Her bloody hands found his, and held them, while Gamache tried to stanch the wound.
Peter’s eyes were wide and filled with panic. His lips were turning pale. Paler. As was his face.
“Peter,” Clara whispered, staring into his eyes.
“Clara,” he sighed. “I’m so sorry…”
“Shhhh. Shhhh. Help is coming.”
“I wanted to come home,” he said, gripping her hands. “I wrote…”
“Shhh,” she said, and saw his eyes flicker.
She bent low, until she was down beside him, whispering in his ear, looking into his eyes. “You’re at the top of the hill in Three Pines,” she spoke softly. “Can you see the village green? Can you smell the forest? The grass?”
He nodded slightly, his eyes softening.
“You’re walking down the hill now. There’s Ruth. And Rosa.”
“Rosa,” Peter whispered. “She came home?”
“She came home, to Ruth. Like you’ve come home. To me. There’s Olivier and Gabri, waving to you from the bistro. But don’t go in yet, Peter. You see our home?”
Peter’s eyes had a faraway look, the panic gone.
“Come up the walkway, Peter. Come into the garden. Sit beside me in our chairs. I’ve poured you a beer. I’m holding your hand. You can smell the roses. And the lilies.”
“Clara?” said Gamache gently.
“You can see the woods, and hear the Rivière Bella Bella,” said Clara, her voice faltering.
Her warm face was touching his cold cheek, as she whispered, “You’re home.”
FORTY-ONE
They held Peter Morrow’s funeral in Three Pines. Friends and family gathered in St. Thomas’s chapel and sang, and sobbed, and grieved and celebrated.
Clara tried to give the eulogy, but couldn’t speak. Her words stuck at the lump in her throat. And so Myrna took over, holding her hand while Clara stood beside her.
And then they sang some more. And finally they took Peter’s ashes around the village, sprinkling a bit here. A bit there. Some in the river, some by the bistro, some beneath the three great pines.
The rest were spread in Peter and Clara’s garden. So that Peter would bloom each spring, in the roses and lilies and lavender. And the gnarled old lilac.
Marcel Chartrand had come to the funeral. And stood at the back. But had left before the reception.
“It’s a long way home,” he explained to Gamache, when asked why he was leaving so soon.
“Perhaps not,” said Armand. He was standing with Jean-Guy and Henri, while Reine-Marie and Annie were across the hall, with Clara.
“Come back again, in a year or so,” Gamache suggested. “It would be nice to see you.”
Chartrand shook his head. “I don’t think so. I’m a bad memory.”
“Clara will never forget,” said Gamache. “That’s for sure. But the cure for lost love is more love.” He looked down at Henri.
Chartrand scratched the shepherd’s ears and smiled a little. “You’re a romantic, monsieur.”
“I’m a realist. Clara Morrow will not spend the rest of her life in that one horrific event.”
After Marcel left, Armand walked over to Ruth, who was holding Rosa and looking at the punch bowl.
“I don’t dare have any,” she said. “It might not be spiked.”
“Noli timere,” said Gamache, and when she smiled, he said, “You knew?”
“About Professor Massey? No. If I had, I’d have said something.”
“But you were afraid of him,” said Gamache. “You saw something in him that scared you. That’s why you were so nice to him. Jean-Guy caught on. We all assumed you were nice because you liked him, but Jean-Guy said you probably hated him.”
“I didn’t hate him,” said Ruth. “And how can you trust the opinion of someone who’s sober?”
“But Jean-Guy was right, wasn’t he? You might not have hated him, but there was fear there. Otherwise why say, noli timere? Be not afraid.”
“That blank canvas on his easel was one of the saddest things I’ve seen,” said Ruth. “An artist who’s lost his way. It builds up. Eats away at you. Beauvoir over there”—she gestured with the duck across the room, where Jean-Guy and Annie were talking with Myrna—“he’s a numbskull. And you?” She gave Gamache a sharp assessing look. “You’re a fool. Those two?” She turned to Olivier and Gabri, putting food onto the long table. “Are just plain ridiculous.”
She turned back to Gamache.
“But you’re all something. Professor Massey was nothing. Empty. Like the canvas. I found that terrifying.” She paused, remembering. “What happened to that painting? The only one of Professor Norman’s that survived?”
“The one at the back of Massey’s studio? The good one?”
“The great one,” said Ruth. “It was poetry.”
“The asbestos would never come out. It was destroyed.”
Ruth lowered her head, then raised it again. Her chin high, her eyes hard. She gave a curt nod and limped away, to stand beside Clara.
Noli timere, thought Gamache as he watched the two women. And Rosa.
*
The Long Way Home
Louise Penny's books
- The Face of a Stranger
- The Silent Cry
- The Sins of the Wolf
- The Dark Assassin
- The Whitechapel Conspiracy
- The Sheen of the Silk
- The Twisted Root
- The Lost Symbol
- After the Funeral
- The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding
- After the Darkness
- The Best Laid Plans
- The Doomsday Conspiracy
- The Naked Face
- The Other Side of Me
- The Sands of Time
- The Sky Is Falling
- The Stars Shine Down
- The Lying Game #6: Seven Minutes in Heaven
- The First Lie
- All the Things We Didn't Say
- The Good Girls
- The Heiresses
- The Perfectionists
- The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly
- The Lies That Bind
- Ripped From the Pages
- The Book Stops Here
- The New Neighbor
- A Cry in the Night
- The Phoenix Encounter
- The Dead Will Tell: A Kate Burkholder Novel
- The Perfect Victim
- Fear the Worst: A Thriller
- The Naturals, Book 2: Killer Instinct
- The Fixer
- The Good Girl
- Cut to the Bone: A Body Farm Novel
- The Devil's Bones
- The Bone Thief: A Body Farm Novel-5
- The Bone Yard
- The Breaking Point: A Body Farm Novel
- The Inquisitor's Key
- The Girl in the Woods
- The Dead Room
- The Death Dealer
- The Silenced
- The Hexed (Krewe of Hunters)
- The Night Is Alive
- The Night Is Forever
- The Night Is Watching
- In the Dark
- The Betrayed (Krewe of Hunters)
- The Cursed
- The Dead Play On
- The Forgotten (Krewe of Hunters)
- Under the Gun
- The Paris Architect: A Novel
- The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush
- Always the Vampire
- The Darling Dahlias and the Confederate Rose
- The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree
- The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies
- The Darling Dahlias and the Texas Star
- The Doll's House
- The Garden of Darkness
- The Creeping
- The Killing Hour
- Long Lost: A Kate Burkholder Short Story