Chapter 16

C HAPTER 16

The paper sat on the gleaming pew beside Armand.

Some malady was looking up at him.

He'd asked Olivier and Gabri to leave him alone in the chapel so he could think.

Gabri had been about to ask a question, or ten, but stopped himself. He could see that Armand wasn't just surprised, he was dumbstruck. Thunderstruck. And needed space and time and peace and quiet. To find some answers.

What he didn't need were more questions.

They left. And Armand stared ahead. Trying to see his way clear. The fog was getting thicker. Settling around him. He felt he was well and truly lost. Wandering in circles. And if that was the case, the only thing to do was to stand still. And think. Assess. Think some more.

Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

He had to tell himself not to race ahead. Not to leap from uncertain conclusion to uncertain conclusion. Until he leaped right over the edge.

Now was the time for clarity, not speed.

But still, his mind sped. Then, with effort, it slowed, and slowed. And landed on the one certainty.

Armand Gamache knew who that man was. The one he'd passed on the village green. The one he'd recognized, but not recognized. The one who'd given his name as Monsieur Gilbert.

Armand almost smiled at that. Perhaps he should have twigged then, when Olivier said it. But he hadn't. It was just too unlikely.

Monsieur Gilbert, who'd sung softly alone in his room at the B&B. Armand would bet good money that it had been just as the sun set when Gabri had heard that beautiful voice behind the door.

Monsieur Gilbert, who'd worn baggy old clothes and spent time in the church, and left a note here, for Armand to find. The other half of which had been placed in the coat stolen from his home. For Armand to find.

Placed there by a very different hand. Who had written on the reverse side a single word.

Water.

What was the connection? For there was one. A very strong one. Two halves of a note. Two halves of a whole. Were the people who'd possessed the document that too?

Did the one know about the other? Know what the other had done with their half? Know that Armand now possessed both halves? The whole?

But the whole of what?

Armand looked down at the piece of paper, sitting like a companion beside him on the pew in the peaceful little chapel.

Some malady… It sounded like a threat, and might be one. But it was also a quote. One he knew, and one Monsieur Gilbert knew he'd recognize.

Some malady is coming upon us. We wait. We wait.

It was from the T. S. Eliot play Murder in the Cathedral . About the brutal murder of Thomas à Becket by assassins, after the king had muttered, "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?"

Given all the people, all the churchmen, who'd abandoned the Archbishop of Canterbury, only one had stood by him. Stood up for him. At great peril to himself. An unlikely hero.

Saint Gilbert. Though he wasn't a saint at the time. That came later, for reasons that were unclear since the man had done nothing to distinguish himself except that one glorious, courageous, unlikely act. He'd stood up and, in the face of great peril, had defended his archbishop.

And now Monsieur Gilbert had visited Three Pines. And brought with him some malady.

What malady? Though Armand feared he knew.

He sat there in the uncertain light of the chapel and waited. And waited. For his mind to calm, and for the answer to come. Though, to be honest, he'd known as soon as he'd seen those two words. A threat maybe. More likely a warning.

Placed together, the two halves read, Some malady… water .

And on the other side of the paper were the words both halves shared. Angelica stems. Was it just coincidence that the paper had been torn just there? But Armand was beginning to think few things about these events had been left to chance.

Like a competitor in a race to solve the Rubik's Cube, everything had twisted and clicked into place.

The soft singing.

The baggy clothing.

The vague recognition.

The sense of calm he'd had as he'd locked eyes with the older man.

The name the man had given to Olivier and Gabri. Monsieur P. Gilbert.

And now, the quote. That was the clincher. It put it beyond doubt.

What remained unclear was the purpose of the note someone, two someones, had wanted him to have. A list of herbs and spices. And the scribbled words on the back.

And what about the cocktail? The Last Word?

Armand closed his eyes and tipped his face to the cathedral ceiling. There was something someone had said yesterday. Isabelle? Reine-Marie?

It was Jean-Guy. Opening his eyes, Armand brought from his breast pocket the other half of the note. He reread the list of herbs. Until he came to the demi-words, the last words, clinging to the bottom of the page. Angelica stems.

Named after an archangel. The obscure herb often mistaken for its poisonous look-alike. It was used to make, among other things, the liqueur Chartreuse. And Chartreuse was the main ingredient in the cocktail. The Last Word.

Armand lowered his hand slowly, until it rested on the pew, the one page sitting beside the other. Reunited. The page made whole.

He knew now what that list was. It was part of the recipe for the liqueur Chartreuse.

And the elderly man who'd come to Three Pines and left it for him? Armand had met him a few years ago.

Dom Philippe, the Abbot of the remote monastery Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups. P. Gilbert.

And now Armand felt sure that the other half of the recipe had come from the Abbot's opposite number. Charles Langlois had given his jacket to his boss, and she'd returned it to Armand.

That horror, Jeanne Caron, had slipped it into his jacket. Two halves of a whole. Heaven and Hell.

Armand was still sitting there when he heard the door to the chapel open, and footsteps down the aisle.

He'd been so lost in thought that the drumming of rain, heavy now against the windows and on the roof, came as a surprise. But the voice that greeted him did not.

