The Nature of the Beast: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel

“I was thinking the same thing,” said Beauvoir, getting up.

“Who?” asked Rosenblatt, setting aside a copy of the Québec Gazette from 1778.

“Ruth,” said Gabri.

“He’s going to help her clean? Now?”

Olivier shrugged.

“Keep looking,” said Gamache, kneeling by the overturned blanket box. He could feel the fire behind him and hear the clock above him.





CHAPTER 40

“What is it?” Beauvoir asked, taking a seat next to Ruth in her living room.

Monsieur Béliveau sat across from them on a lawn chair that looked familiar because it had once belonged to the grocer.

Ruth’s home was furnished with what she described as “found” objects. Found, that is, in other people’s homes.

“I know where the plans are.”

“Where?” he asked.

She leaned forward and tapped the play, which was sitting on a plank of wood held up by a stack of books found in Myrna’s bookstore.

“The play?” demanded Jean-Guy. “We already know that.”

“Not the play, numbnuts,” she snapped. “This.”

She thumped the cover and now his eyes widened in frustration.

“For Christ’s sake, what are you saying?”

But then he saw what she’d been indicating. Not the play itself, but the title.

“She Sat Down and Wept?” he said. “You think the title’s the key?”

“It’s a reference to Babylon, isn’t it?” said Ruth. “And what would Fleming want to immortalize? What would give him the most pleasure?”

“A moment of despair,” said Monsieur Béliveau.

“I don’t understand.”

“He came asking for help and I sent him to Al Lepage,” she said. “I’d have done anything to get him away from me.”

Beauvoir was listening, nodding. None of this was new, so why was she repeating herself? Once again, she tapped the title.

She Sat Down and Wept.

“Why did he call it that?” Ruth asked. “We just read it. At no stage does any woman actually sit down and weep. No one does. So why call it that?”

*

Gamache looked at the mess on the floor of the bistro. Old newspapers and magazines were scattered everywhere. But no plans.

What was he missing? It was ten to six and they were no closer to finding the designs for Project Babylon.

He looked at the play, the goddamned play, which he’d tossed onto one of the armchairs at the bistro. Had Fleming lied? It seemed likely now.

She Sat Down and Wept. She Sat Down and Wept.

It was, he had to admit, a strange title. No one in the play, man or woman, ever sat down and cried. Or stood up and cried. No one wept at all.

And the actual biblical quote was “By the waters of Babylon, we sat down and wept.” We sat down, not she. It was a misquote. But Fleming knew the Bible, so it must’ve been done on purpose. With a purpose. Gamache remembered Fleming caressing the play with that one finger. But he wasn’t just touching the script, he was stroking the words of the title when he’d said, “You have no idea why I wrote this, do you? If you did, you wouldn’t need to be here.”

“This” wasn’t the play, it was the title.

She Sat Down and Wept.

Gamache forced himself to sit in the armchair, the play on his lap. Olivier, Gabri and Rosenblatt stared at him.

“Aren’t you going to do something?” Gabri demanded. “Have you just given up?”

“Shhh,” said Olivier. “He is doing something. He’s thinking.”

“Ahhh,” said Gabri. “That’s what it looks like.”

What did it mean? Gamache asked himself, tuning out the rest of the world.

Fleming hid the plans, then he wrote the play. A play set in a fictional Three Pines. His eyes narrowed. There was one thing every character was looking for.

Milk. In the hardware store. They came there to find it. But it wasn’t there, of course. So where would you find it?

Gamache got up and walked to the door.

*

“My store?” asked Monsieur Béliveau. “You think he hid the plans in my store?”

“Where else do you find milk?” asked Beauvoir, walking to the window. Looking out, he saw Gamache standing at the bistro door, also looking toward Monsieur Béliveau’s general store.

But then Gamache turned away.

Jean-Guy followed the Chief’s gaze. Past Monsieur Béliveau’s store, past the village green, past the three tall pines, past Clara’s place to Jane’s home. At Jane Neal’s now-empty house, Gamache’s gaze paused.

Ruth’s best friend. Instead of recommending Jane for the artwork, she’d tossed Al Lepage into the pit.

“Ruth,” Jean-Guy asked. “After you spoke to Fleming, did you go over to your friend Jane’s place? Did you talk to her about this?”

*

Gamache turned from Jane’s home and looked directly across the village green, to Ruth’s place.

He saw movement in the window. Jean-Guy.

Ruth had wanted to see Beauvoir, urgently, but didn’t want anyone else to know why. That’s why she sent the message about Lysol.

Ruth.

Who’d saved herself by betraying someone else. Ruth. Who’d been forced to face a terrible truth. She was a coward.