A Great Reckoning (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #12) - Louise Penny Page 0,126
sounds good.”
After arriving at the bistro, Gamache gestured to Olivier for two Scotches, then he and Gélinas wound their way through the tables toward the cadets. Once at the table, the cadets rose and Commander Gamache waved them to sit back down.
“Ruth said you’d like to speak to me,” Gamache said, smoothing his hair, disheveled from his tuque, and sitting down. “Is something wrong?”
The four young people looked upset. Two of them pale, two of them flushed.
“We were just arguing,” said Huifen. “Nothing new.”
“About what?” asked Gélinas, taking a seat.
“These two found Roof Trusses, or Notre-Dame-de-Douleur, or whatever it’s called,” said Huifen. “We gave up.”
“Hardly matters,” said Jacques. “There’s nothing there but snow. And maple syrup.”
“Sap,” said Nathaniel. “And there was something there.”
“What did you find?” asked Gamache, after thanking Olivier for the Scotches.
“The cemetery.” Nathaniel’s voice was eager now and his eyes bright.
“It was overgrown,” said Amelia. “But still there.”
“And?” asked Gamache.
Nathaniel shook his head. “No Antony Turcotte.”
“No Turcotte at all,” said Amelia.
Gamache sat back, surprised. Considering.
“Didn’t the toponymie man say Turcotte had been buried there?”
“Yes. It was even in the Canadian Encyclopedia.”
Gamache leaned forward again and, putting his elbows on the table, he folded his hands together and rested his chin on them. And stared out at the darkness, the snowflakes furious in the bistro light.
“Could the gravestone have fallen over or been buried?” he asked.
“It’s possible,” Amelia admitted. “But it’s not a big cemetery and most of the stones were fairly easy to find. We can go back tomorrow and take a closer look.”
“But why bother?” asked Jacques. “He’s just trying to keep us busy. Can’t you see that? How can it possibly matter? Besides, he’s not part of the investigation anymore.”
“And you’re not Sûreté officers,” snapped Gamache. “You’re cadets and I’m your commander. And you’ll do as I say. I’m losing patience with you, young man. The only reason I tolerate your insubordination is because I think someone messed with your head. Told you all sorts of things that aren’t true.”
“So you’re here to reeducate me, is that it?” demanded Jacques.
“Yes, as a matter of fact. You’re very close to graduation, and then what?”
“I’ll be a Sûreté officer.”
“Will you? Things have changed at the academy and you’re not changing with them. You’re stuck. Frozen. Perhaps even petrified.” Gamache lowered his voice, though the rest of the table could still hear. “The time has come, Jacques, to decide if you are going to move forward, or not.”
“You have no idea who I am, and what I’ve done,” Jacques hissed back.
“What have you done?” Gamache demanded, holding the young man’s eyes. “Tell me now.”
Huifen reached out. The warning touch. Again. Subtle, but Gamache saw it.
And the moment passed when Jacques might have said something.
Gamache glared at Huifen, then turned to Nathaniel and Amelia. “You’ve done well.”
“What should we do now?” Nathaniel asked.
“Now you join us for dinner,” said Gamache, getting up. “You must be hungry.”
“Us too?” asked Huifen, also rising along with Jacques.
The Commander looked at them and gave a brusque nod before going to the long wooden bar and paying for the cadets’ food and drinks for that day, and inviting Olivier to join them.
* * *
“You okay?” asked Annie.
Jean-Guy was rubbing her swollen feet and both were on the sofa, watching the news. Though Jean-Guy was clearly distracted.
“Just thinking.”
“About what?”
He hesitated, not wanting to upset Annie with ideas that seemed at one moment crazy and the next perfectly plausible.
“Do you think your father could have ever…”
“Oui?”
She took a huge bite of the éclair she’d been having as an hors d’oeuvre.
Now, looking into his wife’s unsuspecting gaze, it seemed crazy to Jean-Guy. Armand Gamache would never—
“Nothing.”
“What is it?” She lowered the éclair to a plate. “Tell me. Is Dad in trouble? Is something wrong?”
There, he’d upset her after all, and he knew she wouldn’t let it go until he told her.
“There’s a senior officer from the RCMP who’s joined us as an independent observer and he seems to think your father might’ve—”
“Had something to do with the murder?” asked Annie.
“Well, no, not really, it’s just, well—”
She swung her legs off his lap and sat up. Annie the lawyer was in the building.
“Is there any evidence?” she asked.
Jean-Guy sighed. “Circumstantial, at best.”
“And what’s the worst?”
“Fingerprints.”
Annie’s brows shot up. She hadn’t expected that.
“Where?”
“On the murder weapon.”
“Jesus. Which was a revolver, right?”
“Your father said he never touched it, never even knew Leduc had it.”
“He wouldn’t allow it,” said Annie, her eyes narrowing in thought.