Chapter 34

C HAPTER 34

Commander Michaud raced around the side of the house in Blanc-Sablon, glancing quickly into windows. She saw nothing. Not even a light.

She also didn't see one of the windows at the front, on the upper level, slide open.

But Gamache did. He also saw the tip of a rifle poke through the lace curtain.

His concern, since he'd heard that the Rousseaus hadn't been seen in days, was that they were either being held hostage, or were dead inside. Along with Dom Philippe.

If so, there was a chance the killer was still in there.

What was pointing at him was a .22. It was a hunting rifle for smaller game.

This was no professional hitman. This was a frightened villager.

" S'il vous pla?t , Monsieur Rousseau. I'm here to help." Gamache considered edging back toward the protection of the pickup, but worried that any movement might prompt the person to shoot. So he stayed put.

"I met your brother, Yves, Dom Philippe, at Saint-Gilbert a few years ago." He paused. The tip of the rifle had not moved.

Armand also realized, as soon as he'd seen the small-caliber hunting rifle, that Dom Philippe could not be in the house. He'd have told his brother that the visitor wasn't a threat.

He put his disappointment aside. The brother would still have a lot to tell them. He must know something if he was so frightened he needed to point a gun at a S?reté officer.

"I know Yves must've warned you about strangers and told you not to trust anyone. But you know Valerie Michaud. You know you can trust her, even if you don't know me." He paused. "Look, I'm not even armed."

Armand took his jacket off and dropped it on the ground.

"Turn around," the man called.

Armand sighed. No experienced cop would voluntarily turn their back on a gunman. Still, he did it. Pausing to stare at the empty vehicle, then turning back around.

"You see? No gun. Now, please. It's getting cold."

Though in fact, Gamache was perspiring. There were dark marks under his armpits and down his back.

Finally, the rifle disappeared, and a few moments later the front door opened and a wiry older man, unshaven and disheveled, came out still holding the .22.

"Raymond Rousseau, what do you think you're doing?"

The voice came from the corner of the house where Valerie Michaud stood. Her gun, Gamache saw, was still in its holster. He was grateful for that. It meant the situation would not escalate.

"You should be offering us hot tea, not threats. Where's Miriam?"

The station commander strolled forward as though she'd already been invited in for tea and cookies.

The rifle lowered. "In the basement."

"Well, get her up here. We need to talk."

"Miriam!"

Armand lowered his arms, scooped up his jacket, and just like that, it was over. Or almost.

Jean-Guy Beauvoir was so stunned it took him a full thirty seconds of staring at the paused image before he noted the time on the Mission security tape. Then he hit play again.

The video was at double speed so he could get through it quickly. He now knew what he was looking for. And who he was looking for.

And there it was. A section they'd already seen, but hadn't fully appreciated. Once again, he stopped the recording.

There was Charles Langlois in the kitchen of The Mission. He was talking with Jeanne Caron. They'd seen that part already. Thought that was the headline, and it still was. But the scene had more to tell them.

In the foreground a grinning politician heaped food onto the plate of one of the residents. The resident was wearing an old grey suit, too big for him.

Beauvoir could almost smell the mothballs.

"Shit, shit, shit," he muttered and started the tape again.

Jean-Guy's quick eyes, trained after years of scanning for threats, moved from one security camera to another, and finally found them again.

Charles Langlois was opening the locked front door late one night and admitting Jeanne Caron. But there was someone else standing in the shadows.

Enlarging, brightening, focusing the image, Jean-Guy was still unable to make out who it was, but thought it was again Dom Philippe. Watching them.

He hit play, and the scene played out. They'd already seen Langlois and Caron going into his office. They'd also seen the two of them leave a few minutes later, and had followed them to the door, where Langlois let her out and relocked it. But this time Beauvoir slowed down the tape and lingered on the office. He saw Caron and Langlois leave. And he saw something else, just as the door swung closed.

A third person had been in that meeting, and now he stood alone in the office, as though it belonged to him.

It was Dom Philippe.

"Holy shit," Beauvoir whispered and sat back in the chair, staring in disbelief. But the image was unmistakable, as was the look on the Abbot's face. He was content. Certainly satisfied.

This meant the person in the shadows by the front door hadn't been Dom Philippe. It must have been Parisi.

"What the hell's going on here?"

"Where's your brother?"

