by Louise Penny
‘Remember this?’ He brought over a small book and handed it to Clara. She flipped it open and read, at random,
‘You were a moth
brushing against my cheek
in the dark.
I killed you
not knowing
you were only a moth,
with no sting.’
She flipped to another poem, again at random, and another and another.
‘They’re almost all about death, or loss,’ she said, lowering the book. ‘I hadn’t realized that. Most of Ruth’s poems are about death.’ She closed the book. It was one of Ruth’s older volumes.
‘Not just about death,’ said Peter, throwing a birch log on the fire and watching it spit, before heading to the kitchen to check the casserole warming for dinner. From there he shouted, ‘But also very subtle. There’s a great deal to Ruth we don’t see.’
‘You were only a moth, with no sting.’ Clara repeated the words. Was CC only a moth? No. CC de Poitiers had a sting. To come anywhere near the woman was to feel it. Clara wasn’t sure she agreed with Peter about Ruth. Ruth got all her bitterness out in her poetry. She held nothing in, and Clara knew the kind of anger that led to murder needed to ferment for a long time, often sealed beneath a layer of smiles and sweet reason.
The phone rang and after a few short words Peter hung up.
‘Drink up,’ he called from the doorway. ‘That was Myrna inviting us for a quick one at the bistro.’
‘I have to gulp one drink to get another?’
‘Like old times, isn’t it?’
Armand Gamache stood outside the old Hadley house. The door had closed and he felt he could exhale. He also felt foolish. He’d toured the gloomy old pile with Lyon and nothing he’d seen had made him like the place more, but neither did it hide any ghouls. It was just tired and sad and it longed for laughter. Like its inhabitants.
Before he left he’d gone back into the living room where Crie was still sitting in her sundress and flip-flops. He’d put a blanket round her and sat across from her, watching her impassive young face for a moment then closing his eyes.
He tried to let her know it would be all right. Eventually. Life wouldn’t always be this painful. The world wouldn’t always be this brutal. Give it time, little one. Give it another chance. Come back.
He repeated that a few times, then opening his eyes he saw Lemieux at the door watching.
Now, outside, Gamache shrugged deeper into his coat and walked down the path toward the car. The flurries were just beginning, fluffy and light and lovely. He looked down at the village below, all sparkling in the light from the decorations and the flurries. Then something Gabri’d said floated like a flurry into his head. ‘The monster is dead and the villagers are celebrating.’ An allusion to Frankenstein. But in that story the villagers weren’t just celebrating the death of the monster, they’d killed him themselves.
Was it possible this sleepy, lovely, peaceful place had banded together and killed CC de Poitiers?
Gamache almost dismissed it. It was a crazy idea. But then he remembered. It was a crazy death.
‘Do you have a question for me?’ Gamache asked, not turning back to the young man behind him.
‘No sir.’
‘Lesson number three, son. Never lie to me.’ He turned round now and looked at Agent Lemieux in a way the young man would never forget. There was caring there, but there was also a warning.
‘What were you doing in the living room with the daughter?’
‘Crie is her name. What did it look like?’
‘You were sitting too far away to be talking to her. And, well…’
‘Go on.’
‘Your eyes were closed.’
‘You’re right.’
‘Were you praying?’ Lemieux was embarrassed to ask. Prayer, in his generation, was worse than rape, worse than sodomy, worse than failure. He felt he’d just deeply insulted the chief. Still, the man had asked.
‘Yes, I was praying, though not, I suppose, in a conventional way. I was thinking about Crie and trying to send her the message that the world could be a good place, and to give it another chance.’
This was more information that Agent Robert Lemieux wanted. Way more. He began to wonder how difficult this assignment was going to be. But as he watched the chief walk slowly, thoughtfully, back to the car Lemieux had to admit Gamache’s answer had somehow comforted him. Maybe this wasn’t going to be so hard. He brought out his notebook and while the two of them sat in the now warm vehicle Gamache smiled to see young Agent Lemieux write down what he’d said.
Shaking snow off their coats Peter and Clara hung them on the rack by the door and looked around. The bistro was full, the conversation robust. Servers wound expertly between the little round wooden tables, balancing trays with drinks and food.
‘Over here.’ Myrna stood by the sofa in front of the fireplace. Ruth was with her and a couple was just getting up to leave.
‘You can take our seats,’ said Hanna Parra, their local elected representative, as she and her husband Roar wrapped scarves round their necks. ‘Snow begun?’
‘A bit,’ said Peter, ‘but the roads should be fine.’
‘We’re just off home. An easy drive.’ Roar shook their hands while Hanna kissed them on both cheeks. Departing was not an insignificant event in Quebec.
But then neither was arriving.
After making the rounds and kissing everyone on both cheeks Clara and Peter subsided into the soft wing chairs. Peter caught Gabri’s eye and soon the big man had arrived with two glasses of red wine and two bowls of cashews.
‘Can you believe what happened?’ Gabri took a sip of Clara’s wine and a handful of nuts.
‘Are they sure it was murder?’ Myrna asked.
