Page 185 of The Grey Wolf
“Numbnuts?”
Jean-Guy jumped, then turned to the unexpected voice. As did Armand and Reine-Marie. Ruth’s head appeared from behind the sofa where she’d been napping. Or “napping.”
“Jesus, you old hag,” said Jean-Guy. “You almost scared me to death.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” said the duck.
“True. We’ll need to try harder.”
The old poet struggled to get up. Jean-Guy held out his arms, and she gripped them as he lifted her to her feet.
She looked into his eyes. “You’d better come home.”
“I will,” he whispered and kissed her on both cheeks. “Thank you for looking after the family.”
As the vehicle drove past the chapel, now lit up and surrounded by cop cars and ambulances, Ruth muttered, “I just sit where I’m put, composed / of stone and wishful thinking.” The elderly poet was quoting from one of her more obscure works. “That the deity who kills for pleasure / will also heal.”
“Come.” Reine-Marie put a fleshy arm through Ruth’s scrawny one, and with Annie on the other side, they walked back into the home, Rosa waddling behind. Silent, for once.
At the threshold, Reine-Marie looked up the hill as the car disappeared.
… that in the midst of your nightmare,
the final one, a kind lion
will come with bandages in her mouth…
Then her gaze dropped to the church, as the thin body of a kindly monk, covered in an altar cloth, was placed in an ambulance.
and pick your soul up gently by the nape of the neck
and caress you into darkness and paradise.
CHAPTER41
“I’m with the Sûreté du Québec.” Armand slid his ID under the door.
We wait…
He and Beauvoir exchanged glances.
“It’s late. What do you want?” The voice of Charles Langlois’s father was querulous, tremulous.
“I’m sorry, I can’t explain from out here. Can you let us in?” The home was in darkness. But now a shaft of light appeared under the door. The ID was pushed back out.
“Come back in the morning.”
Armand searched his mind for something to say, something that would get them inside.
Beauvoir had his ear to the door. “Madame Langlois is saying something. I can’t hear, but they seem to be arguing.”
Gamache turned back to the door. “I’m not sure if you’ve seen the videos posted online. I hope you haven’t, but if you have, you know that I spoke to Charles. You can’t hear what I said, but I was begging him to tell me what he’d found out. That’s when he said ‘family.’ He wanted me to come here, not just to comfort you, but to find what he’d given you for safekeeping. He trusted you.” Gamache paused. “He trusted me. Now you need to.”
We wait…
There was a click, and the door opened.
Brother Constantine put a worn leather bookmark in the huge volume and closed it with a thump. Then, clutching it to his chest, he walked to the back of the workshop.
