The Nature of the Beast: A Chief Inspector Gamache Novel

How would he feel if he found Annie…?

Chief Inspector Gamache had told them to crawl into the skins of the victim and the suspects, but he’d warned his investigators that it was difficult to do, and it was dangerous. Jean-Guy had never really understood the need, or the danger.

But now he did.

He’d gotten into Brian’s skin but had overshot the mark and ended up in his broken heart.

As they left, Jean-Guy picked up the copy of the play from the table. Brian explained it was Antoinette’s. He’d taken it with him to Montréal, having left his own copy in the theater.

Beauvoir was not a superstitious man, or claimed not to be. But even to this rational man, the play seemed heavier than just paper.

*

They interviewed all the neighbors, none of whom saw or heard anything, and left Madame Proulx, next door, ’til last. She was middle-aged and plump and worried, her large, red hands intertwined and fidgety.

“What did Brian Fitzpatrick say to you exactly?” Isabelle Lacoste asked as they took seats in the comfortable living room. “When he arrived this morning.”

“That something had happened and he needed to call for help, but he was trembling too hard, so I called.”

“Did he say anything else?”

“Only that Antoinette had been hurt. I asked if we should go over to help and he looked so frightened, I knew.”

Her eyes moved from one to the other. “She’s dead, isn’t she?”

“I’m afraid so.”

And then she did something rarely seen anymore in Québec. She crossed herself.

“Did you see anyone arrive at their place last night?” Isabelle Lacoste asked.

“No, I had the curtains drawn and was watching television. Les Filles de Caleb.”

Lacoste nodded. It was what all the other neighbors had said. Everyone had drawn the curtains and settled in front of the television to watch the rerun of the wildly popular show.

A werewolf could tear apart the living room and this woman wouldn’t budge while that show was on. Lacoste was beginning to wonder if the killer had chosen the time for that very reason.

“Do you know who did it?” asked Madame Proulx.

“Non, not yet, but we will,” said Lacoste.

She tried to reassure Madame Proulx, but without a suspect arrested the reassurance was hollow.

At least Laurent Lepage’s murder hadn’t appeared random. It seemed clear from the beginning that he was killed not because he was Laurent, or a child, but because of what he found in the woods. There was a reason.

But the murder of Antoinette Lemaitre seemed senseless. There was no obvious motive. And into that void there streamed all sorts of suspicions. And understandable terror.

Lacoste could see exactly what Madame Proulx was thinking. It could’ve been me. Followed closely by, Thank God it was the woman next door.

“What did you think of Antoinette?” Lacoste asked.

“She was okay. She’s friendly without being overly familiar, if you know what I mean.”

“Did you like her?” Lacoste asked.

There was a hesitation and Madame Proulx shifted in her La-Z-Boy. “I warmed to her. I liked her uncle, Guillaume. We’d chat over the fence in the summer while he gardened.”

“Sounds like you didn’t really like her, though,” Lacoste gently pushed, though it didn’t take much.

“She was difficult,” Madame Proulx admitted. “As soon as she moved in she started complaining. About the kids playing street hockey and the noise from family barbeques. She behaved like it was her seigneurie and we were all habitants, if you know what I mean.”

Lacoste did. Les Filles de Caleb was having its effect, down to the old-fashioned description of lord and peasant. But while the words were from a TV script, the emotions seemed genuine. Madame Proulx did not take kindly to the city woman bossing them around. It was what they’d heard, in various versions, from the other neighbors, once they’d gotten past being polite about the recently, and violently, deceased.

“Can you think of anyone who might’ve done this?” Lacoste asked, and saw Madame Proulx’s eyes widen.

“No. Can’t you? Isn’t that your job? You have no ideas?”

“We have some,” said Lacoste, bringing out the reassurance yet again, and yet again it had a marginal effect. “But I need to ask. No especially violent feuds with neighbors?”

“None. It was annoying, nothing more. And she looked odd. Those clothes. She was like a spoiled child.”

She turned shrewd eyes on the investigators.

“You don’t think it was just a robbery?”

“We’re looking at all possibilities.”

Madame Proulx took in, apparently for the first time, the script in Beauvoir’s hand, and she rose to her feet. Not swiftly, not even struggling out of the comfortable chair. There was a grace and ease about all her movements. And there was also certainty.

“I would like you to leave, and take that with you.”