Peter and Clara nodded.
‘That great oaf Gamache is in charge again,’ said Ruth, reaching for Peter’s wine, ‘and you know what happened last time.’ She took a swig.
‘Didn’t he solve the case?’ said Myrna, moving her Scotch to the other side of the table.
‘Did he?’ Ruth gave her an arch look. ‘Luck. I mean, look at it. This woman collapses on the ice and he thinks she was electrocuted? By what? The hand of God?’
‘But she was electrocuted,’ said Peter, just as Olivier arrived.
‘You’re talking about CC,’ he said, looking longingly at the empty chairs by the fire. But he had a restaurant full of patrons and to sit down now was to be lost.
‘Peter thinks you did it, Ruth,’ said Clara.
‘And maybe I did. And maybe you’re next.’ She smiled maniacally at Peter who wished Clara had kept her mouth shut.
Ruth reached for the nearest drink on the table.
‘What did you tell the police?’ Olivier asked Peter.
‘I just described what happened.’
‘The Chief Inspector booked into the B. & B.’ Olivier picked up Peter’s empty wine glass and tilted it toward him in a silent question. Peter, surprised it was empty, shook his head. Two was his limit.
‘You don’t think she was electrocuted?’ Clara asked Ruth.
‘Oh, I know she was. Knew it right away. I was just surprised that nincompoop Gamache glommed onto it so quickly.’
‘How could you know right away?’ asked a skeptical Myrna.
Ruth said,
‘A smell of burning filled the startled air.
CC de Poitiers was no longer there.’
Myrna, despite herself, started to laugh. It was a particularly appropriate quote, or misquote. A smell of burning had indeed filled the startled air.
‘Actually,’ said Clara, ‘another poem came to my mind.
This world he cumbered long enough
He burned his candle to the snuff
And that’s the reason some folks think,
He left behind so great a stink.’
Clara’s poem fell into the silence round the fire. Behind them conversations ebbed and flowed, bursts of laughter were heard,
Gamache could smell the stew before he made it through the door. Boeuf bourguignon, with its aroma of sirloin and mushrooms, of tiny pearl onions and Burgundy wine. He’d called Reine-Marie from the office to let her know he was back, and on her request had picked up a fresh baguette from the local bakery round the corner from their house. Now he struggled through the door carrying the evidence box, his satchel and the precious baguette. He didn’t want to break bread before he’d even made it through the door, though it wouldn’t be the first time.
‘Is that the pool boy?’
‘Non, Madame Gamache, désolé. It’s just the baker.’
‘With a baguette, I hope.’ She came out of the kitchen wiping her hands on a towel. When she saw him her face broke into a warm smile. She couldn’t help it. There he was standing in the hall, both hands holding the box, his leather satchel falling off his shoulder and trying to drag his giant caramel coat with it, and the baguette under his arm rubbing crust into his face.
‘It’s not, I’m afraid, as robust as it once was.’ He gave her a wry smile.
‘It’s just perfect for me, monsieur.’ She carefully tugged it out from under his arm, freeing him to bend down and drop the box to the floor.
‘Voilà. It’s good to be home.’ He took her in his arms and kissed her, feeling her soft body beneath his coat. They’d both swelled since they’d first met. There was no way either would get into their wedding clothes. But they’d grown in other ways as well, and Gamache figured it was a good deal. If life meant growth in all directions, it was fine with him.
Reine-Marie hugged him back, feeling his coat wet from the falling snow making her own sweater damp. But she figured it was a good deal. In exchange for a little discomfort, she got immense comfort.
After he’d showered and changed into a clean turtleneck and tweed jacket he joined her for a glass of wine in front of their fireplace. It was the first quiet night for weeks, what with family and the crush of Christmas parties.
‘Should we eat here?’ he asked.
‘What a wonderful idea.’
He put out folding tables in front of their chairs while she served the boeuf bourguignon on egg noodles, with a basket of sliced baguette.
‘What a strange couple,’ said Reine-Marie, when he’d finished telling her the events of his day. ‘I wonder why CC and Richard stayed together. I wonder why they married at all.’
‘I do too. Richard Lyon’s so passive, so befuddled, and yet I wondered how much was an act. Either way, he’d be a very annoying person to live with, unless you’re also kind of vague, or very patient, and it doesn’t sound as though CC de Poitiers was either. Have you heard of her?’
‘Never. But she might be known in the English community.’
‘I think she was only famous in the mirror. Lyon gave me this.’ He reached into the satchel lying beside his easy chair and pulled out Be Calm.
‘Self-published,’ Reine-Marie commented after examining the cover. ‘Lyon and his daughter saw the whole thing?’
Gamache nodded, taking a forkful of the tender stew. ‘They were in the stands. Lyon didn’t know anything was wrong until he noticed everyone looking over to where CC had been sitting. Then people began leaving their seats. Gabri went to him and said there’d been an accident.’
He realized he’d spoken of Gabri as though Reine-Marie had met the man. And she seemed to feel the same way.
