Out the window he watched the Chief Inspector toss his bag into the back of the car.
* * *
Chief Inspector Gamache closed the back door to the car and turned round, watching Ruth and Brian.
Then someone else came into his field of vision.
Olivier walked slowly as though approaching a landmine. He paused just once, then kept going, stopping only when he reached the bench, and Ruth.
She didn’t move, but continued to stare into the sky.
“She’ll sit there forever, of course,” said Peter, coming up beside Gamache. “Waiting for something that won’t happen.”
Gamache turned to him. “You don’t think Rosa will come back?”
“No, I don’t. And neither do you. There’s no kindness in false hope.” His voice was hard.
“You aren’t expecting a miracle today?” Gamache asked.
“Are you?”
“Always. And I’m never disappointed. I’m about to go home to the woman I love, who loves me. I do a job I believe in with people I admire. Every morning when I swing my legs out of bed I feel like I walk on water.” Gamache looked Peter in the eyes. “As Brian said last night, sometimes drowning men are saved.”
As they watched, Olivier sat on the bench and joined Ruth and Brian staring up at the sky. Then he took off his blue cardigan and draped it over Ruth’s shoulders. The old poet didn’t move. But after a moment she spoke.
“Thank you,” she said. “Numb nuts.”
* * *
Eleven numbers.
The phone was ringing. Jean Guy almost hung up. His heart was beating so hard he thought for sure he’d never hear if anyone answered. And probably pass out if they did.
“Hello?” he managed. “Annie?”
* * *
Armand Gamache watched Peter Morrow drive slowly along du Moulin, and out of Three Pines.
As he turned back to the village he saw Ruth get to her feet. She was staring into the distance. And then he heard it. A far cry. A familiar cry.
Ruth searched the skies, a veined and bony hand at her throat clutching the blue cardigan.
The sun broke through a small crack in the clouds. The embittered old poet turned her face to the sound and the light. Straining to see into the distance, something not quite there, not quite visible.
And in her weary eyes there was a tiny dot. A glint, a gleam.
ALSO BY LOUISE PENNY
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
A TRICK OF THE LIGHT. Copyright © 2011 by Three Pines Creations, Inc. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.minotaurbooks.com
Excerpt from “Up” from
by Margaret Atwood. Copyright © 1995. Published by McClelland & Stewart in Canada, and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company in the United States. Used with permission of the author and her publishers (in their respective territories) and the author’s agent, Curtis Brown Group Ltd., London, acting on behalf of Margaret Atwood. All rights reserved.
Excerpts from page 82 of the book
