FOURTEEN
‘Daniel?’
Hi, Dad, enfin. I was beginning to think I’d imagined you.’
Gamache laughed. ‘Mom and I are at the Manoir Bellechasse, not exactly a telecommunications hub.’
As he spoke he looked out of the French doors of the library, across the mint-green wet grass and to the misty lake beyond. A low cloud clung softly to the forest. He could hear birds and insects, and sometimes a splash as a feeding trout or bass jumped. And he could hear the wah-wah of a siren and the irritated honking of a horn.
Paris.
The City of Light mingling with the wilderness. What a world we live in, he thought.
‘It’s nine p.m. here. What time is it there?’ Daniel asked.
‘Almost three. Is Florence in bed?’
‘We’re all in bed, I’m embarrassed to admit. Ah, Paris.’ Daniel laughed his deep, easy rumble. ‘But I’m glad we finally connected. Here, wait, let me just get to another room.’
Gamache could see him in their tiny flat in Saint-Germaindes-Pres. Moving to another room wouldn’t guarantee either privacy for him or peace for his wife and child.
‘Armand?’ Reine-Marie stood at the door of the library. She’d packed her bags and a porter was just taking them out to the car. They’d talked about it, and Armand had asked her to leave the Bellechasse.
‘I will, of course, if that’s what you want,’ she’d said. But she searched his face. She’d never seen him on a case before, though he talked about his work all the time and often asked her opinion. Unlike most of his colleagues, Gamache hid nothing from his wife. He didn’t think he could keep so much of his life from her and not have it come between them. And she was more important than any career.
‘I’ll worry less if you’re not here,’ he said.
‘I understand,’ and she did. She’d feel the same way, if roles were reversed. ‘But do you mind if I don’t go far?’
‘A pup tent on the edge of the property?’
‘You are intuitive,’ she’d said. ‘But I was thinking of Three Pines.’
‘What a good idea. I’ll just ring Gabri and get you into his B&B.’
‘No, you find out who murdered Julia and I’ll call the B&B.’
And now she was ready to go. Ready but not happy. She’d felt a pain in her chest as she’d watched him negotiating the first steps of the investigation. His people so respectful, the officers from the local detachment so deferential and even frightened of him, until he’d put them at ease. But not too much at ease. She’d watched her husband take command of the situation, naturally. She knew, and he knew, that someone needed to be in charge. And he was by temperament more than rank the natural leader.
She’d never actually witnessed it before, and she’d watched with surprise as a man she knew intimately exposed a whole new side of himself. He commanded with ease because he commanded respect. Except from the Morrows, who seemed to think he’d tricked them. They’d seemed more upset by that than by the death of Julia.
But Armand always said people react differently to death, and it was folly to judge anyone and double folly to judge what people do when faced with sudden, violent death. Murder. They weren’t themselves.
But privately Reine-Marie wondered. Wondered whether what people did in a crisis was, in fact, their real selves. Stripped of artifice and social training. It was easy enough to be decent when all was going your way. It was another matter to be decent when all hell was breaking loose.
Her husband stepped deliberately into all hell every day, and maintained his decency. She doubted the same could be said for the Morrows.
She’d interrupted him. She could see he was on the phone and began to leave the room. Then she heard the word Roslyn.
He was speaking to Daniel and asking after their daughter-in-law. Reine-Marie had tried to speak to Armand about Daniel, but it had never seemed the right time and now it was too late. Standing on the threshold she listened, her heart pounding.
‘I know Mom told you about the names we’ve chosen. Genevieve if it’s a girl—’
‘Beautiful name,’ said Gamache.
‘We think so. But we also think the boy’s name is beautiful. Honore.’
Gamache had promised himself there’d be no awkward silence when the name was said. There was an awkward silence.
Breathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
‘This is my own, my native land!’
The words of the old poem, spoken as always in the deep, calm voice in his head, filled the void. His large hand clasped gently shut as though holding on to something.
Whose heart hath ne’er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned
From wandering on a foreign strand?
Daniel was in Paris, so far away, but he also felt Daniel was in danger of making a very serious mistake that could propel him further still.
‘I think that might not be the best choice.’
‘Why?’ Daniel sounded curious, not defensive.
‘You know the history.’
‘You told me, but it is history, Dad. And Honore Gamache is a good name, for a good man. You more than anyone know that.’
‘It’s true.’ Gamache felt a twinge of anxiety. Daniel wasn’t backing down. ‘But more than anyone I also know what can happen in a world not always kind.’
‘You’ve taught us we make our own world. What was that Milton quote we were raised with?
‘The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n.
‘It’s what you believe, Dad, and so do I. Remember those walks in the park? You’d take Annie and me and recite poetry all the way there. That was one of your favourites. And mine.’
Gamache felt a fizzing in his throat as he remembered walks, tiny, pudgy fingers in what seemed a massive hand. Not so much holding as being held.
‘One day soon it’ll be my turn. I’ll be taking Florence and Honore to Parc Mont Royal blabbing poetry all the way.’
‘Blabbing? Don’t you mean reciting in a strong yet musical voice?’
‘Of course. Breathes there the man with soul so dead. Re member that one?’
‘I do.’
‘All the ones you taught me, I’ll teach them, including Milton, including that the mind is its own place and we make our own reality, our own world. Don’t worry,’ Daniel continued, his voice full of reason and patience. ‘Honore will know the world starts between his ears and is his for the making. And he’ll be taught as I was what a beautiful name that is.’
‘No, Daniel, you’re making a mistake.’ There, he’d said it. The one thing he’d promised himself not to say. Still, Daniel had to be made to see it, had to be stopped from making this well-intentioned but tragic mistake.
In his peripheral vision he saw a movement. Reine-Marie had taken a step into the room. He looked at her. Her body was composed but her eyes were filled with surprise and anxiety. Still, it had to be done. Sometimes parenting was standing up and doing what was unpopular. Risking censure. Daniel must not be allowed to name his son Honore.
‘I’d hoped you’d feel differently, Dad.’
‘But why would I? Nothing’s changed.’
‘Time has changed. That was years ago. Decades. You need to let it go.’
‘I’ve seen things. I’ve seen what wilful parents can do to a child. I’ve seen kids so deeply wounded—’ they can’t even jump, he almost said. Their feet never leave the ground. No leap for joy, no skipping rope, no jumping from the dock, no dangling in the arms of a loving and trusted parent.
‘Are you accusing me of hurting our child?’ Daniel’s voice was no longer full of reason and patience. ‘Are you really suggesting I’d hurt my son? He isn’t even born yet and you’re already accusing me? You still see me as a screw-up, don’t you?’
‘Daniel, calm down. I never saw you as a screw-up, you know that.’