A Great Reckoning (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #12) - Louise Penny Page 0,96
loved it. They were born on it and buried in it.
Without les habitants there would be no Québec.
But he’d also used another word, a word charged with meaning for the Québécois. Their patrimoine. Their heritage. Their language, their culture, their inheritance. Their land.
“He lived in Montréal but decided to move down here, to the Townships,” said Bergeron. “He set up cartography offices around the province, but chose to map this area himself. I think he must’ve fallen in love with the Townships and its history.”
“Don’t you mean geography?” asked Amelia.
“They’re the same thing.” The middle-aged bureaucrat looked across his desk at her. “Antony Turcotte knew that you can’t separate history and geography.”
“I can,” muttered Amelia. “So could my teachers.”
“Then they were fools.” The bald statement was made all the more forceful by its simplicity. “A place’s history is decided by its geography. Is the terrain mountainous? If so, it’s harder to invade. The people are more independent, but also isolated. Is it surrounded by water? If so, it’s probably more cosmopolitan—”
“But easier to conquer, like Venice,” said Amelia, picking up on what he meant.
“Oui,” said Monsieur Bergeron, turning an approving eye on the Goth Girl. “Venice gave up trying to defend herself and decided to open her doors to all comers. As a result, it became a hub of commerce, of knowledge and art and music. Because of its position, geographically, it became a gateway. Geography decides if you’re the invaded or the invader.”
“Look at the Romans,” said Amelia. “And later the British.”
“Oui, c’est ca,” said Monsieur Bergeron, looking slightly manic now. “Britain was invaded over and over, until it realized its weakness was also its strength. Britannia turned her efforts to ruling the waves and so, in turn, ruled the world. That wouldn’t have happened had it not been an island nation.”
“Geography is history,” said Amelia, taken with the idea. She loved history, but had given absolutely no thought to geography.
“But what does that mean for Québec?” Huifen asked.
“Stuck between two powerful forces?” asked Monsieur Bergeron. “The Americans to the south and the British to the west and east? There was no defense militarily. But one way to defend the patrimoine was to map it and name it.”
“And claim it,” said Huifen.
“There’re earlier maps, of course. Most famously, Champlain’s maps of New France and David Thompson’s maps. Antony Turcotte is less well known, but more beloved, because he didn’t make maps for governments or conquest or commerce. He made them for the people.”
He looked at the paper, as though the map was the man.
“This”—his hand hovered over the map—“isn’t one of his official maps, of course. It looks like one he made for fun. It actually looks like an orienteering map.”
“We think so too,” said Huifen. “You know about orienteering?”
“Of course. But this is different from even those old maps.”
“How so?”
“Well, the snowman, for one thing.” Monsieur Bergeron smiled as he looked at it. “This looks like a sort of hybrid. A real map showing all the topography though without place names, and an orienteering map, showing the man-made structures like stone walls and mills. But then there’re those whimsical touches, like the three little pine trees that appear to be playing. It must have been a map made for his own amusement.”
Monsieur Bergeron leaned in even closer, as though the paper might whisper to him.
“Or maybe it was made for his son.” Huifen laid her iPhone on the desk. “We think this is him.”
The stained-glass boy appeared to be walking into the map.
Monsieur Bergeron shifted his gaze to the iPhone. “A remarkable expression. Where was this taken?”
“It’s part of a stained-glass window, a memorial window, for those killed in the First World War,” said Amelia.
Monsieur Bergeron grunted. “Poor boy.” Then he looked up. “What makes you think this is Turcotte’s son?”
Huifen enlarged the image and Bergeron’s eyes widened when he saw the map just sticking out from the soldier’s knapsack.
“Mais, c’est extraordinaire,” said Monsieur Bergeron, then he shook his head. “When you think of the lives lost for inches of soil.”
He tsked three times, disapproving of war and the slaughter of youth.
Amelia got up and walked to the huge map behind him. Her finger followed the roads and rivers, and stopped in a valley.
She turned. “There’s no Three Pines.”
“There must be,” said Huifen, going over. “I can see it being forgotten by the GPS and commercial maps, but this’s the official map, right?”
Monsieur Bergeron got up and turned to face it. “If it’s not here, it doesn’t exist.”