the door, all cocky and swaggering, but being careful to tell his cat he loved her, just in case.
Watching Chief Inspector Gamache, eyes closed, head tilted back exposing his throat, so trusting, Lemieux wondered just for an instant. Had what he’d been told about Gamache really been true? Once, not so long ago, Lemieux had worshipped Gamache. On his first visit to headquarters as a recruit he’d seen the famous man striding down the hall, junior officers in tow, decoding the most intricate and brutal of cases. And yet he’d had time to smile and nod a greeting. They’d studied his cases. They’d watched and cheered as Armand Gamache had brought down the dirty Superintendent Arnot. And saved the Sûreté.
But things weren’t always as they seemed.
‘Nothing.’ Beauvoir brushed by Lemieux into the living room. Gamache opened his eyes and looked at the two men, his gaze resting on Lemieux. Their eyes held.
Then Gamache blinked and he rocked himself out of the chair.
‘You’ve had enough rest. Time to work. Agent Lemieux, please stay here in case Jeanne Chauvet comes back. You and I’, he said to Beauvoir as they made for the door, ‘are going to see Hazel Smyth.’
As he watched Gamache and Beauvoir walk to their car Lemieux hit the speed dial on his cell phone.
‘Superintendent Brébeuf? It’s Agent Lemieux.’
‘Anything?’ the confident voice came down the line.
‘A couple of things I think might be helpful.’
‘Good. Any sign of Agent Nichol?’
‘Not yet. Should I ask?’
‘Don’t be a fool, of course you shouldn’t. Tell me everything.’
There was a pause at the other end of the line. Brébeuf clenched his jaw. He was not a patient man, though he’d waited this long to get Gamache. They’d grown up together, joined up together, risen through the ranks together. They’d both gone after the Superintendent’s job, Brébeuf remembered with satisfaction. It was the little gift he kept in the back of his mind and unwrapped in moments of stress. Now he did it again. Unfolding the layers of his smiling, nodding, forelocktugging manner toward his best friend. And then he reached the great and unexpected gift. He’d prevailed. He’d won the promotion over the great Armand Gamache. And it had been enough, for a while. Until the Arnot case. Quickly he replaced the wrapping and shoved the comforting thought to the back of his mind. He needed to focus, to be careful now.
‘You know, son, why we’re doing this.’
‘Yes sir.’
‘Don’t be charmed by him, don’t be fooled. Most are. Superintendent Arnot was, and look what happened to him. You need to focus, Lemieux.’
When Lemieux had related the events of the day Brébeuf paused, thinking.
‘There’s something I want you to do. It’s a risk, but not, I think, a very big one.’ He gave Lemieux his instructions. ‘This will all be over soon,’ he said kindly, ‘and when it is, the officers with the courage to stand up for what they believe in will be rewarded. You’re a brave young man and, believe me, I know how difficult this is.’
‘Yes sir.’
Brébeuf hung up. As soon as this case was over he’d have to figure out what to do with Robert Lemieux. The young agent was really too impressionable.
Agent Lemieux hung up, a strange sensation in his chest. Not the tightening he’d had ever since Superintendent Brébeuf had appealed for his help, but a loosening, a euphoria.
Had Superintendent Brébeuf just offered him a promotion? Could he do what was best and benefit at the same time? How far up could he ride this? It might turn out all right after all.
Hazel Smyth was waiting for Madeleine to come home. Each footfall, each creak of the floorboards, each turn of a knob was her.
Then not. Every minute of the day Hazel lost Madeleine again. And now the door to the living room opened and Hazel looked up, expecting to see Mad’s cheery face and a tea tray – it was tea time after all. But instead she saw her daughter’s cheery face.
Sophie stepped in holding a huge glass of red wine for herself and made her way around the crowded room until she’d reached the sofa.
‘So, what’s for dinner?’ she said, flopping into a chair and picking up a magazine.
Hazel stared at this stranger. It was as though she’d lost both of them last night. Madeleine dead and Sophie possessed. This wasn’t the same girl. What had happened to morose, selfish Sophie?
The thing in front of her was radiant. It was as though the spirit of Madeleine had