A Trick of the Light

“May I?” Fortin gestured toward it and Gamache handed it to him. “It’s light.” Fortin looked at one side then the other before handing it back. “I’m sorry, I have no idea what it is.”

He looked closely at the Chief Inspector.

“I’ve been patient, I think,” said Fortin. “But perhaps now you’ll tell me what this’s about.”

“Do you know a woman named Lillian Dyson?”

Fortin thought, then shook his head. “Should I? Is she an artist?”

“I have a picture of her, would you mind looking?”

“Not at all.” Fortin reached for it, fixing Gamache with a perplexed glance, then looked down at the photograph. His brows drew together.

“She looks—”

Gamache didn’t finish Fortin’s sentence. Was he going to say “familiar”? “Dead”?

“Asleep. Is she?”

“Do you know her?”

“I think I might have seen her at a few vernissages, but I see so many people.”

“Did you see her at Clara’s show?”

Fortin thought then shook his head. “She wasn’t at the vernissage while I was there. But it was early and there weren’t many people yet.”

“And the barbeque?”

“It was dark by the time I arrived so she might have been there and I just didn’t notice.”

“She was definitely there,” said Gamache, replacing the coin. “She was killed there.”

Fortin gaped at him. “Someone was killed at the party? Where? How?”

“Have you ever seen her art, Monsieur Fortin?”

“That woman’s?” Fortin asked, nodding toward the photo, now on the table between them. “Never. I’ve never seen her and I’ve never seen her art, not as far as I know, anyway.”

Then another question struck Gamache.

“Suppose she’s a great artist. Would she be worth more to a gallery dead or alive?”

“That’s a grisly question, Chief Inspector.” But Fortin considered it. “Alive she would produce more art for the gallery to sell, and presumably for more and more money. But dead?”

“Oui?”

“If she was that good? The fewer paintings the better. A bidding war would ignite and the prices…”

Fortin looked to the ceiling.

Gamache had his answer. But was it the right question?

TWELVE

“What’s this?”

Clara stood beside the phone in the kitchen. The barbeque was on and Peter was outside poking steaks from the Bresee farm.

“What?” he called through the screen door.

“This.”

Clara walked outside and held up a piece of paper. Peter’s face fell.

“Oh, shit. Oh, my God, Clara, I completely forgot. In all the chaos of finding Lillian and all the interruptions—” He waved the prongs, then stopped.

Clara’s face, rather than softening as it had so often, had hardened. And in her hand she held his scribbled list of messages, of congratulations. He’d left it by the phone. Under the phone. Pinned there, for safe keeping. He’d been meaning to show it to her.

It had just slipped his mind.

From where she stood Clara could see the police tape, outlining a ragged circle in her garden. A hole. Where a life had ended.

But another hole now opened up, right where Peter stood. And she could almost see the yellow tape around him, encircling him. Swallowing him, as it had Lillian.

Peter stared at her, his eyes imploring her to understand. Begging her.

And then, as Clara watched, Peter seemed to disappear, leaving just an empty space where her husband had been.

*   *   *

Armand Gamache sat in his study at home, taking notes and speaking with Isabelle Lacoste.

“I’ve spoken to Inspector Beauvoir about this, and he suggested I call you as well, Chief. Most of the guests have been interviewed,” she said, down the phone line from Three Pines. “We’re getting a picture of the evening, but what isn’t in the picture is Lillian Dyson. We asked everyone, including the waiters. No one saw her.”

Gamache nodded. He’d been following her written reports all day. They were impressive as always. Clear, thorough. Intuitive. Agent Lacoste wasn’t afraid to follow her instinct. She wasn’t afraid to be wrong.

And that, the Chief knew, was a great strength.

It meant she’d be willing to explore dim alleys a lesser agent wouldn’t even see. Or, if they did, they’d dismiss as unlikely. A waste of time.

Where, he asked his agents, was a murderer likely to hide? Where it was obvious? Perhaps. But most of the time they were found in unexpected places. Inside unexpected personalities and bodies.

Down the dim alleys, most of them with pleasant veneers.

“What do you think it means that no one saw her at the party?” he asked.

Agent Lacoste was quiet for a moment. “Well, I wondered if she could’ve been killed somewhere else and her body brought into the Morrow garden. That would explain why no one saw her at either party.”

“And?”

“I spoke with the forensics team and that seems unlikely. They believe she died where she was found.”

“What are the other options?”

“Besides the obvious? That she was teleported there by aliens?”

“Besides that one.”

“I think she arrived and went directly to the Morrows’ garden.”

“Why?”

Now Isabelle Lacoste paused, walking slowly through the possibilities. Not being afraid to make a mistake, but not rushing to make one either.