"Olivier said you'd be here." Jean-Guy slipped in beside him. "Annie and I brought the kids down. Daniel and Roz have just arrived with Florence and Zora. Your home sounds like a day care. Are you claiming sanctuary here? Can I come too?"

Armand gave a grunt of laughter. He could almost hear the earsplitting shrieks of the grandchildren playing together, to be followed by wailing as one or the other, or all four youngsters, either fell or suffered hurt feelings. Both events were inevitable.

"I saw the security video you sent," Armand said.

"It's the same woman, isn't it? Jeanne Caron. The Chief of Staff to the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada."

Armand nodded.

"Fucking hell."

Gamache didn't disagree.

"And she's involved?"

"Up to her neck," said Gamache.

"You obviously know her."

Armand knew this would come up and had weighed what he would say. It wasn't that he didn't trust Jean-Guy with the truth. He trusted him with his life. But the truth involved Daniel, and that was the problem. He'd betrayed his son once, and Daniel would see this, rightly so, as yet another.

Before he could say anything, the door opened again. Both men turned around to see Isabelle Lacoste shaking water off her coat. Her hair was plastered to her skull, and strands, whipped by the wind, stuck to her cheeks.

"Jesus, Chief. Couldn't you have been in the bistro?"

The little chapel had become damp and chilly, and even with the overhead light on, it was dark. And now smelled of wet wool.

Isabelle sat in the pew in front of them and leaned over the back to talk.

"Thank you for inviting my family down," she said. "We've checked into the B&B."

"I'm sorry there isn't room in the house," said Gamache.

"The kids think staying in a hotel is pretty cool. Their first time." She and her husband had not, of course, told them why they'd suddenly decamped to the countryside. To a village with well water and a spring-fed stream running through it.

It was still far from certain that there was a threat to the drinking water, but Armand wanted to be safe. Just in case…

Though he wondered if this was how Noah had felt as he stood on the deck of the ark and stared at those left behind.

"They're over at your place now. I would not advise returning any time soon unless you want Play-Doh to the side of the head." She lifted her hand and removed a bright green glob from her wet hair. "Your house is insured, right?"

" Oui. " But his marriage was not. He thought he really should go home and rescue Reine-Marie. Soon…

Isabelle turned to Jean-Guy. "I saw the video you sent. So it's confirmed. Jeanne Caron was Charles Langlois's contact and probably the boss he talked about. She's Chief of Staff to the Deputy PM. Does that mean he's behind this?"

"Not just him," said Jean-Guy. "If the PM gave him the counter-terrorism dossier, does that mean he's involved too?"

They were staring at the Chief.

"I think we have to assume the worst." It was, he knew, part of his job. To assume and prepare for the worst. To try to see it coming.

And what he now saw coming blotted out the sun.

"There's something you need to know," said Gamache. "Madame Caron called me on Sunday morning. She wanted to meet. I told her to go to hell."

"Why would you do that?" asked Lacoste.

"And why would she call you?" asked Beauvoir.

"I don't know what she wanted, but you need to know that we have a history. Years ago, when she was a young executive assistant and her boss was a newly elected member of Parliament, they asked me for a favor. To get his daughter off a manslaughter charge. I refused."

"What happened?"

"Despite overwhelming evidence, she was acquitted. Then they came after me. But not just me. They found out about Daniel's drug use." As he spoke, Armand's hands slowly closed. Clenched. "He was in court-ordered rehab, as part of his plea bargain. They had it reversed. Had him charged with trafficking. He never trafficked."

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. Been addicted 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 does Some malady mean?"

"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 became one with each other. One with nature. One with the universe. One with God.

All led by their Abbot, Dom Philippe. The spiritual leader of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups. The all but forgotten, and forsaken, abbey in the wilderness.

By the time they'd left there, Armand and Jean-Guy's relationship was in ruins. A terrible chapter in their lives had begun at the monastery of Saint Gilbert Between the Wolves.

That was now in their past, was history. Though like all history, it had left its mark.

But clearly something else had happened at Saint-Gilbert. Something recent that had propelled the gentle Abbot from his cloistered existence into the world. Into Three Pines. From one forgotten place to another.

He'd put on the clothes he'd been wearing fifty years earlier, when he'd entered Saint-Gilbert as a young man and, placing a grey hat on grey head, he'd left.

Armand wondered why, if the Abbot had traveled all that way to give him a message, had even recognized him as they'd passed, he hadn't stopped him. Hadn't handed him the note in person, hadn't sat down and explained instead of leaving the envelope propped against the chapel wall.

Was it because Dom Philippe did not want to answer the inevitable questions? Did not want to provide an explanation? Which could mean either Dom Philippe or someone he cared about was involved.

"I know what those notes, when put together, make," he said. "It's a recipe, or at least part of one. I think it's for Chartreuse."

Beauvoir and Lacoste stared at him.

"The drink?" said Lacoste. "What my grandmother used to have on special occasions?"

"The drink."

They brought out their phones, and while Gamache stared at the stained-glass window, they looked up the liqueur.

Then all three S?reté officers sat in the weak light and, as the three boys looked on, they talked about murder and monks and how a remote monastery and an obscure recipe for a little-used liqueur could possibly have anything to do with the killing of Charles Langlois. A biologist who might, or might not, have stumbled onto a plan to poison Montréal's drinking water.