encased in concrete beneath the Literary and Historical Society, helping prop up the venerable Anglophone institution. Indeed, Renaud’s life was a mother lode of irony. Like the time he’d dug for Champlain on live television only to break through into the basement of a Chinese restaurant. Since Champlain had spent much of his life trying to find China it seemed, well, ironic. Or the time Renaud had opened a sealed coffin, once again convinced it was Champlain, only to have the pressurized contents explode into the atmosphere in a plume of missionary fervor. The Jesuit inside, turned to dust, was sent to the heavens, immortal. Though not the sort of immortality he’d prayed for or expected. The priest tumbled back to earth in raindrops, to join the food chain and end up in the breast milk of the native women he’d tried to wipe out.
Renaud himself had narrowly escaped a similar fate, coming within hours of forming the foundation of the Literary and Historical Society.
Armand Gamache had hoped that after the initial interviews his obligation to Elizabeth MacWhirter and the rest of the Lit and His would be over. But he now knew that wasn’t true. Renaud had demanded to meet the board, the board had refused, then they’d purged the incident from the minutes. When word got out there’d be hell to pay. And it would be the Anglos who had to pay it.
No, Gamache thought as he and Henri trudged out the gates, he couldn’t leave them. Not yet.
The snow had almost stopped and the temperature was dropping. There was no traffic, not a sound except Gamache’s feet squeaking on the snow.
It was three twenty in the morning.
Every day Gamache woke at about that time. At first he’d tried to get back to sleep, had stayed in bed, had fought it. But now, after weeks and weeks, he’d decided this was it, for now. Instead of fighting, he and Henri would get up quietly and go for a walk, first around their Montreal neighborhood and now here in Quebec City.
Gamache knew that in order to get through the day he needed this quiet time with his thoughts at night.
He needed this quiet time with the voice in his head.
“My father taught me to play the fiddle,” Agent Paul Morin said, in answer to Gamache’s question. “I was about four. We have some home video of it somewhere. My father and grandfather playing the fiddle behind me, and me in front wearing these great big sagging shorts, they look like diapers.” Morin laughed. “I had my little fiddle. My grandmother was on piano and my sister pretended to conduct. She was about three. She’s married now, you know, and expecting.”
Gamache turned left and walked through the darkened Carnaval site at the foot of the Plains of Abraham. A couple of guards watched but didn’t approach. Too cold for confrontation. Gamache and Henri wound along the pedestrian walk, past attractions that would be filled with excited kids and freezing parents in just a few hours. Then the stalls and temporary buildings and rides trailed off and they were walking through thin forest toward the infamous open field and the monument erected where the English General Wolfe fell, and died, on September 13, 1759.
Gamache scooped up a handful of snow and crushed it into a ball. Henri immediately dropped the tennis ball and danced around. The Chief cocked his arm, smiling at Henri, who suddenly crouched. Muscles tense. Waiting.
Then Gamache threw the snowball and Henri raced after it, catching it in mid-air. He was ecstatic for a moment then his jaws closed, the snow disintegrated and Henri landed, perplexed as always.
Gamache took the tennis ball encrusted with frozen saliva, put it in the Chuck-it and tossed. The brilliant yellow ball sailed into the darkness with the shepherd sailing after it.
The Chief Inspector knew every inch of the Champs-de-Bataille, in every season. He knew the changing face of the battlefield. Had stood there in spring and seen the daffodils, had stood there in summer and seen the picnickers, had stood there in winter and watched families cross-country ski and snowshoe, and he’d stood there in early autumn. On September 13. The exact day of the battle, when more than one thousand men had died or been wounded in an hour. He’d stood there and believed he heard the shouts, heard the shots, smelled the gunpowder, seen the men charging. He’d stood where he believed Général Montcalm had been when he realized the