They were sitting at the kitchen table, cups of strong tea in front of them.

Gamache had brought in the bags of groceries. He'd bought them suspecting the elderly couple, if still alive, might be running low on food if they hadn't left the house in days.

Raymond at first refused the offering, but Miriam brushed that aside and grabbed the bags, calling her husband an old fool. Though it was said with affection.

"We were afraid to leave," said Miriam. She was wearing a clean, crisp polka-dotted apron over her round body and was standing by the white enamel stove, shoving a pound of sizzling bacon around a cast-iron pan.

The home was soon filled with the scent of bacon and eggs. And fresh-perked coffee.

The toast popped up, and before Armand could butter it, Miriam waved the spatula at him. "Sit."

"Yves came here a month or so ago," said Raymond, wiping the toast into the yolk and bacon drippings on his plate. "Haven't seen him since. But he called a few days ago warning us that someone might be on their way here looking for him. They were dangerous, he said. Killers."

"You thought it was us," said Gamache.

"Yves told us they'd probably come as friends," said Miriam. She was eating standing up, even though there was a seat at the table.

"That's why you were going to shoot us," said Valerie.

"But you didn't," said Armand.

"To be honest, I was just about to when Mother stopped me."

"We only kill what we can eat," she explained. "And you're too big for the pot."

Armand laughed. "Thank God for éclairs." Then he grew serious. "And your brother didn't tell you who these people were."

"No."

"Why didn't you tell me?" asked Valerie, but after decades on the coast, she knew the reason. These were people who solved their own problems. It would never occur to them to go to the police. If there was trouble, the police came to them for help.

"Tell us about his visit a few weeks ago," said Armand.

"He showed up unannounced," said Miriam. "First time we'd seen him in—what, Big Gars? Forty years?"

"At least, Mother. Barely recognized him."

Armand smiled at her calling her husband Big Gars. Big Fella. He wondered how long it had been since she called him Raymond. And how long since he'd called his wife anything but Mother. Probably not since their first child was born.

"Why did he come here?" Gamache asked.

Now Big Gars and Mother looked uncomfortable. Armand decided to help them out.

"He came asking for money and to borrow your passport and probably driver's license."

Raymond nodded. If standing side by side, the brothers wouldn't look that much alike. The Abbot was taller, slightly softer in body. Big Gars was wiry, more weather-worn. Weather-beaten. But in a passport or Québec driver's license photo, Dom Philippe could pass for his brother.

And clearly did.

"We took all but fifty dollars out of our account and gave it to him," said Miriam. "Along with our credit card."

"How much cash was that?"

"Came to just under nine hundred dollars. Our card has a ten-thousand-dollar limit. He bought a round-trip ticket to Grenoble on it and rented a car."

"He also borrowed a bunch of clothes."

"Do you have any idea where he is now?"

" Non. His return flight was a few days later." Big Gars rested his bright blue eyes on Gamache's deep brown ones. "Is he okay?"

"I think so, but I need to find him. Is there anyone else he might go to for help? Another family member?" Just then, his phone buzzed. "Do you mind?"

They shook their heads.

Gamache walked into the neat front room.

"Jean-Guy?"

"I'm at The Mission, patron . I've watched the security tapes. Have you found Dom Philippe?"

"No. He's gone. He came here straight from the monastery, but—"

In a move almost unheard of, Jean-Guy interrupted Gamache.

"Listen. Dom Philippe and Paolo Parisi were here at the same time."

"At The Mission?"

"Yes. They had breakfast together every morning."

" Quoi? " What?

"But there's more. The Abbot also knows Langlois and Caron. He was in the meeting with them in the Exec's office. We didn't look closely enough. When those two left, you can just see Dom Philippe in the background as the door closed."

"He knows Caron?" Gamache was so stunned he felt he needed confirmation. "Jeanne Caron?"

" Oui, oui. More than in passing, it seems."

Gamache's mind raced.

What does this mean, what does this mean, what could this possibly mean? He looked out the window to the rocky shore. Where so many ships had been dashed. Where so many screams for help and prayers had gone unanswered.

He suddenly felt himself foundering.

"Did someone mention Jeanne?" Raymond Rousseau was standing a few feet into the living room. "We were just about to tell you about her."

