Page 65 of The Grey Wolf
Armand could feel his face growing hot, and his anger rising. Taking over. He paused and took a deep breath before continuing.
“He was sent to prison, where he relapsed. His lawyers and I fought the new charge, and he was eventually released, the charge expunged, and he was sent back to rehab. It took many months, and a suicide attempt.” Armand steadied himself, and exhaled deeply, before he was able to go on. “But he got clean. Has been clean ever since. He blamed me for many years. We’ve come a long way, but I think it’s a wound that will never completely heal.”
Beauvoir’s eyes were closed. He’d been down the same road. Beenaddicted to painkillers, then worse. Had done untold damage to those he loved. Including this man. But had finally gotten clean.
He’d known there was something between Daniel and his father, but he hadn’t known what. Something that had been resolved in Paris a year or so earlier.
But now he saw that the hurt, the rage, still existed. Probably in both men. Certainly in Daniel’s father.
Jeanne Caron and her boss had almost succeeded in killing Daniel Gamache. Armand would never, could never, forgive that.
Was that why he’d often find his father-in-law sitting in this seat in this tiny church? Was he drawn to the three boys, who seemed to have forgiven far worse?
They were quiet for a moment, giving him time to recover. Armand wiped his face with his hand, as though to erase the worst of the memory.
“I have no idea why she wanted to meet,” he finally said.
“Well, we’ll find out soon enough. We need to question her,” said Beauvoir.
“Not yet,” said Armand. “We don’t have enough evidence. And something else has come up. On Sunday afternoon, just as Reine-Marie and I were walking to our car to drive into Montréal, we passed an older man. A guest who’d just arrived at the B&B. He left an envelope for me here, in the church.” Gamache continued to hold Beauvoir’s puzzled gaze. “This was inside. Careful, we need to fingerprint it.”
Beauvoir used a tissue to pick up the torn paper. Then he looked down at the other half, still sitting on the pew. The one left in Gamache’s jacket.
Beauvoir turned the page in his hand around. “What doesSome maladymean?”
“It’s a quote from a play. I think it’s both a warning, and a way for me to identify him. He knew I’d recognize it. That paper isn’t the only thing he left behind. He gave Olivier a bottle of Chartreuse and a recipe for a cocktail called the Last Word.”
Isabelle Lacoste tilted her head. “That’s the same cocktail that’s in the newspaper your coat was wrapped in.”
“Oui.”
“Wait a minute,” said Beauvoir. “The videos confirm Jeanne Caron was Charles’s boss. She got him to break into your home,patron, and take your coat. And she had your coat sent back to you, wrapped in the newspaper with the recipe and the list in one of the pockets.”
“And then she called you,” said Lacoste.
“No. The call came first,” said Armand. “The break-in happened later that morning.”
“Are they connected?” asked Lacoste. “Did she want to warn you? But that doesn’t make sense. Why would the person ordering the break-in also try to stop it?”
“And she didn’t want to warn me, she wanted to meet me.”
“True.”
“And then that man comes here with the same cocktail,” said Beauvoir. “Does this mean they’re in it together? The B&B guest you recognized and Jeanne Caron?”
“They must be,” said Lacoste. “Who is he? You know, don’t you.”
Gamache once again looked at Beauvoir, who was now troubled by that gaze.
“He gave his name to Olivier and Gabri as Monsieur Gilbert. P. Gilbert. I’d met him before. So have you.”
Beauvoir cocked his head, his brow furrowed. “A criminal? A killer? Who?”
“It was Dom Philippe.” Gamache watched Jean-Guy as he said the name.
It took Jean-Guy a moment or two to cast his mind back, but he finally got there. To that charred spot in both their lives. When the two men had stepped off a boat onto the rocky shore, to investigate a murder. They’d looked up at the remote monastery on some God-forsaken lake. Though not completely forsaken.
Many times a day, at matins and lauds, at compline and vespers, the voices of the monks rose from the abbey to join the old-growth forest, and the wildflowers, and wild animals, the fresh water and fish and fowl. The men, the monks, sang ancient Gregorian chants. The word of God, in the voice of God. And with those chants they becameone with each other. One with nature. One with the universe. One with God.
