“Well, what?”
“Why is it clear Madame Arsenault wasn’t killed here?”
“I don’t know. Why?”
But Gamache just shook his head and looked out the window at the impenetrable forest, and Beauvoir settled into a silent huff. He was clearly being sent back to the basement.
He should have been so lucky.
CHAPTER 5
They’d taken their seats in the increasingly warm, increasingly stuffy auditorium.
Jean-Guy had arrived and was sitting, perspiring, on the other side of Reine-Marie. His knee bounced up and down. He might still get to the barbecue in time for a burger. Or two. If they started soon.
Though he knew his agitation had very little to do with the burgers. That was a distraction, a counterirritant, so he didn’t have to think about why they were there. And who else would be.
The hubbub slowly died down, then a stir could be heard as those at the back of the room got to their feet. Like a wave at a hockey game, though far more polite and contained, the audience rose row by row as the Chancellor and President of the Université de Montréal, as the professors and board of governors and honored guests, entered in procession.
They wore flowing black robes and caps, some of which were stiff and covered in silk, some velvety soft and floppy.
What would look ludicrous out on the street was impressive here.
The procession was solemn. Reflecting the importance of this day.
After they’d taken their places on the stage, the President nodded and the next procession began. This one was far different. Friends and family members, already on their feet, began applauding, unable to contain their excitement.
Some whistled, some shouted names. No doubt embarrassing, and secretly delighting, the young woman or man. Phones were held high, recording the event. To be shown later to friends and relatives who hoped the dinner was delicious enough to warrant having to watch.
The procession became a parade, a celebration, as graduates in their caps and gowns entered the hall in alphabetical order, to cheers from relieved and a few privately surprised parents.
Watching this, Jean-Guy, despite the dark stains under his armpits and the rumble in his stomach and his slight foreboding, could not contain a smile. One that grew as more young people arrived.
Their joy was infectious.
He thought of the day he and Annie would rise up and applaud as Honoré entered just such an auditorium. Idola never would, of course. But she had other gifts. Not everyone was cut out for academia.
He looked across Reine-Marie, to Armand. He actually looked like he might cry. Was that possible? He was certainly gripped with a strong emotion, probably never having dreamed this day would come.
Armand and Reine-Marie craned their necks to find her in the crowd. Fiona Arsenault.
And then, as Jean-Guy watched, Armand’s expression changed. It first froze and then the smile melted away, leaving something cold and flinty behind.
Jean-Guy followed Armand’s eyes, though he knew what, who, he’d find at the other end.
And sure enough. There he was. A young man, still handsome, perhaps even more handsome than when Beauvoir had first seen him. The same day he’d first met the Chief Inspector.
The young man was looking past the stream of joyful graduates. Past the cheering and applauding parents. He paused briefly to look at Jean-Guy and smiled in recognition before moving on. Past Reine-Marie.
Sam Arsenault’s stare landed on Chief Inspector Gamache, and stayed there.
“Turn right here,” said Gamache.
“But the detachment’s that way.” Agent Beauvoir jerked his head to the left.
“We’re not going to the detachment.”
“Then where … Oh.”
He drove in silence while Gamache reread the police report. Familiarizing himself with the family. With all those who’d been interviewed in an effort to find the missing woman.
It didn’t take long.
There was no mention of the children’s father or Clotilde’s partner. No mention of relatives or even friends. Neighbors were interviewed, but that was about all.
Clotilde Arsenault and her children had moved to the community six years earlier from a town down south.
She was a known prostitute and addict. But not, it seemed, a dealer.
Then he reread the news stories, which were, shamefully, more detailed and enlightening than the official police report. But even they had scant solid information.
No one knew anything, though he sensed they were not trying very hard. No one had seen her the day she disappeared. Or admitted—Gamache automatically inserted the qualifier—to seeing her.
There was about these interviews the whiff of wishful thinking. That Clotilde Arsenault was indeed gone. Forever.
The ambivalence was slightly softened by sympathy for her children. Though even then not as much as Gamache would have thought.
The sister and brother, ages thirteen and ten, respectively, lived alone with their mother. They’d gone to the police saying she hadn’t come home. She’d been away overnight before but never without telling them, and never two nights in a row.
They were worried.
The girl, Fiona, looked younger than her age. The boy, Samuel, looked older than his years.
Gamache searched the police report to see who was looking after the children in their mother’s absence but couldn’t find a name.
“Captain Dagenais, it’s Gamache,” he said into his phone. “Can you tell me who’s staying with Clotilde Arsenault’s children? Yes, we’ve positively identified her. I’m on my way over there now. I need to know—I’m sorry?”
Beauvoir glanced over at the Chief Inspector. Gamache’s eyes had hardened, his face grown rigid as he struggled to contain his outrage. To not let his rage out.
“Are you telling me that two children came to you about their missing mother, and you sent them home alone?” There was silence as Gamache listened, his knuckles turning white as he gripped his phone. “I don’t care that the girl is mature. She’s still a child. Her mother’s missing. Someone should’ve been found to stay with them, a friend, a state-appointed guardian, one of your agents. We’ll discuss this later. Send someone now. Then put in an urgent call to Child Protection.”
He hung up, cutting off the tiny, whiny voice.
“He’s a real—” Beauvoir began.
“That’s enough, Agent Beauvoir,” snapped Gamache, and looked out at the gloom. The sun set early in November, and even earlier this far north. The light swallowed by the mountains and ancient forests.
“We’re here.” The car turned into a small, single-story home.
The vehicle was barely stopped when Gamache got out and walked quickly up the front path, righting a rusted and dented garbage can blocking the way.
While part of Gamache wished he could give these children a few more moments of blissful ignorance, a few more minutes when their mother might still be alive, the Chief Inspector knew that false hope was not a kindness.
If they were watching, and he suspected they were, they’d have seen the car drive up, and they’d know. They probably knew, deep down, when they’d made the missing person report.
Their mother was not coming home.
He needed to put them out of that misery, and into the next. A loss like this was a progression of miseries, like stepping-stones. Until they reached the other side. The new continent. Where the terrible reality lived, and the sun never fully came out again. But where, with time and help, they might find acceptance and, with that, peace.
He knew, from experience, that there was no avoiding this pain. In a sense, they were fortunate. Their mother had been found and, as horrific as that was, the not knowing would have been worse.