"Hold on, Jean-Guy." Armand turned to Rousseau. "We're talking about Jeanne Caron. The Chief of Staff for the Deputy Prime Minister."

"Yes. That's the one. You asked about family members. She's the only one we could think of."

Jean-Guy's mosquito voice came through the phone. He'd obviously heard. But Gamache ignored him and was staring at Big Gars.

"She's family?"

"Our niece. Eunice's girl."

"Jeanne Caron?" Gamache repeated, barely able to grasp what he was hearing.

"Yes. I just said so. Lives in Ottawa now. She comes back every now and then, when there's some official visit, some federal announcement. But not recently."

"When was the last time?"

"Mother?"

"Two and a half years ago, when they announced the road project."

Big Gars turned back to Gamache and saw the sort of look a swimmer has when they've just inhaled a huge amount of seawater and are about to choke.

Gamache put the phone down and with it Beauvoir's increasingly insistent squeak. He patted his pockets and found the photograph the priest had given him.

"Who are these people?"

"Oh, so you have it. We've been looking for that picture," said Raymond. "That's Yves, Eunice, and Jeanne."

And from the phone a tiny "Oh, shit."

"What do you mean he refuses to see me?" Lacoste demanded, though the meaning could not have been clearer.

"Did you expect anything else?"

She was standing in the large courtyard garden of Grande Chartreuse facing the head of the lay monks.

Isabelle took a deep breath. He was right, of course. It would have been a miracle if Brother Robert, afraid of beige, had agreed to meet her. Still, she was far from certain this smug young man had tried very hard, if at all.

With his long face and burlap smock and straw hat, he looked like one of those sad donkeys from Don Quixote . Though he'd been given just enough power, by the Abbot of this monastery, if not by God, that he managed to also be snooty. A haughty ass.

"You're the first women to cross that threshold since the monastery was built," said the lay monk. "I think you have gone far enough."

He clearly meant too far .

She rolled her shoulders and flexed her neck, to release the tension. Confrontation did no good and would only make this man dig his hooves in further.

"If I can't see him, can you take him a message?"

"No."

As she looked at his stubborn, mulish face, Isabelle tried to understand where he was coming from. She saw herself, saw the situation, through his eyes.

The sudden appearance of strangers, never mind two women, in their forecourt, having breached the wall, must have been a shock. His job, as head of the lay monks, was to stand between the Carthusians and the outside world.

He was just doing his job. As was she.

"What would you suggest?" She stepped back both physically and figuratively.

"That you leave."

She smiled. "Unfortunately we can't. We've come a long way, and Frère Robert has information we need to save perhaps thousands of lives."

"I can ask him to pray that your situation is resolved and those lives saved, but that's all."

"I imagine he's already praying for that."

"Then there you have it. His prayers will be answered, though the answer is not always yes."

It was the dismissive justification Isabelle had heard from clerics all her life. It covered a multitude of sins.

"Is it possible, mon frère , that we are the answer to his prayers?" It had worked once, why not again?

"I doubt it."

"Why?"

"Because if you were, I'd let you in."

Sister Irene rolled her eyes. She wished she'd thought of that.

"Goodbye." The lay monk held his arm out toward the gate. He held all the power and knew it. Lacoste had nothing. Except…

She looked at Dussault, who raised his bushy brows. Reluctantly reaching into his breast pocket, he withdrew an official-looking envelope and handed it to her.

"This might help," said Lacoste. "Maybe not you, but us. As you say, the answer to your prayers isn't always yes."

The lay monk took it and read the search warrant. Then he turned and walked away.

"Do you have a copy of that, Monsieur Dussault?" Lacoste asked.

" Non. "

They watched the mulish monk step through an archway; then he, and the warrant, disappeared.

Gamache got back to the airport just as the plane's door was closing. All the way back on the flight, he ignored the man next to him who was going on and on. How lucky he was that the seat had opened up. Then he segued into something about vaccinations and zombies.

"People do screwy things when they're scared. That's what the government's trying to do. Scare people. Take global warming…"

Gamache wasn't listening. He was looking out the window and willing the plane to get back to Montréal faster. Faster. And not just because he was seated beside an idiot.

Before they took off, Gamache had sent a quick text to Jean-Guy, telling him to have Customs and Immigration and Interpol do a search for a Raymond Rousseau. See where and when his passport had been used. And to track any charges on the credit card.

