” he said. “And he did nothing to stop it. The bombing killed hundreds of men and women and children.”
Beauvoir’s tense face slackened. But he said nothing.
“The British had cracked the German code,” Gamache explained. “But to act would’ve meant letting them know that. Coventry would have been saved. Hundreds of lives would’ve been saved. But the Germans would’ve changed the code and the Allies would have lost a huge advantage.”
“How many were saved because of that decision?” Beauvoir asked.
It was a terrible calculus.
Gamache opened his mouth, then closed it. And looked down at his hands.
“I don’t know.”
Then he raised his gaze to Beauvoir’s steady eyes. “There’s some suggestion the English never did use their knowledge, for fear of losing their advantage.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
Though it was clear he was not.
“What good’s an advantage if you’re not going to use it?” Beauvoir asked. More astonished than angry. “And if they allowed the bombing of that city—”
“Coventry.”
“—what else did they allow?”
Gamache shook his head. “It’s a good question. When do you use up all your currency? When are you being strategic, and when are you being a miser, hoarding it? And the longer you hold it, the harder it is to give up. If you have only one shot, Jean-Guy, when do you take it? And how do you know when that time comes?”
“Or maybe when you finally do take that shot, it’s too late. You’ve waited too long,” said Beauvoir. “The damage done is way more than any good you could do.”
All of Beauvoir’s rage had dissipated as he looked at Chief Superintendent Gamache. Struggling with that question.
“People will die, Jean-Guy, when that fentanyl hits the streets. Young people. Older people. Children, perhaps. It will be a firestorm.”
Gamache thought of his visit to Coventry with Reine-Marie, many years after the bombing. The city had been rebuilt, but they’d kept the shell of the cathedral. It had become a symbol.
He and Reine-Marie had stood a long time in front of the altar of the ruined cathedral.
Just days after the bombing, someone had etched words into one of the walls.
Father Forgive.
But forgive whom? The Luftwaffe? Goering, who unleashed the bombers, or Churchill, who chose not to stop them?
Was it courage or a terrible misjudgment on the part of the British leaders, safe in their homes and offices and bunkers hundreds of miles away?
As he was safe, high above the streets of Montréal. Far from the firestorm he was about to unleash. Saint Michael, he remembered. Coventry Cathedral had been dedicated to the archangel. The gentle one who came for the souls of the dying.
He glanced down at his index finger and was surprised to see a bright blue line. As though the eighty kilos of fentanyl would be traveling straight through him on its way south.
Armand Gamache stood astride the route from the Magdalen Islands to the U.S. border. A line that passed through an insignificant little village in a valley.
He had a chance, now, the power to stop it.
Gamache knew he would be marked for the rest of his life by the decision he was making this night.
“Isn’t there something you can do?” asked Jean-Guy, his voice hushed.
Gamache remained silent.
“Have a quiet word with the DEA? Warn them?” Jean-Guy suggested.
But he knew that wouldn’t happen.
Gamache’s jaw was tight, and he swallowed, but said nothing. His deep brown eyes remained on his second-in-command. His son-in-law.
“How long do you think it will take the fentanyl to reach the border?” Gamache asked.
“If it left immediately? It should cross tomorrow night. Maybe sooner. It might already be on its way.”
Gamache nodded.
“But there’s probably still time to intercept,” said Beauvoir, though he knew what he really meant was that there was time for Gamache to change his mind.
But he also knew that would not happen. And deep down, Jean-Guy Beauvoir knew it should not happen.
The fentanyl had to cross the border. Their secret had to be protected.
To be used later. In the final coup de grâce.
Armand Gamache nodded and, getting up, he headed to the door. And he wondered if, when he left his office that night to return to the small apartment he and Reine-Marie kept in Montréal, a dark figure would detach itself from the shadows and follow him.
Come to collect a debt Chief Superintendent Gamache knew he could never repay.
All he could really hope for was forgiveness.
CHAPTER 8
“I thought you said this was going to be a fast trial,” said Judge Corriveau’s wife, Joan. “Will we be able to go away this weekend?”
Maureen Corriveau moaned. “I don’t know. Ca
n we get out of the reservations if we have to?”
“I’ll call the inn and see. Don’t worry, we can always go away another weekend. Vermont will be there.”
