“He gave himself up, didn’t he?”
“No.” Though Jean-Guy couldn’t help but smile at the memory. “He came back looking for the water filtration system the dead man had. You should’ve seen his face when your father and I strolled out of the outhouse.”
Annie had laughed until she almost wet herself.
The Internet connected and Jean-Guy swung around, his hands hovering over the keyboard.
He had a bunch of competing priorities. But the first was obvious.
He fired off a quick email to Annie, to let her know what had happened and that he’d be spending at least the night, perhaps longer, at her parents’ place.
As he wrote, he ached for her. For Honoré. For the feel and scent of them.
“Miss you,” Annie wrote back. “Hope it’s not a two-holer.”
It had become their code for big shit.
And then he typed in Lord of the Flies, and hit enter.
*
“Clara?” Myrna called.
The cottage was in near darkness, just a lamp on in the living room.
Myrna switched on the lights and the cheerful kitchen appeared. Empty.
She didn’t want to disturb her friend if she was napping. But Myrna suspected after the discovery of the day, they’d all have trouble sleeping.
When Armand had returned home, they’d left. Knowing the two of them would want to be alone.
“Jesus, you woke me up, you great pile of … clothing.”
Myrna, once she’d returned to her skin, looked over at the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. Framed there was the demented and bedraggled old poet. And her duck. Feathers ruffled.
“Clothing?”
“Okay, I meant shit, but Michael has asked me to be more polite. So I’d appreciate it if anytime I speak to you, you replace the appropriate word with ‘shit.’”
Myrna took a deep breath in through her nostrils, and out through her mouth. And began to worry that Ruth might actually wiggle her way into heaven with the help of a seriously deluded archangel. In which case …
“Where’s Clara?”
“How the fuck should I know, shithead?”
“Which word would you like me to replace?”
“Hmmm, let me think about that.”
There was really only one place Clara might be. The place she always went when things went bad.
“There you are,” said Myrna, tapping softly on the door of Clara’s studio.
The lights were on. Not bright. Just enough to mimic indirect morning sun.
Clara swiveled on her stool, a fine oil brush in her hand and a portrait on the easel.
Myrna could only see the edges of the painting. Clara’s body blotted out the rest.
Canvases leaned against the walls of the studio. There must’ve been a dozen portraits. Some almost finished. Most not even close.
It looked like a roomful of abandoned people.
Myrna looked away, unable to catch their eyes. Afraid of the pleas she might see there.
“How’s it coming?” she asked, nodding toward the easel.
“You tell me.”
Clara slid off the stool and stepped aside.
Myrna stared.
Normally Clara painted portraits. Extraordinary faces on canvas. Some brought smiles. Some made the viewer unaccountably melancholy, or uncomfortable, or cheerful.
Some provoked strong feelings of nostalgia for no particular reason, except that Clara was a sort of alchemist, and could render emotions, even memories, into paint. Fossilized feelings were turned into oil, then returned, framed, to the person.
But this work was different. It wasn’t a portrait at all. Or, at least, not of a person.
It showed Clara’s puppy, Leo, and Gracie, his littermate, the Gamaches’ puppy, or something.
Leo sat, contained, magnificent, handsome and confident. While Gracie, the runt, stood beside him, cocking her head, as she often did. Quizzical. Scraggly. Ugly. Not quite meeting the eye of the observer, but looking at something beyond, behind.
Myrna almost turned to see what Gracie might be seeing.
Neither dog was adorable. Neither was cute. There was something wild about them.
Clara had captured what these two domesticated animals might have been, had they not been tamed. Had they not been captured. And civilized. She’d painted what almost certainly still lurked in their DNA.
Myrna found herself reaching out toward the canvas, then drawing her hand back.
She could almost hear the snarl.
“I’m sorry,” she said to Clara. “I shouldn’t have disturbed you. I went to the bistro, but everyone’s talking about the murder, and I needed to get away but didn’t want to be alone.”
“Me too. Poor Reine-Marie,” said Clara, joining Myrna on the lumpy sofa. Surrounded by the familiar and comforting scents of oil paint and old bananas.
“I tried to pump Armand,” said Myrna. “But he just gave me that look, and walked away.”
They all knew that look. They’d seen it before. More times than you’d think possible.
There was no censure there. No suggestion they shouldn’t ask. He’d be surprised if they didn’t. And they’d be surprised if he answered.
More than anything, there was resolve in those eyes.
But this time there was also anger. And shock. Though he tried to hide both.
It always struck Myrna as curious that a man who’d hunted killers all his career and was now the head of the whole S?reté should be so surprised by murder.
And yet, he was. She could see it.
He’d spoken to her about his decision not simply to return to the S?reté, but to accept the top job.
“You think you can make a difference?” she’d asked, and seen his face break into a smile. The creases radiating from his eyes and down his cheeks.
“You sound unconvinced,” he’d said.
“I’m just trying to understand why you’re doing it.”
“You’re wondering if it’s hubris? Pride?” he asked.
“I’m wondering, Armand, if your decision to take the top job is driven by your ego.”
This was during one of their now informal sessions, where the retired therapist listened to the retired cop, and prodded at wounds that others might ignore. Looking for infection.
“A love of power,” she’d said. “How does that sound? Familiar?”
She spoke with only a slight smile of her own to soften the thrust.
“I don’t love power,” he said, his voice still warm, but firm. “But neither am I afraid of it when it’s offered. We all have skills, things we do well. I happen to be good at finding criminals.”
“But it’s more than that for you, Armand. It’s as much about protecting the innocent as finding the guilty. It’s good to have a mission in life, a purpose. It’s not so good to have an obsession.”
He’d leaned forward then, and she’d felt the authority of the man. It wasn’t smothering or threatening. If anything, it was incredibly calming.
“This isn’t a hobby, this isn’t a pastime. It isn’t even a job. If I accept the position of Chief Superintendent of the S?reté, it must be with complete commitment. There’re big problems. Huge. I have to believe I can fix them, otherwise, why take on the task?”