Page 98 of Miss Wolcott’s Ghost

“Can you tell me?”

“No, it’s okay. I think seeing Comeau again, and having to spend time with that … has brought stuff back. I really am fine.”

He knew he should call his sponsor. To talk through what had just happened. To take the edge off another temptation that was whispering to him.

As he reached for the phone, Jean-Guy could feel his cold, wet pajamas sticking to his body.

“Bonjour,” came the voice down the line.

“Is this the Police Nationale in Aix-les-Bains, France?”

“Oui.” There was a pause. “Allô? Who’s there?”

Jean-Guy, help!

Papa! Papa!

Here, here, this must be the way, Comeau thought.

He moved into the forest just as a vehicle approached down the dirt road. He pressed himself against the rough bark of a tree trunk and watched. It was the Chief Inspector, returning to the village.

Comeau instinctively drew back. Why had he called Gamache, of all people? Though he knew why. It was that calm voice in the dark, in the night, telling him it would be all right. But it wasn’t. That was a lie.

Gaston Comeau knew he was on his own.

He turned and headed deeper into the woods.

Armand parked outside his home and wrote his two senior agents to meet him there.

Before hitting send, he glanced toward the B&B. Where Gaston Comeau was waiting.

He knew he had to face him. Eventually. Perhaps he should do that now, first?

Armand stood there, uncharacteristically irresolute. His finger hovering over send. Then it descended.

He turned to his left and walked through the gate into his garden. Pausing for a moment to look at Miss Wolcott’s Ghost.

He wondered if there was a reason this malevolent-looking plant had been allowed to go extinct. Not for the first time, he thought that some things were better off dead.

CHAPTER 35

Will that be fries with your burger?

That was the subject line of the message that had appeared in Chief Inspector Gamache’s email on the day after the attack.

The Sûreté operation had netted most of the gang, but not all.

The fact any of them had gotten out was a failure on his part, Armand knew. Not necessarily of his planning or leadership during the raid itself, but his decision to assign a relative rookie the job of guarding an exit. It was the one least likely to come into play.

Everyone knew that.

And yet—

After the mop-up. After processing and interviewing those arrested. After spending hours in interview rooms, trying to get out of their prisoners where the others might have gone, Armand had returned to his office. The sun was just rising. He desperately wanted to get into a shower. Into a change of clothes.

But instead, Armand sat at his desk. Exhausted. Frustrated. And, yes, angry.

One officer had been wounded, thankfully not badly. Five criminals had been arrested. One killed. Two wounded.