The Beautiful Mystery

And then he realized what it was.

Peace. Complete and utter peace.

He closed his eyes and let the neumes lift him, out of himself, out of the pew, out of the Blessed Chapel. They took him out of the abbey and out over the lake and the forest. He flew with them, free, unbound.

This was better than Percocet, better than OxyContin. There was no pain, no anxiety, no worry. There was no “us” and no “them,” no boundaries and no limits.

And then the music stopped, and Beauvoir descended, softly, to the earth.

He opened his eyes and looked around, wondering if anyone had noticed what had just happened to him. He saw Chief Inspector Gamache in one of the front pews, and across from him sat Superintendent Francoeur.

Beauvoir looked around the chapel. Someone was missing.

The Dominican. What had become of the man from the Inquisition?

Beauvoir turned to the altar and as he did he intercepted a brief glance from Gamache to Superintendent Francoeur.

Christ, thought Beauvoir. He really does despise the man.

*   *   *

Armand Gamache brought his gaze back to the monks. The chanting had stopped and the abbot was again standing front and center in the quiet church.

Then, into the silence, there came a single voice. A tenor. Singing.

The abbot looked at his monks. The monks looked at their abbot, then at each other. Their eyes wide, but their mouths shut.

And yet, the clear voice continued.

The abbot stood over the host and the goblet of wine. The body and blood of Christ. A wafer frozen in mid-blessing, offered to the air.

The beautiful voice was all around them, as though it had glided down the shafts of thin light and taken possession of the chapel.

The abbot turned to face the tiny congregation. To see if one of them had lost his wits and found his voice. But all he saw were the three officers. Scattered. Watching. Silent.

Then, from behind the plaque to Saint-Gilbert, the Dominican appeared. Frère Sébastien walked slowly, solemnly, to the center of the Blessed Chapel. There he paused.

“I can’t hear you,” he sang in an upbeat tempo, much faster, lighter, than any Gregorian chant ever heard in the chapel. The Latin words filled the air. “I have a banana in my ear.”

The music the prior died with had come to life.

“I am not a fish,” the Dominican chanted, as he walked down the center aisle. “I am not a fish.”

The monks, and the abbot, were paralyzed. Little rainbows danced around them as the morning sun burned through more mist. Frère Sébastien approached the altar, his head up, his arms thrust into his sleeves, his voice filling the void.

“Stop it.”

It wasn’t so much a command as a howl. A baying.

But the Dominican stopped neither his singing nor his progress. He continued, unhurried and unrelenting, toward the altar. And the monks.

Armand Gamache slowly rose to his feet, his eyes on the one monk who had finally separated himself from the rest.

The lone voice.

“Nooo!” the monk cried in pain. It was as though the music was sizzling his skin, as though the Inquisition had one final monk to burn.

Frère Sébastien came to a halt just below the abbot, and looked up.

“Dies irae,” Frère Sébastien sang. Day of wrath.

“Stop,” the monk pleaded. He’d stepped toward the Dominican and sank to his knees. “Pleeease.”

And the Dominican stopped. All that filled the chapel was sobbing. And giddy light.

“You killed your prior,” said Gamache quietly. “Ecce homo. He is man. And you killed him for it.”

*   *   *

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

The abbot crossed himself.

“Go on, my son.”

There was a long pause. Dom Philippe knew this old confessional had heard many, many things over the centuries. But none as disgraceful as was about to come out.

God, of course, already knew. Had probably known before the blow was struck. Probably even knew before the thought was formed. This confession wasn’t for the Lord, but for the sinner, the sheep who’d wandered too far from the fold. And been lost in a land of wolves.

“I have committed murder. I killed the prior.”

*   *   *

Bugs were crawling all over Jean-Guy Beauvoir’s skin and he wondered if the infirmary might’ve been infested with bedbugs or cockroaches.

He wiped his hand over his arms and tried to get at the ones crawling down his spine. He and the Chief were in the prior’s office, doing the paperwork, making notes. Packing up. The final preparations before leaving with the boatman.