He reread the interviews with the men arrested in the pedophilia sweep and reviewed, yet again, the evidence found in the house. Spending extra time with the stickers beside the names.
Finally, dropping his head and closing his eyes, he brought one hand up to his forehead. And massaged. Then, no longer able to avoid it, he gave the rest of the evidence to the handwriting expert.
Clotilde’s car had been found in the possession of one of those men. The one with the unicorn beside his name. The DNA evidence found in the vehicle proved it was how Clotilde’s body got to the lake.
The man had already been arrested, but now Gamache had another talk with him. And with Dagenais.
Only then was he ready to speak to Clotilde’s children.
First, though, since it was going to be delicate and emotional, he called the provincial guardian and the counselor who’d been sent to help the children. He also spoke to the doctor who’d examined them. Her report was both predictable and devastating.
Finally, he called Agent Moel, advising her that he and Chernin would be going over to talk to Fiona and Sam.
“May I make a suggestion, patron?” Hardye Moel had spent the days and nights since the discovery of their mother’s body with the children. She knew them well.
“Of course.”
“Any talk of her killer needs to be handled with care. I know you’re aware of that, Chief, but there is something you can do that might help.”
“What’s that?”
“Get Agent Beauvoir down so he can be there when you speak to them.”
Gamache knew that Beauvoir and Sam had, with his permission, kept in touch. With the understanding that if the boy said anything important to the case, Beauvoir would pass it along.
“Agent Beauvoir seems to have made a connection with Sam, which for that boy is pretty remarkable,” Moel explained. “I think Sam sees Beauvoir as a sort of big brother, maybe even a father figure. He trusts him. I think, if you’ll forgive me, he sees you as an authority figure. Someone likely to judge and punish him. He doesn’t like or trust you.”
Gamache heard this without surprise. He’d seen the expression on Sam’s face, had felt the hostility radiating off the boy. He suspected Agent Moel was understating Sam Arsenault’s feelings toward him.
“Having Agent Beauvoir here,” Moel continued, “might make it less traumatic.”
Gamache wasn’t so sure about that, given what was about to happen, but anything that might help the children was worth doing.
He’d handed the stuffed toy and model plane to Agent Moel to give to them. And he’d bought another model for Sam to make and a packet of stickers for Fiona. He wondered if putting fairies and unicorns on things acted as a kind of charm? The way others use incense and a crucifix? Was it a way to ward off evil?
How much worse would the girl’s life have been without the help of angels and fairies and unicorns? And yet, the cheery stickers had ended up in that terrible tally of abuse.
He sent for Agent Beauvoir and put off the meeting with Fiona and Sam until Beauvoir could arrive the next day.
It turned out to be a disastrous decision. One that would have consequences for years to come.
That night the children got by the Sûreté officer guarding them, mostly because she was looking for external trouble, not runaways. It took the combined efforts of the Montréal police and the Sûreté, as well as emergency and social services, to find them. And even then, they only found Sam.
He’d been badly beaten and left for dead in a back alley in the inner city. When he’d come to in the hospital, Gamache was there. Agent Beauvoir was holding the boy’s hand.
It seemed the boy’s injuries, while bad, were not as life-threatening as they appeared. It was mostly cuts and bruising around his head where he’d been hit, repeatedly, with a brick.
Sam Arsenault, tiny and vulnerable in the big hospital bed, roused. Jean-Guy Beauvoir bent over him and whispered that he was safe. That it would be okay.
Armand listened, and was glad he’d made one good decision, and that was not to tell Agent Beauvoir what they knew.
That it would not be okay.
Sam’s bruised and bloodshot eyes shifted from Jean-Guy to Gamache. And remained there. And Armand knew then with certainty that Sam was not safe. Never was. Probably never would be.
When questioned, the boy refused to say who’d done that to him. Gamache found it interesting, even telling, that he didn’t say he didn’t know. He just wouldn’t say.
He also refused to tell them where Fiona was. While others were afraid she was dead, Gamache himself, though worried, never actually believed that.
They found her a day later, hustling on boulevard de Maisonneuve. Her first question was “Is Sam okay?”
“He’s recovering in hospital,” Gamache said, watching her closely.
“From what? What’s happened to him?” Her voice rose. Her panic sounded genuine. But Gamache knew that her entire life had been an act. A magic trick, meant to misdirect, to deceive. To hide what was really happening inside that home. Inside their lives. Desperate for people to see the happy stickers and not the horrors.
Fiona was an accomplished liar. What she did not do well, if at all, was tell the truth. Though not for the first time Gamache wondered if she and Sam could even tell the difference.
When Sam was well enough, he rejoined his sister at the home in Montréal where they were staying. Gamache, Beauvoir, and the counselor sat in the kitchen with the children, mugs of hot chocolate and tea in front of them. Inspector Chernin and Agent Moel sat in the next room, where they could follow what was happening but not overwhelm Fiona and Sam.
“How are you feeling?” Gamache started. His voice soft. Calm and calming.
“Okay,” they said, as one.
Gamache looked at Sam. The boy’s face was swollen and bruised from the beating in the alley. There was a bandage on the side of his head.
“Are you sure?”
Sam just nodded, not meeting the Chief Inspector’s gaze.
“I know you’ve been asked this before, but I want to ask again. Is there anyone we should be calling? Any family?”
Sam shook his head, and Fiona said, “It’s just us.”
Gamache caught the eye of the counselor. They both knew this was a hallmark of abuse. Isolation.
Armand had planned to tell them something he rarely talked about. His own childhood. That he’d lost both parents suddenly when he was about Sam’s age.
He wanted to open up to them in hopes they’d relax and open up to him. It was, he admitted, slightly manipulative. But more than anything, Armand wanted Fiona and Sam to know that while shocking and devastating, it was possible to survive. And even, with help, be happy one day.
Behind the children, he could see into the neat living room of the cheerful house. There, on the coffee table, was the new model plane he’d given Sam. Already built.
Armand was glad. Daniel, his son, had also loved making models. They’d done quite a few together. The model he’d chosen for Sam had looked like a good one.
But now he hesitated to tell them about his parents, for a number of reasons, not least of which was that this was about their loss, their pain. Not his. Though there was another reason, one that was instinctive and indistinct.
Instead, he asked, “Why did you run away?”
They looked at each other, each waiting for the other to speak. Finally Fiona said, “We were bored.”
It was not the answer any of them expected, but upon reflection Gamache realized their lives had been, from the moment of waking to going to sleep, chaotic. Filled with violence, anxiety, danger, pain. Uncertainty. Drama. Activity. People.
It’s not that they liked it. It was all they knew.
A nice, comfortable, safe, and calm home was completely foreign. Perhaps even frightening. It allowed thoughts and feelings to surface.