Once the plane landed, Jean-Guy was at the gate with news.

"Isabelle got into Grande Chartreuse."

"Thank God for that." The two of them were headed for the exit, Jean-Guy having to run slightly to keep up with the Chief Inspector's longer strides. "Has she spoken to Frère Robert?"

"I'm waiting for word. Frère Sébastien is also there, acting as a lay monk and sort of bodyguard slash gatekeeper, but seems Robert has refused to tell him anything. But he did meet with Dom Philippe."

"Robert did? So the Abbot knows what this is about. If we find him—"

"No, that's just it. Seems the damned monk didn't tell the Abbot everything."

"Why not?"

"He said he didn't trust him."

"Why not?"

"A feeling, apparently."

In the past Jean-Guy Beauvoir's disdain of feelings would have been obvious. But since working with the Chief, since going to rehab, since loving Annie, since having two children, he'd come to see how powerful feelings were. In many ways, in every way that mattered, feelings were more real, more powerful than thoughts. They were the engine of perception, which drove thought, which became words and prompted action.

Feelings were where it all began. For better and worse. And since they were homicide investigators, it was often the worse that they knelt beside.

Gamache tossed his bag into the car and got in the passenger's side. "Frère Robert had no actual reason to distrust him?"

"Apparently not."

They pulled out into the chaotic traffic at l'aérogare de Montréal .

Brother Robert was no longer alone in his doubts about the Abbot. Dom Philippe's presence at The Mission, his knowing both Parisi and Caron, was suspicious at best.

And Armand Gamache suspected they were not looking at the best.

"You will not serve this warrant on us."

Standing in front of Isabelle Lacoste was a tall, powerfully built man. He wore a hood framing his face and radiated authority. He'd used the same tone as Obi-Wan Kenobi.

These are not the droids you're looking for.

But of course they were the droids. And Lacoste had every intention of serving the warrant. If necessary.

"I hope, mon frère , it won't be necessary."

He bristled at being called " mon frère, " as though he and this young woman were equals. As though he was not the Abbot in charge of one of the most famous monasteries in the world. And she was, well, not.

Though he had to admit, it was the proper term. And he knew he should be one among equals, but still, it didn't feel right. Though there was more to take offense at than what she called him. The threat to search this most private of monasteries, for instance. To violate the sanctity of their home. Their place of worship.

It would not be the first time this had happened. And while this young woman was hardly the Inquisition come to slaughter them, the Carthusians knew that this was how bad things started. Innocently enough.

It was how defenses were breached. Not by force but by a smile. An offer to help.

The Abbot glared at Frère Sébastien, the Gilbertine. Who'd lied and entered their monastery as a lay monk. And opened the gate to these invaders. Yes, that's how defenses were breached. By friends. By the wolf in sheep's clothing.

"You wouldn't dare search the monastery."

Claude Dussault stepped forward, his face grave. "It would be a terrible thing. And I'd hate to do it. But too many lives are at stake. If we do have to serve the warrant, if I need to bring in a force, it will be on you. Not us. You have the power to stop it."

Sensing a weakening in the Abbot's defenses, Lacoste said, "We just need to speak to one monk. Twenty minutes should do it. I promise, we won't take him away. We don't even have to go inside. Just bring him to us. You can be here for the interview. Please."

The Abbot looked at the warrant in his hand, then stepped aside and spoke to two of the lay brothers, who left.

Irene and Sébastien exchanged looks, as did Claude Dussault and Isabelle Lacoste. This did not guarantee that Brother Robert would tell them what they needed to know, but it was a huge step forward.

"What can it mean that Dom Philippe and Jeanne Caron are related?" asked Beauvoir as they drove toward Montréal.

"And met recently at The Mission," said Gamache. "After you called, I told Raymond Rousseau that his brother had seen his niece. Both he and Miriam said that couldn't be true."

"Why not?"

"There'd been a falling-out. His niece had refused to see Dom Philippe, or even have his name mentioned. Seems he didn't return to Blanc-Sablon for her mother's funeral. Eunice died when Jeanne was thirteen. Drowned. Jeanne adored her uncle and begged him to come back and lead the service."

"Why didn't he?"

"I don't know. Might've taken his vows of silence and cloistered life to an extreme. He sent back a short letter of condolence and said he'd pray for Eunice's soul."

"That's cold."

