‘No, not at all.’ Agent Lemieux closed his notebook. ‘We were just having a small talk. How are you?’
‘Not too bad.’ She turned to Monsieur Beliveau. ‘How are you doing? I hear you had dinner with Clara and Peter last night.’
‘I did. It was a comfort. I’m doing exactly as you might expect.’
‘It’s a sad time,’ said Myrna, deciding not to try to jolly Monsieur Beliveau out of his rightful sorrow. ‘I’ve come for a paper.
‘There’s quite a call for that paper today.’
‘There’s a strange article in it.’ She wondered whether she should keep it quiet but decided that horse had bolted. She paid for the paper and flipped through the pages until she found the city column.
All three leaned over it then all three rose, like devotees after ancient prayers. Two were upset. One was ecstatic.
Just then a quacking sound took them to the swinging screen door and out onto the veranda.
TWENTY-THREE
‘Monsieur Sandon,’ Inspector Beauvoir called for the gazillionth time. He was getting a little worried. He was deep in the woods outside St-Remy. Odile had told him where to find Gilles’s truck and his trail through the woods. The truck had been easy. Beauvoir had only gotten lost twice on the way to this cul-de-sac, but finding the man was proving more difficult. The trees were just beginning to bud so his view wasn’t obscured by the leaves, but it was heavy going what with downed trees, swamps, and rocks. It wasn’t his natural habitat. He scrambled over slimy stones and stumbled through mud puddles, hidden under a layer of decaying autumn leaves. His fine leather shoes, not sensible he knew but he couldn’t yet lower himself to rubber, were filled with water, mud and sticks.
Odile, as he’d stepped into the fresh air from the cloying aromas of the organic store, had shouted a phrase that still resonated in his ears.
‘Watch out for bears,’ she’d sung cheerily after him.
He’d picked up a stick when he’d entered the woods. To knock the bear on the nose. Or was that sharks? Well, he was ready either way. The bear could always use the stick as a toothpick after eating him.
He had a gun but he’d been so thoroughly trained by Gamache not to ever take it out unless he was certain to use it, it remained holstered.
Beauvoir had watched enough news reports about bear attacks to know that black bears weren’t generally dangerous, unless you got between mother and child. He also knew they were dangerous if startled. So screaming ‘Monsieur Sandon’ had taken on a dual purpose.
‘Monsieur Saaaandonnnn.’
‘I’m here,’ came the sudden response. Beauvoir stopped and looked around.
‘Where?’ he yelled.
‘Over here. I’ll find you.’
Now Beauvoir heard footsteps through the autumn leaves, and the cracking of twigs. But he saw no man. The sound grew louder and still no man. It was like the approach of a ghost.
Damn, shouldn’t have thought that, thought Beauvoir, feeling his anxiety rise. I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe in ghosts.
‘Who are you?’
Beauvoir turned round and on the top of a slight rise stood a massive man. Broad-chested, powerful and tall. He wore a shaggy knitted hat and his red beard stuck out in all directions. He was covered in mud and bark.
Yeti. Big Foot. There was some old creature his grandmother had told him about. The Green Man. Half man, half tree. This was him.
Beauvoir gripped his stick.
‘Inspector Beauvoir, Surete du Quebec.’
It had never sounded more feeble. Then the Green Man laughed. Not a malicious, ‘I’m going to tear you limb from limb’ laugh. But a laugh of genuine amusement. He came down the small hill, winding gracefully between old growth trees and saplings.
‘Thought you were a tree talking to me just now.’ He put out his massive, filthy hand and Beauvoir took it. He too laughed. It was hard not to feel cheerful in this man’s company. ‘Though they’re generally a little less obvious when they speak.’
‘The trees?’
‘Oh, yes. But you’re probably not here to talk about them. Or to them.’ Sandon reached out and put his hand squarely on a massive trunk beside him. Not leaning against it, but as a sort of touch-stone. Even without Odile’s obscure comments Beauvoir could tell this man had a singular relationship with the woods. If Darwin had concluded man evolved from trees, Gilles Sandon would be the missing link.
‘That’s true. I’m investigating the murder of Madeleine Favreau. I believe—’ Beauvoir stopped. The large man in front of him had taken a step back as though Beauvoir had physically pushed him.
‘Her murder? What are you saying?’
‘I’m sorry, I assumed you knew. You do know she’s dead.’