Maureen grabbed a piece of toast, kissed Joan, and whispered, “Thank you.”
“Off you go, and play nice,” said Joan.
“It’s my sandbox. I don’t have to play nice.”
She looked outside. It was barely seven in the morning and already the sun was beating down.
Getting in her car, she yelped and lifted her bottom off the scorching seat.
“Shit, shit,” she muttered, throwing on the AC and lowering herself slowly.
She could see heat distorting the air above the hood and wondered what the courtroom would be like.
But Judge Corriveau knew that, even without the heat wave, it would be suffocating.
*
“All rise,” she heard.
The door was opened by the guard, and Judge Corriveau stepped across the threshold.
There was a hubbub as all rose. Then sat, as she sat.
Everyone looked slightly disheveled. Already.
She nodded to the Crown, who recalled his witness from the day before.
As Chief Superintendent Gamache walked up to the witness box, Judge Corriveau noticed he seemed composed, wearing a tailored suit that might not look quite so good by the end of the day.
The AC had been turned off and already the room was close.
She also noticed, as he took his seat, that very slight scent of sandalwood.
The gentle aroma sat with her for just a moment before dissipating. Then Judge Corriveau turned her attention to the defendant, who was watching the Chief Superintendent.
There was a sharp focus, and a plea in the eyes. Aimed at Gamache.
It was intense. And only two people in the courtroom could see it. Herself. And the Chief Superintendent.
But what was the defendant pleading for? Mercy? No, that was not Gamache’s to give.
The defendant wanted something from Gamache, was desperate for it.
Forgiveness? But again, surely, that wasn’t his to give either.
What could the Chief Superintendent offer the defendant, a person he himself had arrested, at this point?
Only one thing, Judge Corriveau knew.
Silence.
He could keep some secret.
Judge Corriveau looked from the defendant to the Chief Superintendent. And wondered if a deal had been struck. Something she knew nothing about.
Again, the photo of the cobrador on the village green was put up on the screen. And there it would stay, throughout the trial.
It appeared to be watching them.
“You understand you’re still under oath, Chief Superintendent?” she asked.
“I do understand, Your Honor.”
“Bon,” said the Crown. “You told us yesterday afternoon, before we broke for the day, that you’d concluded someone in the village of Three Pines had done something so hideous that that thing”—the Crown pointed to the cobrador—“had to be called. Who did you think it was?”
“I honestly didn’t know.”
“I know you didn’t know, I asked who you thought it might be. Did you have any suspicions?”
“Objection,” said the defense attorney.
Judge Corriveau sustained it, with regret. She’d have loved to hear the answer.
*
“A conscience?” said Ruth. Behind her on this dreary November evening, cold rain hit the window and slid down, not quite liquid, not quite solid. “So that’s what it is. I wonder who he’s come for.”
She surveyed them from her seat in one of the deep armchairs in the Gamaches’ living room. Once in, she couldn’t possibly get out without help. It was how her neighbors preferred her. Comfortable and confined.
Rosa sat on her lap, her head swiveling toward whoever was speaking. Like a duck possessed.
“Who made this?” asked Olivier, standing at the door between their kitchen and the living room. Holding a baguette.
“Jacqueline,” said Clara. “Sorry. It was all that was left at the bakery. She hasn’t improved?”
In his other hand, Olivier lifted the bread knife, its teeth askew. He went to the back door and tossed the baton of bread out, for some beaver to sharpen its teeth on. Though he suspected it would still be lying there when some future archeologist found it. It would become like Stonehenge. A mystery.
Myrna got up and, taking her red wine to the window, looked out into the dusk.
“A peace above all earthly dignities,” she quoted. Then turned back to the room. “A still and quiet conscience.”
“Shakespeare,” said Reine-Marie. “But it doesn’t feel very peaceful.”
“That’s because we’re not there yet,” said Myrna. “That thing is here because someone in the village doesn’t have a quiet conscience.”
“It’s just a man in a costume,” said Armand. “He’s playing a mind game with someone.”
“But not us,” said Gabri.
“Really?” asked Ruth. “Not us? We’re immune? Is your conscience really so still and quiet?”
Gabri squirmed.
“Is anyone’s?” Ruth asked, looking at them all before coming to rest on Armand.
