A Better Man (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #15) - Louise Penny Page 0,46

and Beauvoir shone their beams along the old logging bridge. Then stopped. The two circles of light converged on a single spot.

A section of wooden handrail was missing. The side opened up to thin air.

Gamache pointed his beam down. Into the drop-off. Twenty feet below, maybe more, was the churning river. Grabbing, dragging, swallowing all that it could.

They played their lights over both shores, but there was nothing. Then Beauvoir’s beam stopped.

“Wait, I think I see something.”

Gamache swung his flashlight over to the far shore.

“What is it?” called Reine-Marie. “Have you found something?”

“No, it’s nothing,” said Beauvoir, relieved. “Just branches. They looked like a body for a moment.”

He moved his flashlight away. “We can’t search the bridge or shoreline right now. Too dangerous. It’ll have to wait ’til morning.”

But Gamache’s light hadn’t moved. In the beam, he saw what Beauvoir had seen. Tree branches, bobbing slightly in the current. Nothing more.

He could see why Beauvoir would mistake—

Opening his mouth, Gamache took a sharp breath, almost a gasp.

“What is it?” asked Beauvoir. “Do you see something?”

Once more he swung his light over, to join Gamache’s, until the two became one bright spot.

Beauvoir looked more closely at the clump of debris on the opposite bank. But still saw nothing. Certainly not anything that would explain the expression on his father-in-law’s face.

It was one of surprise. Shock, even.

“Vivienne’s not here,” Gamache said, then looked at Beauvoir. “But I think I know where she is.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The two men ran along the path, the river on one side, the forest on the other.

Jean-Guy skidded once and went down on one knee in the mud. Armand grabbed his jacket and hauled him to his feet.

And then they continued on. Their flashlights bobbing wildly ahead of them, illuminating trees, path, rocks, river.

They didn’t have far to go. Just to the bend in the river.

When they’d arrived back in Three Pines, they’d taken Carl Tracey to the bistro, where they found Olivier and Gabri, now that the danger of flooding had passed.

“Keep him here,” Gamache had instructed them. “Billy will stay with you. Homer?”

“At your place,” Olivier said. “Clara and Myrna took him there hoping he’d get some sleep. They’re staying with him.”

“What time is it?” asked Reine-Marie.

“Two thirty,” said Gabri.

“That late?”

“That early,” he said. “The wee hours, as Ruth calls it.”

“Where is she, by the way?”

“She went home. Had to wee.”

Reine-Marie glanced at Tracey. He was in the far corner, where he’d been placed by Jean-Guy. Far away from the warmth and soft light of the fireplace.

Then she turned to Armand. “I’ll make sure Homer doesn’t come over here. You go.”

And Armand and Jean-Guy did.

Even though both men knew there was no need to rush, still they ran. Down the path. Beside the wall of sandbags. They ran behind the general store, the boulangerie, past the back of the bistro and the bookstore. The Bella Bella on one side, forest on the other.

And then they were there.

Gamache was panting and holding his flashlight out in front of him with both hands, like a gun. Aiming the beam, steadying it as he stood beside Beauvoir.

Their lights, pointed in the same direction, merged.

And then they saw it. Her.

Gamache had been there earlier, when he and Olivier had checked the river levels.

They hadn’t come quite this far, but still, he’d seen it then as he’d leaned out. Olivier holding on to him.

The growing dam.

He’d noted the pale tree limbs and leaves bobbing up and down in the current. Trapped in the broken ice and debris that was forming.

He’d hesitated, trying to get a closer look. But Olivier’s grip had been slipping, and he was pulled away.

Now he was back. And he saw, in the bright circle of light, his mistake.

At the logging bridge, Beauvoir had momentarily taken trees for a body. And in that moment, Armand Gamache realized he’d done the same thing, only in reverse.

He’d mistaken a body for trees.

Now he looked once again at the tangle of ice and tree limbs. Debris and detritus picked up by the Rivière Bella Bella as it rushed down from the mountains.

Here was Vivienne Godin.

This is where she’d come to rest.

Her dark hair, like leaves, floated on the surface, moving with the current. Her pale arms and legs. Limbs. Now so clearly human.

Armand Gamache crossed himself, just as Beauvoir shoved his flashlight into Gamache’s hands.

“What’re you doing?”

“What does it look like?” Beauvoir stripped off his coat. “I’m going to get her.”

“You can’t.” Gamache placed himself between Beauvoir and the Bella Bella and