To reappear more than three hundred years later. On the radio.
The voices of an order everyone had thought was extinct were heard first by a few, then by hundreds, then by thousands and hundreds of thousands. Then, thanks to the Internet, finally millions of people listened to the odd little recording.
Of monks chanting.
The recording had become a sensation. Suddenly their Gregorian chants were everywhere. De rigueur. Deemed a “must listen” by the intelligentsia, by the cognoscenti, and finally, by the masses.
While their voices were everywhere, the monks themselves were nowhere to be seen. Eventually they’d been found. Gamache remembered his own astonishment when it was discovered where the monks lived. He’d assumed it was some remote hilltop in Italy or France or Spain. Some tiny, ancient, crumbling monastery. But no. The recording was made by an order of monks living right there, in Québec. And it wasn’t just any order. The Trappists, the Benedictines, the Dominicans. No. Their discovery seemed to astonish even the Catholic Church. The recording had been made by an order of monks the Church seemed to think had died out. The Gilbertines.
But there they were, in the wilderness, on the shores of this far-flung lake. Very much alive, and singing chants so ancient and so beautiful they awakened something primal in millions worldwide.
The world had come calling. Some curious. Some desperate for the peace these men seemed to have found. But this “gate,” made from trees felled hundreds of years ago, held firm. It did not open for strangers.
Until today.
It had opened to let them in, and now it was about to open again, to let them out.
The portier came forward, the large black key in his hand. At a small sign from the abbot he inserted it in the lock. It turned easily, and the door swung open.
Through the rectangle the men saw the setting sun, its reds and oranges reflected in the calm, fresh lake. The forests now were dark, and birds swooped low over the water, calling to each other.
But by far the most glorious sight was the oil-stained boatman, smoking a cigarette and sitting on the dock. Fishing.
He waved as the door swung open, and the Chief Inspector waved back. Then the boatman struggled to his feet, his considerable bottom all but mooning the monks. Gamache motioned Beauvoir and Charbonneau, with the body, to leave first. Then he and the abbot followed them to the dock.
The rest of the monks stayed inside, clustered around the open door. Craning to see out.
The abbot tipped his head to the red-streaked sky and closed his eyes. Not in prayer, Gamache thought, but in a sort of bliss. Enjoying the meager light on his pale face. Enjoying the pine-scented air. Enjoying his feet on the uneven, unpredictable ground.
Then his eyes opened.
“Thank you for not interrupting Vespers,” he said, not looking at Gamache, but continuing to soak in the natural world around him.
“You’re welcome.”
They took a few more steps.
“Thank you too for bringing Mathieu to the altar.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I don’t know if you realized it, but it gave us a chance to offer special prayers. For the dead.”
“I wasn’t sure,” admitted the Chief Inspector, also looking ahead at the mirror lake. “But I thought I heard Dies irae.”
The abbot nodded, “And Dies illa.”
Day of wrath. Day of mourning.
“Are the monks mourning?” asked Gamache. Their gait had slowed almost to a halt.
The Chief had expected an immediate answer, a shocked reply. But instead the abbot seemed to consider.
“Mathieu wasn’t always an easy man.” He smiled a little as he spoke. “No one is, I suppose. One thing we learn early when committing to a monastic life is that we have to accept each other.”
“And what happens if you don’t?”
The abbot paused again. It had been a simple question, but Gamache could see the answer wasn’t simple.
“That can be very bad,” said the abbot. He didn’t meet Gamache’s eyes. “It happens. But we learn to set aside our own feelings for the greater good. We learn to get along.”
“But not necessarily to like each other,” said Gamache. It wasn’t a question. He knew the S?reté was much the same. There were a few colleagues he didn’t like, and he knew the feeling was mutual. Indeed, “didn’t like” was a euphemism. The feeling had gone from disagreement, to dislike, to distrust. And was growing still. It had settled, for now, on mutual loathing. Gamache didn’t know where it would stop, but he could imagine. The fact these people were his superiors made it simply more uncomfortable. It meant, at least for now, they had to figure out how to exist together. Either that, or tear each other and the service apart. And Gamache, as he tilted his own face to the glorious sunset, knew that was a possibility. In the calm of the early evening it seemed far away, but he knew this peaceful time wouldn’t last. Night was coming. And it was a fool who met it unprepared.
“Who could have done this, mon père?”
Now they were stopped on the dock, watching as the boatman and the officers secured Frère Mathieu’s covered body to the boat, beside the catch of bass and trout and the writhing worms.