"She couldn't forgive him. What made it worse was that years later, when the recording of the Gregorian chants came out, he did interviews and even personal appearances to promote it."

"He left the monastery for that, but not for her." Jean-Guy slid a glance at the Chief. "Doesn't sound like a nice man."

Gamache was silent for a few moments. "But something's changed."

"There's nothing like a common goal to patch things up," said Beauvoir.

"That being to poison the population?"

"If that's what's going on, yes. That's Old Testament shit. The Great Flood. Sodom and Gomorrah. Maybe when he finally did leave the monastery, he saw how screwed up the world is. Maybe he sees himself as some sort of messiah, an agent of God. Wouldn't be the first religious wingnut to take things into their own hands."

"Could be."

It was clear that Caron was the black wolf, or at least in league with it. And now it looked like her uncle Dom Philippe had joined the pack. But what use would a Gilbertine abbot be to terrorists?

One thing did occur to Gamache. If Caron knew that he and the Abbot had met. Had formed a mutual respect. Could she be using her unbalanced uncle to distract and mislead him?

Was it working?

"Why did Dom Philippe and Caron meet at The Mission?" asked Gamache, thinking out loud. "And with Charles Langlois? What were the three of them talking about? Is it possible that's how the map and maybe Langlois's notes got to the monastery? They weren't sent to Dom Philippe, they were sent by him."

Beauvoir considered that possibility. "But Frère Simon told us that Dom Philippe instructed him to keep the map safe."

"True. He made it sound like he'd told Simon in person. But suppose the Abbot ‘told' him that in a letter and we just assumed it was face-to-face. We need to ask him."

Though at this point it didn't really matter. It was a detail for later.

"But why would they send Langlois's research to Saint-Gilbert?" asked Beauvoir as he navigated the heavy rush hour traffic. "Why try to keep it safe? If they're involved in the plot, wouldn't Caron and the Abbot want to destroy the evidence Langlois had collected?"

Gamache shook his head in frustration. "I don't get it. I just don't understand. Three people meet. At least one is deeply involved in a plot to poison Montréal's drinking water—"

"We're still not sure about that, patron . We suspect, but there's no proof. It might be toxic spills."

"Do you really think all this has been set up to cover up industrial waste?"

Beauvoir shook his head. No. A few days ago a disastrous toxic spill would have upset him. Now he was praying for it.

"Isabelle has to get in to see Brother Robert," said Gamache.

"And we have to find those notebooks."

"The Gilbertines have searched their abbey and so far nothing."

Once again, Gamache checked his messages. There was one from the agent investigating the murder in the Saguenay. Probably to tell him that he'd arrived. Armand marked it with a red flag, to be read later.

"That must be how Jeanne Caron got the other half of the Chartreuse recipe," Jean-Guy was saying. "Her uncle gave it to her."

"And Dom Philippe must've gotten it while at Grande Chartreuse."

"From Frère Robert? But why, and how? Don't only two monks have access to the recipe?"

"We need to get our thoughts in order. Let's go over it again. Brother Robert hears something in a confession that terrifies him. He suddenly applies for a job in the Curia, gets it, and leaves DC. But his conscience gets the better of him, and he asks Sister Irene to come to Rome, where he tells her that something horrific was going to happen, an attack that will kill thousands, but refuses to tell her more. She writes to Frère Sébastien at Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups and asks him to come to Rome and help her get the information out of their friend."

"Right. He goes, but by then Robert has taken off again, this time to Grande Chartreuse."

"Sister Irene doesn't know what spooked him, but something obviously did. Maybe he wanted to avoid seeing Sébastien. You said there'd been a falling-out."

"It seems an overreaction, doesn't it?" said Jean-Guy. "There're people I'd rather not see, but I don't barricade myself in a monastery."

"Either way, Irene and Sébastien follow him to Grande Chartreuse," said Gamache. "But Robert refuses to see them. That's when Sébastien had the idea of getting Dom Philippe over. Have you heard back from the parish priest in DC? Does he admit what happened?"

"That a monk took his place in confession? No. And he won't. Neither will he tell us who his regular parishioners are, those who go to confession."

