“Is that how you became a tactician?”
“It started with maps, yes. I was an awkward child,” he said, as though that might be in doubt. “I found the world chaotic. Unsettling. But there was order in maps. And beauty. I love maps.”
It did not seem an exaggeration. He looked down at the paper on the coffee table with affection. A newfound friend.
“Even the word is interesting. Map. It comes from mappa mundi. Mappa is Latin for napkin. Mundi is world, of course. Isn’t that wonderful? A napkin, with their world on it. The mundane and the magnificent. Map.”
He said the word as though it was indeed magic. And in the young man’s drenched face, Gamache saw the world opening up for an unhappy boy.
Map.
“Monks did some of the first European maps,” said Charpentier. “Gathering information from mariners and merchants. They’re sometimes called Beatine maps because some of the earliest were done by a monk called Beatus in the eighth century. They were for his work on the Apocalypse.”
“Not that again,” muttered Gamache.
Charpentier glanced at him, but returned to the paper on the table.
“Every map has a purpose,” he whispered. “What’s yours?”
“Can you guess?”
“I can give you my educated and informed opinion from years of studying maps and tactics,” offered Charpentier.
“Fine,” said Gamache. “I’ll take that instead.”
“This was done by a cartographer. A mapmaker. It’s not the work of a hobbyist. Whoever drew this was probably a professional.”
“Is it the cow that gave it away, or the pyramid?” asked Gamache.
“Neither,” said Charpentier, missing the humor. “You can tell by the contours.” He pointed to the thin lines denoting elevation. Hills and valleys. “I suspect if we investigate, we’ll find this is extremely accurate.”
“Not completely. The cow was rescued and the snowman would’ve melted a hundred years ago, and I can guarantee you there’s no pyramid nearby.”
He pointed to the triangle in the upper-right quadrant.
“That’s what makes this map especially interesting,” said Charpentier. “Old maps show history. Of settlement, of commerce, of conquest. This one seems to show a very personal history. It’s a map meant for one person. One purpose.”
“And what is that purpose?” asked Gamache again, not expecting an answer. But this time he got one.
“I think it’s an early orienteering map.”
“Orienteering? The sport?”
“But it didn’t start out as that,” said Charpentier. “The soldier in the window is from the First World War, right? Orienteering was developed as a training tool to help soldiers find their way around battlefields.”
“So it is a battlefield map?” asked Gamache, losing his way.
“Of course not. There’s a snowman in it with a hockey stick. This isn’t Ypres. This is here. You wanted to know why this map was made?”
In the background, the fire sputtered as the last of the embers died. Henri snored on the floor at Gamache’s feet, and little Gracie had stopped whimpering.
Gamache nodded.
“It was made for that young soldier as an aide-mémoire,” said Charpentier. “To remind him of home.”
Armand looked at the three young, playful pines.
“To bring him home,” said Charpentier.
But it hadn’t worked. Not all maps, Gamache thought, were magic.
CHAPTER 23
Myrna sat up straight in bed. Awoken by what sounded like a gunshot. Still groggy from sleep, she listened, expecting it was just a dream.
But then there was another shot. And not a single one, but rapid fire. Unmistakable. Automatic weapons fire.
And then shouting. Screaming.
Tossing the duvet aside, she ran to the door of her bedroom and opened it. But even as she did, her dream state fell away and she knew what she’d find.
Jacques Laurin sat at the laptop, his face lit only by the flickering images on the screen.
It was two in the morning and Jacques had finally followed her advice and googled “Armand Gamache.”
And the link to this video had come up.
More shouts, commands. Controlled, forceful. The voice cut through any panic, cut through the gunfire, as the S?reté agents moved deeper and deeper into the abandoned factory. Pushing the gunmen ahead of them. Engaging them.
But the gunmen were everywhere, swarming the agents.
It looked to be an ambush, a slaughter.
But still, on the man’s urging, by voice and swift, decisive hand signals, they moved forward.
*
Huifen Cloutier sat up in bed.
This was the first quiet time she’d had since the death of Professor Leduc. The murder of the Duke.
That’s what he’d be remembered for, she knew. The man would be erased by the murder. Serge Leduc no longer existed. He’d never lived. All he’d done was died.
She pulled the map onto her lap, and stared at it.
*
Cadet Laurin’s face grew paler and paler.
He recognized this. It was their tactical exercise, in their mocked-up factory. The one where he’d been killed twice and taken hostage once. The one they never won.
But this was no exercise. It was real.
The video had been edited from the cameras the agents wore. The point of view changed from one agent to another. It was jerky, shaky. As they ran. And crouched behind concrete pillars that exploded as bullets hit.
But it was clear. As were the looks on the agents’ faces. Determined. Resolute. As they moved forward. Even as they fell.
*
Amelia lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.
The duvet was warm around her as the cold, fresh air came in through the open window. The sheets smelled faintly of lavender. Not enough to be off-putting. Just enough to be calming.
And slowly, slowly, her mind slowed. Stopped its whirring. Stopped its worrying. She breathed in the lavender, and breathed out her anxiety.
The Duke was dead. Resting in peace, and now, finally, so could she.
*
The sounds were even more jarring than the images. Jacques flinched as the bullets struck all around. The walls, the floors. The agents. It was so much louder than in the exercise at the academy. His mind had gone numb, overwhelmed by the din, the chaos, the shouts and explosions, the screams of pain. His hands gripped the arms of the chair, holding tight.
All his senses were shutting down.
On the screen, an officer in tactical gear was moving forward. Then he suddenly stopped. And stood straight up. And in a grotesque parody of a ballet move, he spun gracefully. And fell.
A voice called, “Jean-Guy.”
Jacques watched as Professor Beauvoir was dragged to safety. Then the camera switched and he saw Commander Gamache, completely focused. Quickly assessing the wounded man, as gunfire sounded, pounded, around them.
Beauvoir stared up at Gamache as he tried to stanch the bleeding. Beauvoir was silent but his eyes were wide with terror. Pleading.
“I have to go,” said Gamache, putting a pressure bandage in the younger man’s hands and holding it to the wound. Gamache paused for a moment. Then leaning forward, he kissed him gently on the forehead.
*
Ruth Zardo stood at the threshold and stared at the boy in the bed.
He slept soundly, deeply. She listened to the rhythm of his breathing. Then she closed the door and went downstairs.
The old poet didn’t sleep much anymore. Didn’t seem to need it. What she needed was time. She could see the shore ahead. A distance away still, she thought. But visible now.
The boy had left his copy of the map in the kitchen. Ruth made a cup of chamomile and sat in her usual seat next to Rosa, who was asleep in her rag bed beside the oven.
Rosa muttered in her sleep, exhaling, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
Ruth stared at the map. She’d thought maybe she’d be moved to write a poem. To purge her feelings onto paper. As the person who’d made this map had so obviously done.
But now she felt there was no need. The map said it all.
In the fine contours. The roads and rivers. The stranded cow, the elated snowman.
The three small but vibrant pines.
And the smears. Of mud. Or blood.