‘And the daughter? Crie did you say her name was? Why call a child Crie? What a hideous thing to do to a child, poor one.’
‘More than you know. She’s not well, Reine-Marie. She’s withdrawn, almost catatonic. And she’s immense. Must be fifty, sixty pounds overweight and she’s only twelve or thirteen. Lyon couldn’t remember.’
‘Being fat isn’t a sign of unhappiness, Armand. At least, I hope it isn’t.’
‘True. But it’s more than that. It’s as though she’s disconnected. And there’s something else. When the murder happened Lyon described seeing CC lying there and the rescuers working on her but he didn’t know where Crie was.’
‘You mean he didn’t look for her?’ asked Reine-Marie, her fork stopped partway to her mouth in astonishment.
Gamache shook his head.
‘Odious man,’ said Reine-Marie.
It was hard not to agree, and Gamache was left to wonder why he was trying so hard not to.
Maybe, came the answer, maybe it’s too easy. Maybe you don’t want the solution to be anything as pedestrian as the scorned, humiliated, cuckolded husband murdering the selfish wife. Maybe that was too easy for the great Armand Gamache.
‘It’s just your ego,’ said Reine-Marie, reading his mind.
‘What is?’
‘The reason you’re not agreeing with me about Lyon. You know he probably did it. You know they must have had a sick relationship. Why else would she treat him like that and why else would he take it? And why else would their daughter withdraw until she all but disappeared? I mean, by your description, no one even noticed whether she was there or not.’
‘She was there. She went with them in the truck. But you’re right.’
‘About what?’
‘I don’t want Richard Lyon to be guilty.’
‘Why not?’ She leaned forward.
‘I like him,’ said Gamache. ‘He reminds me of Sonny.’
‘Our dog?’
‘Remember how he’d wander from backyard to backyard, looking for picnics?’
‘I remember he once got on the 34 bus and ended up in Westmount.’
‘Lyon reminds me of Sonny. Eager to please, hungry for company. And I think he’s got a good heart.’
‘Good hearts get hurt. Good hearts get broken, Armand. And then they lash out. Be careful. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said any of that. You know your business better than I. Forgive me.’
‘It’s always good to be reminded, especially about my ego. Who was that character in Julius Caesar who described his job as standing behind the emperor and whispering, “You’re only a man.”’
‘So now you’re an emperor? This isn’t going in a promising direction.’
‘Careful,’ he said, wiping the last of the gravy off his plate with a crispy piece of baguette, ‘or you’ll crush my ego completely. Then I’ll disappear.’
‘I’m not worried.’ She gave him a kiss as she collected their plates and made for the kitchen.
‘Why wasn’t CC sitting with her family?’ she asked a few minutes later as Gamache washed up and she dried. ‘Doesn’t that strike you as strange?’
‘The whole thing strikes me as strange. I’m not sure I’ve ever had a case where so little made sense from the get-go.’ Gamache’s sleeves were rolled up and his hands soapy as he vigorously scrubbed the Le Creuset pot.
‘Why would a woman leave her family in the cold stands while she took a comfortable chair under the heater?’ Reine-Marie seemed genuinely perplexed.
‘I guess that answers it.’ Gamache laughed, handing her the pot. ‘It was comfortable and warm.’
‘So she was selfish and he’s odious. If I were Crie I’d disappear too.’
Once the dishes were done they took their coffee tray into the living room and Gamache carried over the box with the evidence from Elle’s murder. It was time to change gears, at least for a while. Sipping coffee and occasionally lowering a report to stare into the fire, he went through the box more thoroughly than he’d been able to that morning.
He picked up the small engraved wooden box and opened it, staring at the strange assortment of letters. Homeless people weren’t famous for their good sense, but even so, why would she have cut out all those letters? C, B, L, K and M. Turning it over he saw again the letters taped to the bottom. B KLM.
Maybe the C fell off. Maybe it sat in that hole between the B and K.
He picked up the autopsy report. Elle had been strangled. Alcohol was found in her bloodstream and there were signs of chronic alcoholism. No drugs. Some bruising round her neck, of course.
Why kill a bag lady?
The murderer was almost certainly another homeless person. Like any sub-culture, this one interacted mostly with itself. A regular pedestrian would probably not care enough about Elle to kill her.
He opened the craft paper envelope which held the crime scene photographs. Her face was smudged and surprised. Her legs were splayed and wrapped in layers of clothing and newspapers. He lowered the picture and peered into the box. There they were. Some yellowing newspaper, some fresher, curled into the shape of Elle’s legs and arms and torso, like a dismembered ghost.
There were pictures of Elle’s filthy hands, her nails grotesque. Long and twisted and discolored with God knew what beneath them. Actually, the coroner knew what. Gamache consulted the report. Dirt. Food. Excrement.
One hand had some blood on it, her own blood according to the report, and a few fresh cuts in the center of the palm, like stigmata. Whoever had killed her might have gotten some blood on him. Even if the clothes were washed there would still be some DNA left. Blood was the new albatross.
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