*   *   *

Gamache returned to his office.

The department was deserted. Even Lacoste had gone. He’d called her from his parked car outside the rectory and asked her to find André Pineault. Now, more than ever, Gamache wanted to speak with the man who’d known Marie-Harriette. But, more than that, Pineault had known Isidore and the girls.

Father and daughter, the technician had said.

Gamache could see Isidore with his arms out, blessing his children. The look of surrender on his face. Was it possible he wasn’t blessing them, but asking for forgiveness?

Then shall forgiven and forgiving meet again.

Is that why none had married? Is that why none had returned, except to make sure he was really dead?

Is that why Virginie had killed herself?

Is that why they hated their mother? Not for what she’d done, but what she’d failed to do? And was it possible that the state, so arrogant and high-handed, had in fact saved the girls by taking them from that grim farmhouse?

Gamache remembered the joy on Constance’s face as her father laced up her skates. Gamache had taken it at face value, but now he wondered. He’d investigated enough cases of child abuse to know the child, when put in a room with both parents, would almost always embrace the abuser.

A child’s effort to curry favor. Was that what was on little Constance’s face? Not real joy, but the one plastered there by desperation and practice?

He looked down at the hat. The key to their home. It was best not to leap to a conclusion that might be far from the truth, Gamache cautioned himself, even as he wondered if that was the secret Constance had locked away. The one she was finally willing to drag into the light.

But that didn’t explain her murder. Or perhaps it did. Had he failed to see the significance of something, or make a vital connection?

More and more he felt it was essential to speak with their uncle.

Lacoste had emailed to say she’d found him, she thought. Might not be the correct Pineault, it was a common name, but his age checked out and he’d moved into the small apartment fourteen years ago. So the timing fit with Isidore’s death and the sale of the farm. She’d asked if the Chief wanted her to interview Pineault, but Gamache had told her to go home herself now. Get some rest. He’d do it, on his way back to Three Pines.

On his desk he found the dossier Lacoste had left, including an address for Monsieur Pineault in east-end Montréal.

Gamache slowly swung his chair around until his back was to the dark and empty office, and looked out the window. The sun was setting. He looked at his watch. 4:17. The time the sun should be going down. Still, it always seemed too soon.

He rocked himself gently in the chair, staring out at Montréal. Such a chaotic city. Always was. But a vibrant city too. Alive and messy.

It gave him pleasure to look at Montréal.

He was contemplating doing something that might prove monumentally foolish. It was certainly not rational, but then this thought hadn’t come from his brain.

The Chief Inspector gathered his papers and left, without a backward glance. He didn’t bother locking his office door, didn’t even bother closing it. No need. He doubted he’d be back.

In the elevator he pressed up, not down. Once there, he exited and walked decisively down the corridor. Unlike the homicide department, this one wasn’t empty. And as he walked by, agents looked up from their desks. A few reached for their phones.

But the Chief paid no attention. He walked straight toward his goal. Once there, he didn’t knock, but opened the door then closed it firmly behind him.

“Jean-Guy.”

Beauvoir looked up from the desk and Gamache felt his heart constrict. Jean-Guy was going down. Setting.

“Come with me,” Gamache said. He’d expected his voice to be normal, and was surprised to hear just a whisper, the words barely audible.

“Get out.” Beauvoir’s voice, too, was low. He turned his back on the Chief.

“Come with me,” Gamache repeated. “Please, Jean-Guy. It’s not too late.”

“What for? So you can fuck with me some more?” Beauvoir turned to glare at Gamache. “To humiliate me even more? Well, fuck you.”

“They stole the therapist’s records,” said Gamache, approaching the younger man, who looked so much older. “They know how to get into our heads. Yours, mine. Lacoste’s. Everyone’s.”

“They? Who’re ‘they’? Wait, don’t tell me. ‘They’ aren’t ‘you.’ That’s all that matters, isn’t it? The great Armand Gamache is blameless. It’s ‘their’ fault. It always is. Well, take your fucking perfect life, your perfect record and get the fuck out. I’m just a piece of shit to you, something stuck to your shoe. Not good enough for your department, not good enough for your daughter. Not good enough to save.”