The Nature of the Beast (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #11) - Louise Penny Page 0,17
glance, Armand took in the position of the bike, the ruts in the road, the broken bushes and bent grass. The placement of rocks. The stark detail imprinted itself forever in his mind.
Then Armand slid down the ditch, through the long grass and bushes that had hidden Laurent and his bike. Behind him he could hear Olivier and Gabri speaking to Al. Offering comfort.
But Laurent’s father was beyond comfort. Beyond hearing or seeing. He was senseless in a senseless world.
Evie was clinging to Laurent, her body enfolding his. Rocking him. Her mousy brown hair had escaped the elastic and fell in strands in front of her face, forming a veil. Hiding her face. Hiding his.
Gamache had been at the scene of enough accidents to know when someone was beyond help. But still he reached out and felt the boy’s cold neck.
Evie’s keening turned into a hum, and for a moment he thought it was Laurent. It was the same tune the boy had hummed two days earlier when Armand had driven him home.
Old man look at my life, twenty-four and there’s so much more.
From behind them, up the embankment and on the road, came a gasp so loud it drowned out the humming.
One gasp, then a heave. And another heave. As Al Lepage fought for breath through a throat clogged with grief.
Under the wretched sounds, Armand heard Olivier calling for an ambulance. Others had arrived, forming a semicircle around Al. Unsure what to do with such overwhelming grief.
And then Al dropped to his knees and slowly lowered his forehead to the dirt. He brought his thick arms up over his gray head and locked his hands together until he looked like a stone, a boulder in the road.
Armand turned back to Evie. The rocking had stopped. She too had petrified. She looked like one of the bodies excavated from the ruins of Pompeii, trapped forever in the moment of horror.
There was nothing Armand could do for either of them. So he did something for himself. He reached out and took Laurent’s hand, holding it in both of his, unconsciously trying to warm it. He stayed with them until the ambulance came. It arrived with haste and a siren. And drove off slowly. Silently.
A little while later Reine-Marie and Armand drew the curtains of their home, to keep out the sunshine. They unplugged the phone. They carefully took the burrs off a patient Henri. Then in the dark and quiet of their living room they sat down and wept.
* * *
“I’m sorry, patron,” said Jean-Guy. “I know how much you cared for him.”
“You didn’t have to come down,” said Gamache, turning from the front door to walk back into their home. “We could’ve spoken on the phone.”
“I wanted to bring you this personally, rather than email it.”
Gamache looked at what Jean-Guy held in his hand.
“Merci.”
Jean-Guy placed the manila file on the coffee table in front of the sofa.
“According to the local Sûreté, it was an accident. Laurent was riding his bike home, down the hill, and he hit a rut. You know what that road’s like. They figure he was going at a good clip and the impact must’ve thrown him over his handlebars and into the ditch. I’m not sure if you saw the rocks nearby.”
Gamache nodded and rubbed his large hand over his face, trying to wipe away the weariness. He and Reine-Marie had caught a few hours’ sleep then gotten up to the sound of rain pelting against the windowpanes.
It was now late afternoon and Jean-Guy had driven down from Montréal with the preliminary report on Laurent’s death.
“I did see them. This’s fast work,” said Gamache, putting on his reading glasses and opening the file.
“Preliminary,” Jean-Guy said, joining him on the sofa.
It was pouring outside now. A chilly rain that got into the bones. A fire was lit in the hearth and embers popped and burst from the logs. But the men, heads together, were oblivious to the cheerfulness nearby.
“If you look here.” Beauvoir leaned in and pointed to a line in the police report. “The coroner says he was gone as soon as he hit the ground. He didn’t…”
He didn’t lie there, in pain. As it got darker. And colder.
Laurent, all of nine years of age, didn’t die frightened, wondering where they were.
Jean-Guy saw Gamache give one curt nod, his lips tightening. There wasn’t much comfort to be found in what had happened. He’d take