gallery to sell, and presumably for more and more money. But dead?”
“If she was that good? The fewer paintings the better. A bidding war would ignite and the prices…”
Fortin looked to the ceiling.
Gamache had his answer. But was it the right question?
TWELVE
“What’s this?”
Clara stood beside the phone in the kitchen. The barbeque was on and Peter was outside poking steaks from the Bresee farm.
“What?” he called through the screen door.
“This.”
Clara walked outside and held up a piece of paper. Peter’s face fell.
“Oh, shit. Oh, my God, Clara, I completely forgot. In all the chaos of finding Lillian and all the interruptions—” He waved the prongs, then stopped.
Clara’s face, rather than softening as it had so often, had hardened. And in her hand she held his scribbled list of messages, of congratulations. He’d left it by the phone. Under the phone. Pinned there, for safe keeping. He’d been meaning to show it to her.
It had just slipped his mind.
From where she stood Clara could see the police tape, outlining a ragged circle in her garden. A hole. Where a life had ended.
But another hole now opened up, right where Peter stood. And she could almost see the yellow tape around him, encircling him. Swallowing him, as it had Lillian.
Peter stared at her, his eyes imploring her to understand. Begging her.
And then, as Clara watched, Peter seemed to disappear, leaving just an empty space where her husband had been.
* * *
Armand Gamache sat in his study at home, taking notes and speaking with Isabelle Lacoste.
“I’ve spoken to Inspector Beauvoir about this, and he suggested I call you as well, Chief. Most of the guests have been interviewed,” she said, down the phone line from Three Pines. “We’re getting a picture of the evening, but what isn’t in the picture is Lillian Dyson. We asked everyone, including the waiters. No one saw her.”
Gamache nodded. He’d been following her written reports all day. They were impressive as always. Clear, thorough. Intuitive. Agent Lacoste wasn’t afraid to follow her instinct. She wasn’t afraid to be wrong.
And that, the Chief knew, was a great strength.
It meant she’d be willing to explore dim alleys a lesser agent wouldn’t even see. Or, if they did, they’d dismiss as unlikely. A waste of time.
Where, he asked his agents, was a murderer likely to hide? Where it was obvious? Perhaps. But most of the time they were found in unexpected places. Inside unexpected personalities and bodies.
Down the dim alleys, most of them with pleasant veneers.
“What do you think it means that no one saw her at the party?” he asked.
Agent Lacoste was quiet for a moment. “Well, I wondered if she could’ve been killed somewhere else and her body brought into the Morrow garden. That would explain why no one saw her at either party.”
“And?”
“I spoke with the forensics team and that seems unlikely. They believe she died where she was found.”
“What are the other options?”
“Besides the obvious? That she was teleported there by aliens?”
“Besides that one.”
“I think she arrived and went directly to the Morrows’ garden.”
“Why?”
Now Isabelle Lacoste paused, walking slowly through the possibilities. Not being afraid to make a mistake, but not rushing to make one either.
“Why drive an hour and a half to a party then ignore it and make straight for a quiet garden?” she asked, musing out loud.
Gamache waited. He could smell the dinner Reine-Marie had prepared. A favorite pasta dish of fresh asparagus, pine nuts and goat cheese on fettuccini. It was almost ready.
“She was in the garden to meet someone,” said Lacoste at last.
“I wonder,” said Gamache. He had his reading glasses on and was making notes. They’d already been through the facts, all the forensic findings, the preliminary autopsy results, the witness interviews. Now they were on to interpretation.
