Read Page 166

Thérèse Brunel saw one of the Sûreté officers emerge from the old schoolhouse. As she watched, he surveyed the village, then went into Emilie’s home, then over to the B and B. A minute or so later he emerged and opened the passenger doors of the SUV.

Superintendent Brunel heard the car door slam and watched as the agent looked around in frustration.Advertisement

He’s lost something, Thérèse Brunel thought, and she could guess at what. Or whom. They were looking for Beauvoir. Then he looked in her direction, his sharp eyes just glancing past hers before she jerked back against the wall.

“What is it?” Jérôme asked.

“He’s headed over here,” said Thérèse, and brought out her gun.

* * *

The agent started toward the line of businesses. The bistro and bookstore and bakery. It was possible Beauvoir had gone in one of them, to rest. Or pass out.

This would be easy, the agent knew.

He could feel his gun on his belt, but he knew what would be most effective was in his pocket. The baggie of pills Tessier had given him, each a little bullet to the brain.

The other agent was making the final arrangements in the schoolhouse, and all they needed now was Beauvoir.

But the officer hesitated. A few minutes earlier he’d noticed a large black woman and an old woman with a cane heading to the church.

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The same old woman who’d been talking to Beauvoir on the bench.

If Beauvoir was missing, she might know where he was.

He changed course and made for the church.

* * *

Armand Gamache parked beside the path into the woods. The one he and Gilles had forged just a few days earlier. It was freshly trodden, he could see.

He walked down the path, deeper and deeper into the forest. Toward the blind.

He saw Sylvain Francoeur first, standing at the base of the white pine. Then he looked up. Standing on the old wooden blind, beside the satellite dish, was Martin Tessier. Inspector Tessier, of the Serious Crimes division, was about to commit a very serious crime. He had an automatic trained on Chief Inspector Gamache.

Gamache stopped on the track, and wondered, fleetingly, if this was how the deer felt. He looked straight at Tessier and turned slightly toward him. Showing the marksman his chest. Daring him to pull the trigger.

If there was ever a time for that damned thing to collapse, thought Gamache, now was it.

But the blind held, and Tessier held him in his sights.

Gamache shifted his eyes to Francoeur and put his arms out at his sides.

The Chief Superintendent gestured and Tessier climbed rapidly and easily down the rickety ladder.

* * *

The agent entered the church and looked around. It appeared empty. Then he noticed the old woman, still in her gray cloth coat and tuque. She sat in a back pew. The large black woman sat in a front pew.

He stared into the corners but couldn’t see anyone.

“You there,” he said. “Who else is here?”

“If you’re talking to Ruth, you’re wasting your time,” said the woman at the front. She stood up and smiled at him. “She doesn’t speak French.”

She herself spoke to him in very good, though slightly accented, French.

“Can I help you?”

The agent walked down the aisle. “I’m looking for Inspector Beauvoir. You know him?”

“I do,” she said. “He’s been here before, with Chief Inspector Gamache.”

“Where is he now?”

“Beauvoir? I thought he was with you,” said Myrna.

“Why would I—”

But he didn’t get to finish his sentence. The muzzle of a Glock was thrust into the base of his skull and an expert hand reached in and took his gun from its holster.

He turned around. The elderly woman in the cloth coat and knitted tuque was holding a service revolver on him.

And she wasn’t old at all.

“Sûreté,” said Agent Nichol. “You’re under arrest.”

* * *

Jean-Guy Beauvoir was on the highway heading toward Montréal. Rosa sat beside him, and hadn’t made a sound. Nor had she stopped staring at him.

But Beauvoir kept his eyes forward. Moving further and further away from the village. He didn’t know what Francoeur and Tessier and the others had planned, and he didn’t want to know.

When he’d emerged from Three Pines his device had blipped, a few times. All messages from Lacoste. Wondering where he was.

Beauvoir knew what that meant. It meant Gamache was looking for him, probably to finish what he’d started the day before. But then he’d read her last message, sent across the system. pqdm.com