Agent Nichol’s car skidded round the snowy corner, barely making the turn off the main road onto the tiny secondary road that led to Three Pines. Gamache hadn’t invited her to stay at the B. & B. with them, but she would anyway, even if she had to pay her own way. While in Montreal, after interviewing the headmistress of Crie’s snooty private school, Agent Nichol had driven home to pick up a suitcase, stopping briefly to have a bite with her relatives gathered in the tiny, fastidious house.
Her father always seemed nervous on these occasions and had instructed his daughters never to mention the family history in Czechoslovakia. Growing up in the immaculate little home in east end Montreal Nichol had seen a parade of distant relatives and friends of friends come to live with them, though it was less a parade than a cortege. They trudged through the door, all in black with stone stern faces, speaking words she couldn’t understand and sucking all the attention the world had to offer. They demanded and yelled and wailed and complained. They came from Poland and Lithuania and Hungary and young Yvette listened to them and came to believe each person must have their own language. Hovering near the doorway in the tiny, crowded, chaotic living room, a room that had once been so pleasant and calm, young Yvette struggled to understand what was being said. At first the newcomers would speak kindly to her, then when she didn’t react they’d speak more loudly, until finally they screamed at her in the universal language that said she was lazy and stupid and disrespectful. Her mother, once so gentle and kindly, had become impatient too, and yelled at her. In a language she did understand. Little Yvette Nikolev had become the foreigner. All her life she’d stand just on the outside. Longing to belong, but knowing she didn’t, when even her mother sided with others.
It was then she began to worry. If her home was this baffling and overwhelming, what was waiting outside? Suppose she couldn’t make herself understood? Suppose something happened, but she couldn’t follow the instructions? Suppose she needed something? Who would give it to her? And so Yvette Nichol had learned to take.
‘So, you’re back with Gamache,’ her father had said.
‘Yes sir.’ She smiled at him. He was the only one who had ever stood up for her as a child. The only one who’d protected her again those invaders. He’d catch her eye and wave her over and give her a butterscotch candy wrapped in noisy cellophane. He’d instruct her to hide someplace to open it. Away from prying and greedy eyes. Their secret. Her father had taught her the value and necessity of secrets.
‘You must never tell him about Czechoslovakia. Promise me now. He wouldn’t understand. They only want pure Quebecers in the S?reté. If he found out you’re Czech you’d be kicked out. Like Uncle Saul.’
The very idea of being compared to stupid Uncle Saul made her nauseous. Stupid Uncle Saul Nikolev who’d washed out of the Czech police and couldn’t protect the family. And so they’d all perished. Except her father, Ari Nikolev, and her mother and the discontented and bitter relatives who’d used their home like a latrine, dropping their shit all over the young family.
In the small, neat back bedroom Ari Nikolev watched as his daughter packed her suitcase with the dreariest, drabbest clothes in her closet. At his suggestion.
‘I know men,’ he’d said, when she’d protested.
‘But men won’t find me attractive in these.’ She’d jabbed her finger at the pile of clothes. ‘I thought you said you wanted Gamache to like me.’
‘Not to date. Believe me, he’ll like you in those.’
As she turned to find her toiletry bag he slipped a couple of butterscotch candies into the suitcase, where she’d find them that night. And think of him. And with any luck never realize he had his own little secret.
There was no Uncle Saul. No slaughter at the hands of the communists. No noble and valiant flight across the frontier. He’d made all that up years ago to shut up his wife’s relatives camped in their home. It was his lifeboat, made of words, which had kept him afloat on their sea of misery and suffering. Genuine suffering. Even he could admit that. But he’d needed his own stories of heroics and survival.
And so, after helping to conceive little Angelina and then Yvette, he’d conceived Uncle Saul. Whose job it was to save the family, and who had failed. Saul’s spectacular fall from grace had cost Ari his entire fictional family.
He knew he should tell Yvette. Knew that what had started as his own life raft had become an anchor for his little girl. But she worshipped him, and Ari Nikolev craved that look in her gray eyes.
‘I’ll call you every day,’ he said, lifting her light case from the bed. ‘We need to stick together.’ He smiled and cocked his head toward the cacophony that was the living room as the relatives shouted at each other from entrenched positions. ‘I’m proud of you, Yvette, and I know you’ll do well. You have to.’
‘Yes, sir.’
None of the fucking relatives lifted their heads as she left, her father carrying her case to the car and putting it in the trunk. ‘In case there’s a crash, it won’t hit you on the head.’
He hugged her and whispered in her ear, ‘Don’t mess up.’
And now she approached Three Pines. At the top of du Moulin she slowed, her car skidding slightly to the side on the slippery road. Below her the village glowed, the lights off the tall trees reflected red and green and blue on the snow and the ice, like a giant stained glass window. She could see figures moving back and forth in front of the windows of the shops and homes.
A feeling roiled in her chest. Was it anxiety? Resentment perhaps about leaving her own warm home to come here? No. She sat in the car for a few minutes, her shoulders slowly sagging from up round her ears and her breath coming in long, even puffs. Trying to identify this strange feeling. Then, knitting her brows together and staring out the windshield at the cheery little village, she suddenly knew what she was feeling.
Relief. Was this what it felt like to let the weight down, the guard down?
Her cell phone rang. She hesitated, knowing who it was, and not wanting to leave her last thought.
‘Oui, bonjour. Yes sir, I’m in Three Pines. I’ll be polite. I’ll win him over. I know how important this is. I won’t mess up,’ she said in response to his warning.
She hung up and took her foot off the brake. Her car glided into the village and came to a stop in front of the B. & B.