"We need to go higher and ask the Archbishop then. Back to Dom Philippe. On Sébastien's request he leaves Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups and goes first to Blanc-Sablon. He borrows his brother's ID, credit card, and cash and heads to Grande Chartreuse, where Brother Robert agrees to meet him. But once face-to-face, Robert apparently has misgivings about the Abbot. He told Dom Philippe something, but not everything. Dom Philippe then returns to Montréal and goes to The Mission."

"And connects up with Parisi and his niece. Was that planned? Or a coincidence? Did the Abbot see Caron at The Mission and realize she was someone he could tell about a possible attack?"

"But if her uncle tells her he knows about the attack," said Gamache, "why not just kill him too? He'd be dangerous to her. To them."

"It looks like Jeanne Caron brought him into the plot," said Beauvoir.

Armand shook his head. He just could not bring himself to see the Abbot siding with the black wolf.

But could it be what Beauvoir said? That isolation had driven Dom Philippe to the brink of madness, and when he finally left the monastery after forty years and saw the state of the world, he went over the edge? Did he now see himself as some sort of Old Testament avenging angel? Adopting muscular Christianity? Not just praying but acting.

"Is it possible," Gamache said, choosing his words carefully, picking his way forward, "that Brother Robert told the Abbot enough so that Dom Philippe realized the Deputy PM was behind it? When he saw his niece, the Chief of Staff, at The Mission, he rekindled the relationship. Hoping to get more information. Maybe even intimating that he was willing to help."

"You're thinking he was just pretending to be sympathetic to the cause? In hopes of what? Gaining their trust and stopping it?"

His boss's inability to see the Abbot as anything other than a decent man worried Jean-Guy.

" Oui, exactement. In hopes of finding out enough, getting enough evidence, and when he did, he'd come to me with it. He must've realized Brother Robert hadn't been completely honest with him. The Abbot is an astute observer. A keen listener. He's lived in community long enough, counseled enough monks to know when one wasn't being entirely truthful. He knew that Frère Robert had more information. That's why he pointed me there. In hopes I could get him to talk."

Gamache checked his phone. Still nothing more from Isabelle. He tapped out a quick message to her.

You MUST get Robert to talk.

He almost never used caps, so this would appear not just a shout, but a scream.

"He also pointed me to Jeanne Caron," he said. "When he gave her the other half of the Chartreuse recipe. He's not a co-conspirator. He's trying to expose her and her boss."

"But patron , that doesn't make sense. I agree, Dom Philippe must've given her the other half, but she was the one who sent it to you, not him. She wanted to get your attention, and he made it possible."

It was true. Armand Gamache felt his heart sink. Had Dom Philippe gone to Three Pines not to alert Gamache to the crisis, but to confuse him? Distract him from what was really happening? Get him to hare off in all directions?

Had Charles Langlois been sent by Caron to meet with him for the same reason? To send out vague half-truths that seemed more legitimate when the young man had been killed. Right in front of the Chief Inspector.

Was he an unwitting pawn? And maybe Langlois was too. And maybe, as he lay dying, the young man realized it.

He'd begged Charles to tell him who was behind this. To give him something. And the dying man had whispered, "Family."

And now, thunderstruck, Gamache had an idea. Could Charles Langlois have been trying to tell him who was behind it after all? And he'd missed it?

The family. Not his, but one of the crime families? Had Langlois recognized Paolo Parisi and known him to be connected to the mafia? That would explain the look of panic on Charles's face when he'd assured the dying man he'd tell his family.

Charles Langlois had gone to his grave, to his maker, to a drawer in the morgue, knowing he'd died senselessly. Because the numbskull head of homicide had made an assumption, based on his own experience when he thought he was dying.

Still, where did that get them? As hard as it was for Gamache to think that the Abbot was the black wolf, he also found it difficult to believe the mafia was involved in a plot to poison Montréal's drinking water. After all, they had no proof Parisi was mafia.

In Gamache's experience, the mob, while brutal, were also astute businesspeople who were surgical in their targets. An act of terrorism on this scale was too messy. And to what end for them?

He needed answers, not more questions. And he needed them now.

They'd come to a fork in the road, in every way. By habit Beauvoir got into the right-hand lane, which would take them into downtown Montréal and S?reté headquarters.

"Go left."

"Left?" Beauvoir asked. The ramp was just meters away.

"Left!"

Jean-Guy yanked the wheel, and they just made the exit, to angry honking behind them.

"Where to, patron ?"

"Ottawa."