The Long Way Home

“Non. I think people were just happy to see him go.”


Driven out of another place, thought Gamache. Or maybe not.

“Is there anyone still living in Baie-Saint-Paul who was a member of the community?” Clara asked.

“Yes. Luc Vachon.”

“We already know about him,” said Beauvoir. “He’s off painting. Anyone else?”

The agent thought about it, then shook his head.

“Merci,” said the station chief and Morriseau left. She looked at them expectantly. “Is there anything else I can do?”

There wasn’t.

Before they left, Gamache ducked back into Captain Nadeau’s office and asked if they had any sniffer dogs.

“For drugs?” she asked.

“For the other,” he said.

“You think not everyone left,” she said.

“I think there was no spaceship,” he said.

She gave one brusque nod. “I’ll make arrangements.”

He gave her his coordinates, and as he left he saw her walk to the map on the wall.

*

They returned to the Galerie Gagnon expecting to spend the night there, but Marcel Chartrand surprised them.

“I think I mentioned that this isn’t my main home. I stay here on weekends when the gallery’s busy. My main home is up the coast a few miles. I need to go back there tonight, but you’re welcome to stay here.”

“What would you prefer?” Clara asked.

“I’d prefer it if you came with me,” he said. And while his eyes swept the group and included them all, they came to rest on Clara.

She didn’t shy away from the gaze.

“I think—” Beauvoir began.

“We’d love to come to your home. Merci,” said Clara.

As they packed, Beauvoir whispered to Gamache, “You should’ve said something, patron. We’re better off here than in a house in the middle of nowhere. If we’re going to track down Peter, we need to be asking more questions.”

“And what questions are those?” Gamache asked.

“Was it really a cult? Did No Man leave voluntarily or was he kicked out of his own community? Where did he go?”

“Good questions, but who would we ask?” Gamache zipped up his case and turned to face Beauvoir.

Jean-Guy considered. They seemed to have hit a dead end.

“Are we so sure No Man really did leave?” Beauvoir asked.

Gamache gave one curt nod. “Captain Nadeau is looking into that. They’re bringing in sniffer dogs.”

“For corpses?”

Gamache nodded again. He wasn’t sure if they’d find anything. And if they did, whether the body would be ten years old, or ten weeks.

Like Beauvoir, he also found it curious that Marcel Chartrand wanted to take them away from Baie-Saint-Paul. They could have stayed above the Galerie for another night. They were already settled in. Surely it was easier, even for Chartrand, to stay.

And yet the gallery owner wanted to move them to a remote home.

Beauvoir was right. There were questions to be asked here. But Gamache suspected most of the answers could be found with Chartrand.





THIRTY-ONE


After stopping for groceries, they drove up the coast highway, the road following the hills and rock cuts and cliffs.

Marcel Chartrand was ahead of them in his van, while Clara drove the others in the car.

Chartrand’s turn signal went on after a few miles. Instead of turning left, away from the river, he was signaling right. But there didn’t seem to be any “right” to be had. Just a cliff. But they went around a corner and there was a spit of land jutting into the river. And on it a cluster of brightly painted, cheerful homes.

“Once belonged to one family,” Marcel explained as he came over to meet them. “All daughters. None married. They built their homes together.”

The houses were modest in size, painted bright red and blue and yellow. Lighthouses, it seemed, in the gray landscape. The style of each house was similar, but slightly different, with swooping dormers and fieldstone chimneys and wooden porches. The roofs were sheet metal and looked like silver fish scales. They caught the fading light and turned soft blues and pinks.

“Does it have a name?” Myrna asked.

“The community? No. No name.”

“No Name,” Myrna repeated.

“Who lives here now?” Clara asked, following Chartrand to the home nearest the river.

“Those places belong to summer people.” He pointed to the other two houses. “I’m the only one who lives here year-round.”

“Does it ever get lonely?” Myrna asked.

“Sometimes. But what compensation.”

His arm swept in an arc, taking in the trees and rocks and cliffs and great dome of sky. And the dark river. Marcel Chartrand was staring as though each was a close friend.

But none had a heartbeat, thought Myrna. It was no doubt glorious, but was it really compensation?

“I bought the place twenty-five years ago. Had been on the market for years, since the last sister died. No one else wanted it. It was derelict by then, of course.”