She reached for her iPhone to google Armand Gamache, something she’d been meaning to do since she’d arrived at the academy, but more pressing things kept occupying her. Like getting through each day.
No connection. She tossed the iPhone on the bed in frustration. She’d forgotten. There was no Internet coverage here. Not only had mapmakers forgotten this place but so, apparently, had time. And technology.
She pulled the duvet up higher and wondered who Armand Gamache really was. And if he knew that Huifen and Jacques and even Nathaniel quietly visited Professor Leduc regularly.
The Duke met with a few select students. And she wondered if Gamache knew that she was among those selected.
Sides had been chosen, allegiances declared, the game of Red Rover was over.
Finally, eyes heavy with sleep, she went to turn off the light. Only then did Amelia notice the inscription at the front of the well-thumbed volume.
For Clouseau, who will be just FINE one day. Ruth.
Ruth?
Ruth?
She sat up in bed and stared at the book, then out the window at the village. That appeared and disappeared and contained all sorts of secrets within its thick walls.
CHAPTER 11
Another week passed and by then they were deep into the term.
Some of the older students still grumbled, but less and less. Not necessarily, Gamache knew, because they were coming to terms with the realities of the new regime, but because they were kept too busy to complain.
He was in his rooms early one morning, talking with Reine-Marie on the phone. He’d had late meetings and decided to stay the night at the academy.
“Did I tell you that Clara got a new puppy yesterday?” she asked.
“From that litter she talked about? That was a while ago.”
“No, Billy Williams found these ones in a garbage can.”
He inhaled deeply and exhaled the word “people.” Not so much an indictment as in wonderment. That there could be so much deliberate cruelty and so much kindness in one species.
“Clara took one. A little male she’s called Leo. Adorable. But there is something—”
And that’s as far as she got. Even down the phone line, she could hear the shouting. Reine-Marie couldn’t make out the words, but she could hear the panic.
“I have to go,” said her husband, and the line went dead.
*
Gamache threw a dressing gown over his pajamas and was out the door in moments, the shouting hitting him in the face as he ran toward it.
One voice. A man’s. Young. Frightened. The terror bounced off the marble floors and walls, magnifying.
“Help,” the voice was screaming. “Help.” The single syllable elongating. “Heeeeelllll-p.” More a sound than a word.
Other professors came out of their rooms, joining in behind Gamache. As he ran past Jean-Guy Beauvoir’s door, Gamache gave it a single pound with his fist, but kept going.
Behind him, he heard the door open and the familiar voice, groggy.
“What the—Jesus.”
Up ahead, the screaming had stopped. But the hallway was still clogged with fear.
Gamache rounded a corner and there, back to the wall, stood Nathaniel Smythe. On the ground in front of him was a tray, with broken glass and china and food.
Stepping in front of the boy, to break his line of sight, Gamache looked quickly, expertly, over him.
“Are you hurt?” he asked.
Nathaniel, eyes wide and not quite focusing on Gamache, shook his head.
“Look after him,” Gamache said to whoever had arrived right behind him. “Take him to my rooms. Don’t let him out of your sight.”
“What’s happened?” Jean-Guy Beauvoir asked, skidding to a stop beside Gamache.
Other professors were arriving and craning to see. But the Commander was blocking the open door, and their view.
He himself had yet to look, but as Nathaniel was led away, he turned around.
“Call the police,” he said, speaking to Beauvoir but still staring into the room. Then he looked at Jean-Guy. “Call Isabelle Lacoste.”
“Oui, patron,” his voice betraying none of the surprise he felt. Though shock would be a better word.
He knew what that meant. What Gamache was seeing.
Jean-Guy ran back down the corridor to his rooms to call. As he went, he was met with worried and excited faces all asking, “What’s happened?”
More professors were arriving, and behind them, staff. And behind them, the first of the students.
“Lock the doors to the academy,” Gamache told two other professors. “No one gets in or out.”
They took off down the corridor.
The other professors were crowding around, trying to see what could possibly be in the room. But Gamache blocked their way.
“The head of each year,” he said, scanning the now-crowded corridor. Three professors stepped forward.
“Here, Commander.”
“Make sure the cadets are safe. Get them into the dining hall and do a head count. Keep them there. Give them breakfast, but no one leaves until I say so.”
He held their eyes. “Understood?”
“Understood.”
“Quickly, then. If someone is hurt or missing, we need to know.”
The professors split up, shepherding reluctant students back down the hallway.
Commander Gamache still had not entered the room.
“Professor McKinnon, take a couple of teaching assistants and gather up the staff. Secretarial, grounds, maintenance, kitchen. Everyone. Take them into the dining hall as well. Ask the head of operations to confirm everyone is who they say they are, and that no one is missing.”
“D’accord, Commander.” And she hurried down the hallway. Leaving just one other professor standing there.
“What would you like me to do, Armand?”
“Nothing,” came his curt response.
Michel Brébeuf stepped away and watched as Gamache stared into the room.
“Actually, there is one thing you can do,” said Armand, turning back to Brébeuf. “Get the doctor.”
“Of course.”
Brébeuf walked quickly down the corridor, though he knew he’d been given the least urgent, the least important, of the tasks. He knew by Gamache’s orders and actions that there was no real need of a doctor.
“Isabelle’s on her way,” said Beauvoir, arriving back at Gamache’s side and marveling at the now-empty corridor.
He looked at his watch at the same moment Gamache did.
It was six twenty-three in the morning.
There was silence now. Except for a tiny sound like a squeal. Both Gamache and Beauvoir looked up and down the corridor. It was still empty. But still the sound came closer.
Then around the corner came Hugo Charpentier in his wheelchair.
“What’s happened?”
Professor Charpentier’s progress stopped when he saw Gamache’s face.
“As bad as that?”
Gamache didn’t move.
“Where’re the others?” Charpentier asked.
“Securing the building. The staff and students are being taken to the dining hall.”
“And they forgot about me,” he said. He started to wheel forward. “Can I help?”
“Non, merci. Just join the others, please.”
As he turned back down the hall, Gamache also marveled that they’d forgotten Professor Charpentier. He felt slightly ashamed, but mostly he tucked that information away. How easily overlooked that man was. And he thought about what an invisible man could get away with.
He also noted the squeal of Charpentier’s wheelchair, as he withdrew. Something Gamache had never noticed before.
And then he turned his attention to the doorway and what lay beyond.
Who lay beyond.
Serge Leduc was crumpled on the floor.
It was all too obvious what had happened. By the body, and the blood. He’d been shot in the head. The gun still lay by his side.
And while it was also clear, by the glaring eyes and open mouth, and the pallor, never mind the wound, that he was dead, Gamache still bent down and felt for a pulse, his hand coming away with a bit of blood, which he wiped off with a handkerchief.
Jean-Guy’s practiced eye swept the scene, then he looked toward the bedroom.
Gamache gave a brief nod and Beauvoir covered the ground swiftly.
“Nothing,” said Jean-Guy a moment later.