FOURTEEN
After a dinner of coq au vin, green salad, and fruit and meringue, the three of them washed up. Chief Inspector Gamache was up to his elbows in suds in the deep enamel sink, while the Brunels dried.
It was an old kitchen. No dishwasher, no special mixer taps. No upper cabinets. Just dark wood shelves for plates, over the marble counters. And dark wood cabinets underneath.
A harvest table, where they’d eaten, doubled as the kitchen island. The windows looked out onto the back garden, but it was dark outside, so all they could see were their own reflections.
The place felt like what it was. An old kitchen, in an old home, in a very old village. It smelled of bacon and baking. It smelled of rosemary and thyme and mandarin oranges. And coq au vin.
When the dishes were done Gamache looked at the Bakelite clock above the sink. Almost nine o’clock.
Thérèse had returned to the living room with Jér?me. He stoked the embers of the fire while she found the record player and turned it on. A familiar violin concerto started playing softly in the background.
Gamache put his coat on and whistled for Henri.
“Evening stroll?” asked Jér?me, who stood by the bookcase, browsing.
“Want to come?” Gamache clipped Henri onto the leash.
“Not me, merci,” said Thérèse. She sat by the fire and looked relaxed, but tired. “I’m going to have a bath and head for bed in a few minutes.”
“I’ll come with you, Armand,” said Jér?me, and laughed at the look of surprise on the Chief’s face.
“Don’t let him stand still for too long,” Thérèse called after them. “He looks like the bottom half of a snowman. Kids are constantly trying to put big snowballs on top of him.”
“That’s not true,” said Jér?me, as he got into his coat. “Once it happened.” He closed the door behind them. “Let’s go. I’m curious to see this little village you like so much.”
“It won’t take long.”
The cold hit them immediately, but instead of being shocking or uncomfortable, it felt refreshing. Bracing. They were well insulated against it. A tall man and a small, round man. They looked like a broken exclamation mark.
Once down the wide verandah steps, they turned left and strolled along the plowed road. The Chief unclipped Henri, tossed a tennis ball, and watched as the shepherd leapt into the snow bank, furiously digging to retrieve the precious ball.
Gamache was curious to see his companion’s reaction to the village. Jér?me Brunel, as Gamache had grown to appreciate, was not easily read. He was a city man, born and bred. Had studied medicine at the Université de Montréal, and before that he’d spent time at the Sorbonne in Paris, where he’d met Thérèse. She’d been deep into an advanced degree in art history.
Village life and Jér?me Brunel did not, Gamache suspected, naturally mix.
After one quiet circuit, Jér?me stopped and stared at the three huge pine trees, lit up and pointing into the sky. Then, while Gamache threw the ball to Henri, Jér?me looked around at the homes surrounding the village green. Some were redbrick, some were clapboard, some were made of fieldstone, as though expelled from the earth they sat on. A natural phenomenon. But instead of commenting on the village, Jér?me’s glance returned to the three huge pines. He tilted his head back, and followed them. Up, up. Into the stars.
“Do you know, Armand,” he said, his face still turned to the sky, “some of those aren’t stars at all. They’re communication satellites.”
His head, and gaze, dropped to earth. He met Gamache’s eyes. Between them there was a haze of warm breath in the freezing air.
“Oui,” said Armand. Henri sat at his feet staring at the tennis ball, encrusted with frozen drool, in Gamache’s gloved hand.
“They orbit,” Jér?me continued. “Receiving signals and sending them. The whole earth is covered.”
“Almost the whole earth,” said Gamache.
In the light from the trees the Chief saw a smile on Jér?me’s moon face.
“Almost,” Jér?me nodded. “That’s why you brought us here, isn’t it? Not just because it’s the last place anyone would think to look for us, but because this village is invisible. They can’t see us, can they?” He waved to the night sky.
“Did you notice,” Gamache asked, “as soon as we drove down that hill, our cell phones went dead.”
“I did notice. And it’s not just cells?”
“It’s everything. Laptops, smart phones. Tablets. Nothing works here. There’s phone service and electricity,” said Gamache. “But it’s all landlines.”
“No Internet?”
“Dial-up. Not even cable. Not worth it for the companies to try to get through that.”
Gamache pointed and Jér?me looked beyond the small circle of light that was Three Pines. Into the darkness.
The mountains. The forest. The impenetrable woods.
That was the glory of this place, Jér?me realized. From a telecommunications point of view, from a satellite’s point of view, this would be complete darkness.
“A dead zone,” said Jér?me, returning his eyes to Gamache.
The Chief tossed the ball again, and again Henri bounded into the snow bank, only his furiously wagging tail visible.
“Extraordinaire,” said Jér?me. He’d started walking again, but now he looked down, concentrating on his feet. Walking and thinking.
Finally he stopped.
“They can’t trace us. They can’t find us. They can’t see us and they can’t hear us.”
There was no need for Jér?me to explain who “they” were.
Gamache nodded toward the bistro. “Would you like a nightcap?”
“Are you kidding, I’d like the entire outfit.” Jér?me rolled quickly toward the bistro, as though Three Pines had suddenly tilted. Gamache was delayed by a minute or two when he noticed that Henri was still bottom up in the snow drift.
“Honestly,” said Armand when Henri popped his head out, covered in snow. But without the ball. Gamache dug down with his hands and finally found it. Then he made a snowball and tossed it into the air, watching as Henri jumped, grabbed it, bit down and was, yet again, surprised when it disappeared in his mouth.
No learning curve at all, marveled Gamache. But he realized Henri already knew all he’d ever need. He knew he was loved. And he knew how to love.
“Come along,” he said, handing the tennis ball to Henri and clipping him back on his leash.
Jér?me had secured seats in the far corner, away from the other patrons. Gamache greeted and thanked a few of the villagers, whom he knew had helped get Emilie’s home ready for them, then he took the armchair beside Jér?me.
Olivier showed up almost immediately to wipe the table and take their order.
“Everything okay?” he asked.