Still Life (A Three Pines Mystery)

'Jane's favorite. He's not just any rose, Chief Inspector.

He's considered by rosarians to be one of the finest in the world. An old garden rose. Only blooms once a season but with a show that's spectacular. And then it's gone. That's why I made the muffins from rose water, as a homage to Jane. Then I ate them, as you saw. I always eat my pain.' Gabri smiled slightly. Looking at the size of the man, Gamache marveled at the amount of pain he must have. And fear perhaps. And anger? Who knows, indeed.

Ben Hadley was waiting for them outside the schoolhouse, as Beauvoir had requested in his call.

'Is everything as it should be from the outside, Mr Hadley?' Gamache asked.

Ben, a little surprised at the question, looked around. Gamache wondered whether Ben Hadley wasn't a little surprised all the time.

'Yes. Do you want to see inside?' Ben reached for the knob, but Beauvoir quickly brought his own hand down on Ben's arm and stopped him. Instead, Beauvoir pulled a roll of yellow police tape from his jacket and handed it to Nichol. While Nichol put the yellow 'Do not cross, crime scene' tape around the door and windows Beauvoir explained.

'It looks as though Miss Neal was killed by an arrow. We need to go over your clubhouse carefully in case the weapon came from here.'

'But that's ridiculous.'

'Why?'

Ben simply looked around as though the peaceful setting was reason enough. Into Beauvoir's outstretched hand he deposited the keys.

As Agent Nichol maneuvered the car on to the Champlain Bridge and back into Montreal she looked past Chief Inspector Gamache, silent and thinking in the seat beside her, and toward the Montreal skyline, the huge cross just beginning to glow on the top of Mont Royal. Her family would have held back Thanksgiving dinner for her. They'd do anything for her, she knew, both comforted and bound by the certainty. And all she had to do was succeed.

Walking into his own home that evening Gamache smelt roasting partridge. It was one of Reine-Marie's holiday specialties, the small game birds wrapped in bacon and slowly cooked in a sauce of mulled wine and juniper berries. Normally he'd have made the wild rice stuffing, but she'd probably have done that herself. They exchanged news while he stripped and took a shower. She told him about the baptism and the finger food afterward. She was almost certain she was at the right baptism, though she didn't recognise all that many people. He told her about his day and the case. He told her everything. In this he was unusual, but he couldn't quite see how he could have a deep partnership with Reine-Marie and keep this part of his life secret. So he told her everything, and she told him everything. So far, after thirty-five years, it seemed to be working.

Their friends came, and it was a comfortable, easy night. A couple of good bottles of wine, an outstanding Thanksgiving meal, and warm and thoughtful company. Gamache was reminded of the beginning of Virginia Woolf's Orlando. Orlando, through the ages, wasn't looking for wealth or fame, or honors. No, all Orlando wanted was company.

Clara rocked back and forth, back and forth, cradling her loss. Earlier in the day she'd felt someone had scooped her heart and her brain right out of her body. Now they were back, but they were broken. Her brain jumped madly about the place, but always back to that one scorched spot.

Peter crept to the bedroom door and looked in. God help him, part of him was jealous. Jealous of the hold Jane had over Clara. He wondered whether Clara would have been like this had he died. And he realised that, had he died in the woods, Clara would have had Jane to comfort her. And Jane would have known what to do. In that instant a door opened for Peter. For the first time in his life he asked what someone else would do. What would Jane do if she was here and he was dead? And he had his answer. Silently he lay down beside Clara and wrapped himself around her. And for the first time since getting the news, her heart and mind calmed. They settled, just for one blessed instant, on a place that held love, not loss.

FOUR

'Toast?' Peter ventured next morning to Clara's blubbering back.

'High doan whan doast,' she sobbed and slobbered, a fine thread of spittle descending to the floor to pool, glistening, at her feet. They were standing barefoot in the kitchen where they'd begun to make breakfast. Normally they'd have already showered and if not dressed at least put on slippers and a dressing gown over their flannel pajamas. But this morning wasn't normal. Peter simply hadn't appreciated how far from normal it was until this moment.

Lying all night, holding Clara, he'd dared to hope that the worst was over. That maybe the grief, while still there, would today allow some of his wife to be present. But the woman he knew and loved had been swallowed up. Like Jonah. Her white whale of sorrow and loss in an ocean of body fluid.