“You don’t have to do anything, but it sure helps. What would happen if you took first year university then skipped to the final year?”
“You’d probably fail.”
“Exactly.”
“But what would failing mean, in this case? You wouldn’t get kicked out of AA?”
Suzanne laughed, but without real amusement. “No. Listen, all the steps are important, but step nine is perhaps the most delicate, the most fraught. It’s really the first time we reach out to others. Take responsibility for what we’ve done. If it’s not done right…”
“What happens?”
“We can do more damage. To them and to ourselves.”
She paused to sniff a lilac in full bloom on the edge of the quiet road. And, Gamache suspected, to give herself time to think.
“It’s beautiful,” she said, raising her nose from the fragrant flower and looking around, as if seeing the pretty little village for the first time. “I could see living here. It would make a nice home.”
Gamache didn’t say anything, judging she was working herself up to something.
“Our lives, when we were drinking, were pretty complicated. Pretty chaotic. We got into all sorts of trouble. It was a mess. And this is all we ever wanted. A quiet place in the bright sunshine. But every day we drank we got further from it.”
Suzanne looked at the little cottages around the village green. Most homes had porches and front gardens with peonies and lupins and roses in bloom. And cats and dogs lounging in the sun.
“We long to find home. After years and years of making war on everyone around us, on ourselves, we just want peace.”
“And how do you find it?” Gamache asked. He more than most knew that peace, like Three Pines, could be very hard to find.
“Well, first we have to find ourselves. Somewhere along the way we got lost. Ended up wandering around in a confusion of drugs and alcohol. Getting further and further away from who we really are.” She turned to him, a smile on her face again. “But some of us find our way back. From the wilderness.” Suzanne looked up from Gamache’s deep brown eyes, from the village green and homes and shops, to the forest and mountains surrounding them. “Getting sloshed was only part of the problem. This is a disease of the emotions. Of perception.” She tapped her temple a few times. “We get all screwy in how we see things, how we think. We call it stinking thinking. And that affects how we feel. And I can tell you, Chief Inspector, that it’s very hard and very scary to change our perceptions. Most can’t do it. But a lucky few do. And in doing that, we find ourselves and,” she looked around, “we find home.”
“You have to change your head to change your heart?” Gamache asked.
Suzanne didn’t answer. Instead she continued to gaze at the village. “How interesting that no cell phones work here. And not a car has come by since we’ve been walking. I wonder if the outside world even knows it’s here.”
“It’s an anonymous village,” said Gamache. “Not on any map. You have to find your own way here.” He turned to his companion. “Are you sure Lillian had actually stopped drinking?”
“Oh, yes, from her first meeting.”
“And when was that?”
Suzanne considered for a moment. “About eight months ago.”
Gamache did the calculation. “So she arrived in AA in October. Do you know why?”
“You mean, did anything happen? No. For some, like Brian, something terrible happens. The world falls apart. They shatter. For others it’s quieter, almost imperceptible. More a crumble. Inside. That’s what happened to Lillian.”
Gamache nodded. “Had you ever been to her home?”
“No. We always met in a café or at my place.”
“Had you seen her art?”
“No. She told me she’d started painting again but I didn’t see it. Didn’t want to.”
“Why not? As an artist yourself I’d have thought you’d be interested.”
“I was, actually. I’m afraid I’m pretty nosy. But it seemed a no-win. If it was great I might become jealous, and that wouldn’t be good. And if it sucked, what would I say? So no, I hadn’t seen her art.”
“Would you really have been jealous of your sponsee? That doesn’t sound like the relationship you described.”
“That was an ideal. I’m close to perfection, as you’ve no doubt noticed, but not quite there yet,” Suzanne laughed at herself. “It’s my only flaw. Jealousy.”
“And nosiness.”
“My two flaws. Jealousy and nosiness. And I’m bossy. Oh, God. I really am fucked up.”
She laughed.
“And I understand you’re in debt.”
That stopped Suzanne in her tracks. “How’d you know that?” She stared at him and when Gamache didn’t respond she gave a resigned nod. “Of course you’d find out. Yes, I’m in debt. Never was good with money and now that apparently I’m not allowed to steal, life is much more difficult.”
She gave him a disarming smile. “Another flaw to add to the growing list.”
A growing list indeed, thought Gamache. What else was she not telling him? It struck him as strange that two artists wouldn’t compare work. That Lillian wouldn’t show her paintings to her sponsor. For approval, for feedback.
And what would Suzanne do? She’d see their brilliance, and then what? Kill Lillian in a jealous rage?
It seemed unlikely.
But it did seem strange that in eight months of an intimate relationship Suzanne had never once visited Lillian’s place. Never seen her art.
Then something else occurred to Gamache. “Was AA the first time you met, or did you know each other before that?”
He could tell he’d hit on something. The smile never wavered, but her eyes grew sharper.
“As a matter of fact, we did know each other. Though ‘know’ isn’t quite right. We’d bump into each other at shows years ago. Before she left for New York. But we were never friends.”
“Were you friendly?”
“After a few drinks? I was more than friendly, Chief Inspector.” And Suzanne laughed.
“But not, presumably, with Lillian.”
“Well, not in that way,” agreed Suzanne. “Look, the truth is, I wasn’t worth her while. She was the big, important critic for La Presse and I was just another drunken artist. And between us? That was just fine with me. She was such a bitch. Famous for it. No amount of booze would make approaching Lillian a good idea.”
Gamache thought for a moment, then resumed walking.
“How long have you been in AA?” he asked.
“Twenty-three years last March eighteenth.”
“Twenty-three years?” He was astonished, and it showed.
“You should have seen me when I first came in,” she laughed. “Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. What you see is the result of twenty-three years of hard labor.”
They passed the front of the terrasse. Beauvoir gestured toward his beer and Gamache nodded.
“Twenty-three years,” repeated Gamache when they resumed their walk. “You stopped drinking about the time Lillian left for New York.”
“I guess I did.”
“Was that just coincidence?”
“She wasn’t part of my life. Lillian had nothing to do with me getting drunk or getting sober.”
Suzanne’s voice had developed an edge. A slight annoyance.
“Do you still paint?” Gamache asked.
“Some. Mostly I dabble. Take some courses, teach some courses, go to vernissages where there’s free food and drink.”
“Did Lillian mention Clara or her show?”
“She never mentioned Clara, not by name anyway. But she did say she needed to make amends to a lot of artists and dealers and gallery owners. Clara might have been among them.”
“And were they among them, do you think?” With a small movement of his head Gamache indicated the two people sitting on the porch of the B and B, watching them.
“Paulette and Normand? No, she didn’t talk about them either. But I wouldn’t be surprised if she owed them an apology. She wasn’t very nice when she was drinking.”
“Or writing. He’s a natural, producing art like it’s a bodily function,” quoted Gamache.
“Oh, you know about that, do you?”
“Obviously you do too.”
“Every artist in Québec knows that. It was Lillian’s finest moment. As a critic, that is. Her pièce de résistance. A near perfect assassination.”
“Do you know who it was about?”
“Don’t you?”
“Would I be asking?”
Suzanne studied Gamache for a moment. “You might. You’re very tricky, I think. But no, I don’t know.”
A near perfect assassination. And that was what it had been. Lillian had delivered a mortal blow with that line. Had the victim waited decades and then returned the favor?