It was beginning to snow. Huge, soft flakes drifted down, caught in the street lamps and the headlights of cars. The forecast was for a storm coming their way.
A foot or more expected overnight. This was just the vanguard, the first hints of what was to come.
Quebec City was never lovelier than in a storm and
the aftermath, when the sun came out and revealed a magical kingdom, softened and muffled by the thick covering. Fresh and clean, a world unsul ied, unmarred.
At the old stone home Émile got out his key.
Through the lace curtains on the door they could see Henri hiding behind a pil ar, watching.
Gamache smiled then brought his mind back to the case. The curious case of the woman in Champlain’s coffin.
Who was she, and what happened to Champlain?
Where’d he go? Seemed his explorations didn’t end with his death.
Once inside Gamache took Henri for a walk and when he returned Émile had set the laptop on the coffee table, put out a bottle of Scotch, lit the fire and was waiting.
The elderly man stood in the center of the room, his arms at his side. He looked formal, almost rigid.
“What is it, Émile?”
“I’d like to watch the video with you.”
“Now?”
“Now.”
Al through the walk the Chief Inspector had been preparing himself for this. The cold flakes on his face had been refreshing and he’d stopped and tilted his face up, closing his eyes and opening his mouth, to catch them.
“I love doing that,” Morin said. “But the snow has to be just right.”
“You were a connoisseur?” the Chief asked.
“Stil am. The flakes have to be the big, fluffy kind.
The ones that just drift down. None of the hard, smal flakes you get in storms. That’s no fun. They go up your nose and get in your ears. Get everywhere. No it’s the big ones you want.”
Gamache knew what he meant. He’d done it himself, as a child. Had watched Daniel and Annie do it. Children didn’t need to be taught, it seemed instinctive to catch snowflakes with your tongue.
“There’s a technique, of course,” said Morin in a serious voice, as though he’d studied it. “You have to close your eyes, otherwise the snow gets in them, and stick out your tongue.”
There was a pause and the Chief Inspector knew the young agent was sitting, bound to the chair, his head tilted back, his eyes closed, his tongue out.
Catching snowflakes.
“Now,” agreed Gamache and after bending down to
release Henri, he walked to the sofa and sat before the laptop.
“I found the site.” Émile sat and looked over at Armand in profile. The trim beard suited the man, now that Émile had gotten used to it. Gamache’s eyes were steady, staring at the screen, then he turned and looked directly at his mentor.
“Merci.”
Émile paused, taken by surprise. “What for?”
“For not leaving me.”
Émile reached out and touched Gamache on the arm, then clicked the button and the video started to play.
Beauvoir stared at the screen. As he suspected, the images were cobbled together from the tiny cameras attached to the headsets of each Sûreté officer. What he hadn’t expected was the clarity. He’d thought it’d be grainy, hard to distinguish the players, but it was clear.
As were their voices.
“Officer down!” Gamache cal ed above the gunfire.
“Go, go, go,” Beauvoir shouted, pointing to a gunman on the gal ery above. Rapid fire shots, the camera swinging wildly, then dropping. Then another view, of the officer on the ground. And blood.
“Officer down,” shouted one of the team. “Help him.”
Two forms moved forward, automatic weapons firing, laying down cover for a third. Someone grabbing the downed officer, dragging him away.
Then a cut to a corridor, racing, chasing the gunmen down darkened hal s and into cavernous rooms.
Explosions, shouts.
The Chief leaning against a wal , wearing a black tactical vest, automatic rifle in his hands. Firing. It looked so strange to see Gamache with a gun, and using it.
“We have at least six shooters,” someone cal ed.
“I count ten,” said Gamache, his voice clipped, precise, clear. “Two down. That leaves eight. Five on the floor above, three down here. Where’re the medics?”
“Coming,” came Agent Lacoste’s voice. “Thirty seconds away.”
“We need a target alive,” the Chief ordered. “Take one alive.”
Al hel was breaking loose as bul ets slammed into wal s, into bodies, into the floor and ceiling. Everything became gray, the air fil ed with dust and bul ets.
Shouts and screams. The Chief issuing orders as they pushed the gunmen from one room into another.
Cornering them.
Then Beauvoir saw himself.
He stepped out from the wal and shot. Then he saw himself stagger, and fal .
Hitting the floor.
“Jean-Guy!” the Chief yel ed.
He saw himself splayed on the ground, legs col apsed beneath him. Unmoving.
Gamache ran, cal ing, “Where are those medics!”
“Here, Chief, here,” cal ed Lacoste. “We’re coming.”
Gamache grabbed Beauvoir’s jacket, dragging him behind the wal , shots ringing out. Now, with the sounds of explosions al round, the scene was suddenly intimate. The Chief’s worried face, in close up, staring down.
Armand Gamache watched, unblinking, though al he wanted to do was look away. Close his eyes, cover his ears, curl into a bal .
He could smel again the acrid gunpowder, the burning, the concrete dust. He could hear the violent report of the weapons. Feel the rifle in his own hands, pounding out bul ets. And weapons firing at him.
Bang, bang, bang, exploding al round. The bul ets hitting and bouncing, ricocheting, thudding. The riot of sensations. It was near impossible to think, to focus.
And for an instant he felt again the jolt of seeing Beauvoir hit.
On the screen he saw himself staring down at Beauvoir, searching his face. Feeling for a pulse. The camera catching not just the events, but the sensations, the feelings. The anguish in Gamache’s face.
“Jean-Guy?” he cal ed and the Inspector’s eyes fluttered and opened, then rol ed closed.
Bul ets splayed their position and the Chief ducked over Beauvoir, pul ing him further behind the wal and propping him up. He opened Jean-Guy’s vest, his eyes sweeping down the Inspector’s torso, stopping at the wound. The blood. Ripping open a pocket in his own vest he brought out a bandage and pressed it into Beauvoir’s hand then pressed the hand to the wound.
Leaning forward he whispered in Beauvoir’s ear.
“Jean-Guy, you have to hold your hand there, can you do it?”
Beauvoir’s eyes fluttered open again, fighting for consciousness.
“Stay with me,” the Chief commanded. “Can you stay conscious?”
Beauvoir nodded.
“Good.” Gamache looked up, at the fighting ahead and overhead, then looked back down. “Medics are on their way. Lacoste’s coming, she’l be here in a moment.” He paused and did something not meant to be seen by anyone else, and now seen by mil ions.
He kissed Beauvoir on the forehead. Then smoothing Beauvoir’s hair, he left.
Beauvoir watched the screen through his fingers clutched to his face, his eyes wide. He’d expected the video to have captured, imperfectly, the events. It hadn’t occurred to him it would also capture how it felt.
The fear and confusion. The shock, the pain. The searing pain as he clutched at his abdomen. And the loneliness.
On the screen he saw his own face watching, pleading, as Gamache left him. Bleeding and alone.