*
“What the fuck is this about?” whispered Beauvoir, as they walked back down the corridor a few feet behind the abbot and Chief Superintendent Francoeur.
Gamache shot Beauvoir a warning. Not a slight visual reprimand, but a club to the head. Shut up, said the stern expression. Hold your tongue now, if you’ve never held it before.
Beauvoir shut up. But that didn’t stop him from watching, and listening. As they progressed they walked through the clouds of conversation created by the two men ahead.
“A terrible shame, mon père,” the Chief Superintendent was saying. “The prior’s death is a national tragedy. I can assure you, though, that we’ll solve this quickly and you’ll have your privacy to grieve. I’ve ordered my people to keep Frère Mathieu’s death quiet for as long as possible.”
“Chief Inspector Gamache said that wouldn’t be possible.”
“And he was quite correct, of course. He couldn’t do it. I have the highest respect for Monsieur Gamache, but his powers are limited.”
“And yours are not?” asked the abbot.
Beauvoir smiled and wondered if the abbot knew who he was dealing with.
Superintendent Francoeur laughed. It was relaxed and good-humored.
“By your measurement, Dom Philippe, my powers are pretty puny. But measured in mortal terms they’re substantial. And are at your disposal.”
“Merci, mon fils. I’m most grateful.”
Beauvoir turned a disgusted face to Gamache and opened his mouth, but shut it again upon seeing the Chief’s expression. It wasn’t angry. It wasn’t even upset.
Chief Inspector Gamache was puzzled. As though trying to work out some complex mathematical formula that didn’t add up.
Beauvoir had a question of his own.
What the fuck is this about?
*
“Can I say it now?” Beauvoir leaned against the closed door.
“No need,” said the Chief, taking a chair in the prior’s cramped office. “I know the question, but not the answer.”
“Like Jeopardy,” said Beauvoir, crossing his arms over his chest and continuing to lean against the door. A human deadbolt. “I’ll take ‘What the Fuck’ for two hundred, Alex.”
Gamache laughed. “It is puzzling,” he admitted.
And, thought Beauvoir, it might also be jeopardy.
They’d last seen Superintendent Francoeur walking through the Blessed Chapel, deep in conversation with the abbot. The homicide agents and the monks had been dismissed but had, for a moment, stood together watching these two men progress through the church and down the long corridor toward the abbot’s office.
Francoeur’s head, with its distinguished gray hair, was bent toward the abbot’s shaved head. Two extremes. One finely dressed, the other in austere robes. One forceful, the other a study in humility.
But both in charge. Apparently.
Beauvoir wondered if the two men would form an alliance, or start another war.
He looked at Gamache, who’d put his reading glasses on and was making notes.
And where did this leave the Chief? The appearance of Sylvain Francoeur seemed to have left Gamache perplexed but unconcerned. Beauvoir hoped he genuinely was, and there was no need to worry.
But it was too late for that. Worry had taken root in Beauvoir’s belly. An old and familiar ache.
Gamache looked up and met Beauvoir’s eyes. The Chief smiled reassuringly.
“It’s no use speculating, Jean-Guy. We’ll know why Superintendent Francoeur’s here soon enough.”
They spent the next half hour discussing their conversations that morning, Beauvoir with Frère Antoine and Gamache with the abbot.
“So the abbot made Frère Antoine the new choir director?” Beauvoir’s surprise was obvious. “He didn’t tell me that.”
“Perhaps it made the abbot look too good, and Frère Antoine wouldn’t want that.”
“Yeah, maybe. But do you think that’s why the abbot did it?”
“What do you mean?” Gamache leaned forward.
“He could’ve appointed anyone. Could’ve taken the job himself. But maybe he gave it to Frère Antoine just to screw with the prior’s men. A mind fuck. Do the opposite of what they expect. Prove he’s above their stupid little fights by making Frère Antoine the choir director. Maybe the abbot wanted to show he’s better than them. It’s a smart move, if you think about it.”
Gamache thought about it. He thought about the two dozen monks. Messing with each other’s minds. Trying to keep each other off-balance. Is that what was going on here, perhaps for years? A form of psychological terrorism?
Subtle, invisible. A glance, a smile, a turned back.
In a silent order a single word, a sound, could be devastating. A tsk, a sniff, a chuckle.
Had the gentle abbot perfected those weapons?
Promoting Frère Antoine was the right thing to do. He was the best musician, a clear successor to the prior as choirmaster. But did the abbot do it for the wrong reason?
To screw with the prior’s men?
And the vow of silence? Had the abbot fought to keep it because of the spiritual significance to the community? Or, again, to screw with the prior? To deny the prior what he most wanted?
And why was the prior so determined to lift a vow in place for nearly a thousand years? Was it for the good of the order, or the good of the prior?
“What’re you thinking?” asked Beauvoir.
“A phrase popped into my mind and I was just trying to remember where it came from.”
“Is it poetry?” asked Beauvoir, a little nervously. It didn’t take much for the Chief to start quoting some unintelligible poem.
“As a matter of fact, I was thinking of an epic work by Homer.” Gamache opened his mouth as though to start reciting then laughed at the distress on Beauvoir’s face. “No. It’s just a line. To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
Beauvoir thought about that. “I wonder if the opposite is ever true.”
“What do you mean?”