In that instant he found himself standing before the door he kept closed, deep in his memory.
He reached out. A very slight tremor in his right hand.
And opened it.
It wasn’t locked. He couldn’t lock it though, God help him, he’d tried. Sometimes it swung open on its own, revealing the thing inside.
Not some fetid, sordid shame.
Before him stood a young man, barely more than a boy. Smiling. Filled with hope, and laughter, with ambition tempered by kindness. He was slender, spindly even, so that his Sûreté uniform looked like a costume.
“He’ll grow into it,” Chief Inspector Gamache had assured his mother at a reception honoring new recruits.
But, of course, he hadn’t.
The boy stood there now, smiling at Armand. Awaiting the day’s orders. Trusting him, completely.
I’ll find you. It’ll be all right.
But, of course, it wasn’t.
Go away, was what Armand wanted to say. Leave me in peace. I’m so sorry about what happened, but I can’t undo it.
But he never said it. And Armand Gamache knew that if the young man ever did leave, he’d miss him. Not the almost unbearable pain he always felt when that door swung open, but his company.
This was one special young man.
And Armand had killed him.
It had been an honest mistake, he’d told himself. A wrong decision made in a crisis.
It had not been deliberate.
But it was a stupid mistake. Avoidable.
Had he turned right instead of left, in that horrible moment, the young man would be alive. Married. Children probably, by now.
May your days be good and long upon this earth.
But, of course, they weren’t.
Armand’s conscience rose up now. Not a dark thing at all, but a skinny young man who never accused, he just smiled.
Armand brought his hand to his temple and absently followed the line of the scar. Like a mark of Cain.
Ruth tilted her head, watching Armand. Knowing, as they all probably did, what he was thinking about. Who he was thinking about.
The old woman looked at her empty glass of scotch, then down at Rosa, as though accusing the duck of drinking it.
It would not be the first time. Rosa was a mean drunk. But then, she was pretty mean sober as well. It was very hard to tell, they’d realized, if a duck was drunk.
“Or maybe he’s here for me,” said Ruth. “Seems more likely, doesn’t it?”
She smiled at Armand. In much the same way the boy smiled at him. There was tenderness there.
“Some of the things I’ve done you know about,” she said. “I’ve admitted them and made amends.”
Clara looked at Gabri and mouthed, “Amends?”
“But there is one thing…”
“You don’t have to tell us,” said Reine-Marie, laying her hand on Ruth’s.
“And have that thing”—she lifted her empty glass toward the village green—“follow me for the rest of my life? No, thank you.”
“You think it’s here for you?”
“It might be. Do you know why we moved to Three Pines when I was a child?”
“Your father got a job at the mill, didn’t he?” asked Gabri.
“He did. But do you know why he applied? He had a good job in Montréal with Canada Steamship Lines. A job he loved.”
Ruth stroked Rosa, who was bending her elegant neck in what was either pleasure or a drunken stupor.
The old poet took a breath, as a cliff diver might before the plunge.
“I was skating on the pond on Mont Royal. It was late March and my mother had warned me not to, but I did anyway. My cousin was with me. He didn’t want to do it, but I made him. I’m a natural leader.”
The friends exchanged glances but said nothing.
“We were late for lunch and my mother came up looking for us. When she saw us on the pond she yelled, and I started skating to the side, wanting to get to her first, to blame my cousin. I can be a little manipulative.”
Brows were raised again, but nothing was said.
“My cousin hadn’t seen her yet and I think his tuque must’ve muffled the sound of her shout. Or maybe I was just attuned to her voice. I can hear it still.”
The elderly woman cocked her head. Listening.
“I think you can guess what happened,” she said.
“He fell in?” Reine-Marie asked quietly.
“I fell in. Ice melts at the edges first, so just when you think you’re safe, that’s when you’re in the most danger. The ice cracked. I can still remember that moment. It was like I was suspended. I stared at my mother, who was still a distance away down the path. I remember every color, every tree, the sun on the snow. The look on her face. And then, I was underwater.”
“Oh God, Ruth,” whispered Gabri.
“It was so cold it was hot, you know?” She looked around her. Everyone there had been out in minus 40, with the wind howling, their cheeks burning in the bitter cold.