Again the abbot considered. “I don’t know. I should know, but I don’t.”
He looked behind him. The monks had ventured out and were standing in a semi-circle, watching them. Frère Simon, the abbot’s secretary, was standing a step or two forward.
“Poor one,” said Dom Philippe under his breath.
“Who do you mean?”
“Pardon?”
“You said, ‘Poor one.’ Who did you mean?” asked Gamache.
“Whoever did this.”
“And who is that, Dom Philippe?” He’d had the impression the abbot had been looking at one monk as he’d spoken. Brother Simon. The sad monk. The one who’d separated himself from the rest.
There was a moment’s tense silence as the abbot looked at his community, and Gamache looked at the abbot. Finally the abbot turned back to the Chief Inspector.
“I don’t know who killed Mathieu.”
He shook his head. A weary smile appeared on the abbot’s face. “I actually believed I could look at them just now and tell. That there’d be something different about him. Or me. That I’d just know.”
The abbot gave a small grunt of laughter. “Ego. Hubris.”
“And?” asked Gamache.
“It didn’t work.”
“Don’t feel badly, I do the same thing. I have yet to look at anyone and know immediately that they’re the killer, but I still try.”
“And what would you do if it worked?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Suppose you did look at someone, and just knew?”
Gamache smiled. “I’m not sure I’d trust myself. Probably think it was all in my imagination. Besides, it wouldn’t impress a judge if on the stand I said, ‘I just knew.’”
“That’s the difference between us, Chief Inspector. You need proof in your line of work. I don’t.”
The abbot glanced behind them again and Gamache wondered if this was idle conversation, or something more. The semi-circle of monks continued to watch.
One of them had killed Brother Mathieu.
“What’re you looking for, mon père? You might not need proof, but you need a sign. What sign in their faces are you looking for? Guilt?”
The abbot shook his head. “I wasn’t looking for guilt. I was looking for pain. Can you imagine the pain he must have been in, to do this? And the pain he still feels?”
The Chief scanned their faces again, and finally came to rest on the man right beside him. Gamache did see pain in the face of one of the monks. Dom Philippe. The abbot.
“Do you know who did this?” Gamache asked again, quietly. So that it was only audible to the abbot and the sweet autumn air around them. “If you do, you must tell me. I’ll find him eventually, you know. It’s what I do. But it’s a terrible, terrible process. You have no idea what’s about to be unleashed. And once it starts, it won’t stop until the murderer is found. If you can spare the innocent, I’m begging you to do it. Tell me who did this, if you know.”
That brought the abbot’s full attention back to the large, quiet man in front of him. The slight breeze tugged at the graying hair just curling by the Chief Inspector’s ears. But the rest of the man was still. Firm.
And his eyes, deep brown like the earth, were thoughtful.
And kind.
And Dom Philippe believed Armand Gamache. The Chief Inspector had been brought to the monastery, admitted to their abbey, to find the murderer. It was what this man was always meant to do. And he was almost certainly very good at it.
“I would tell you if I knew.”
“We’re ready,” Beauvoir called from the boat.
“Bon.” Gamache held the abbot’s eyes for another moment then turned to see the boatman’s large hand resting on the outboard motor, ready to pull the cord.
“Captain Charbonneau?” Gamache invited the S?reté inspector to take a seat.
“Is it possible to keep this quiet?” asked Dom Philippe.
“I’m afraid not, mon père. The news will get out, it always does,” said Gamache. “You might consider issuing a statement yourself.”
He saw the distaste on the abbot’s face and suspected that wouldn’t happen.
“Au revoir, Chief Inspector,” said Dom Philippe, extending his hand. “Thank you for your help.”
“You’re welcome,” said Gamache, taking the hand. “But it isn’t over yet.” At a nod from Gamache, the boatman yanked the cord and the motor leapt into life. Beauvoir dropped the rope into the boat and it drifted away. Leaving Gamache and Beauvoir standing on the dock.
“You’re staying?” asked the abbot, bewildered.
“Yes. We’re staying. I leave with the murderer, or not at all.”
Beauvoir stood beside Gamache and together they watched the small boat chug down the sunset bay, and around the corner. Out of sight.
The two S?reté investigators remained there until the sound had disappeared.
And then they turned their backs on the natural world and followed the robed figures back into the monastery of Saint-Gilbert-Entre-les-Loups.