Kingdom of the Blind (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #14) - Louise Penny Page 0,50

out and held his one hand while he sat on the other.

“Mind if we join you?” came a voice from the living room, and in walked Myrna and Clara. “I’d heard you were sprung from the hospital.” Myrna hugged Benedict. “You okay?”

Billy had jumped up and offered Myrna his seat, blocking Clara from taking it. Reine-Marie’s eyes lit up, and she grinned at Armand.

“Just a bump,” said Benedict.

“A bimp,” said Clara. “You minkey.”

Benedict stared at her, in much the same way Armand stared at Billy when he spoke.

“I don’t think you’ve met,” said Myrna. “This’s Clara Morrow, a neighbor.”

“Hello,” said Benedict, enunciating clearly and speaking loudly.

“You’ve never seen A Shot in the Dark?” asked Clara. She turned to Myrna. “Another movie we need to see again.”

“Good idea.”

“Clouseau?” Clara asked Benedict, who continued to stare, tilting his head slightly as though that might help decode this unkempt person.

“‘My hands are lethal weapons.’” Clara lifted her hands in a karate chop, trying another movie quote, but now Benedict just looked alarmed, and, taking a step back, he bimped into Armand.

“It’s all right,” said Armand with a smile. “She only uses them to paint.”

“Finger painting?” asked Benedict. “I had an aunt who did that. Therapy. Not quite right in the head.”

“Speaking of which, your head’s okay?” asked Myrna, returning to the original question.

“They did a scan, and apparently I have a thick skull.”

He said it with such earnestness that they couldn’t help but laugh.

Benedict, not quite getting it at first, looked confused. Then smirked.

“But a big heart,” said Reine-Marie, patting the blanket at his knee. “You saved their lives.”

“They saved mine.”

“It must’ve been cold in that house,” said Armand. “No heat.”

“It was.”

“Good thing you were able to light that fire to keep warm,” he said.

“But it scared the crap out of us,” said Myrna. “We could smell it and thought the place was on fire. Like just collapsing wasn’t bad enough.”

“Can you tell us now?” asked Clara, accepting Armand’s chair as he pulled another over from the kitchen table. “Do we know the name of the person who was buried?”

“I just told them,” said Jean-Guy. “The dead man is Anthony Baumgartner.”

Myrna’s face opened in shock. “The Baroness’s son? We just saw him yesterday afternoon. At his house.”

Benedict had said the same thing. Most people did, Armand knew. It was as though seeing someone recently should be protection against sudden death.

He turned to Benedict. “You were telling us that when you went into the home, it was unlocked. But you didn’t see any evidence of Monsieur Baumgartner?”

“No, none. I called hello, thinking someone must be there, with the car and all, but there was no answer. I started looking around, using the flashlight on my iPhone. Just wandering, really, waiting for my truck to heat up. But then I got to thinking about maybe trying to save the place, so I went in further, to take a closer look. That’s when it happened.”

The young man went quiet.

Armand and Jean-Guy, both with personal experience of trauma, recognized the signs.

“What happened?” asked Armand softly.

His therapists had taught him something he tried to pass along to all agents in the Sûreté. The need to talk about what had happened. The physical, but also the emotional wounds.

And now he coaxed it out of young Benedict. He of the thick skull and big heart.

Henri, lying between Armand and Benedict, rolled onto his back. His huge ears flopping flat on the floor like two small area rugs.

Benedict bent down and rubbed Henri’s tummy. Not meeting anyone’s eyes.

“I could hear the cracking,” he told Henri, who was listening closely. “I thought it was the frost getting into the wood. It happens with old places. I wasn’t afraid. At first. I thought I knew what it was. But then there was another, huger noise. I was in the kitchen. I could hear something, like a train coming, and the place started to shake.”

His voice was rising, and Myrna reached over and held his hand. Not to stop him but to reassure him.

Benedict looked at Myrna, then over at Armand.

Though his own eyes were bleary, Armand could clearly see the boy’s terror.

“I began to run for the door,” Benedict continued. “But a beam fell, right in front of me. I just managed to stop in time. And then—” He faltered.

“Go on,” said Armand gently.

“And then it just felt like explosions everywhere. I got confused and froze.”

He looked around, his eyes wide, and settled on Jean-Guy, who was looking at the young man not