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“Fifteen?” said Jean-Guy. “Fifteen?”

“It gets worse. A subsequent inquiry found he almost certainly killed more than two hundred. All his patients.”

They stared at him. From anyone else, they wouldn’t have believed it.

“Didn’t anyone suspect?” asked Isabelle.

“Yes, there was even an investigation. But he was a doctor, a respected member of the community, his explanations for the deaths were reasonable. The junior investigators assigned to the case didn’t take the allegations seriously. And do you know why?”

“Because he was a doctor?” asked Isabelle.

“Partly that, but there was another reason. The vast majority of those who died were elderly.” He let that sit there. “Close to death anyway, it was felt. It wasn’t worth the effort to investigate. And before we get all high and mighty, let’s remember what happened here not long ago in the pandemic. Let’s remember what happens when a street worker, a gay or transsexual man or woman, a Black man or woman, an indigenous man or woman or child is killed. There’s hardly a great outpouring of attention or resources. Or grief.”

As he spoke, they could hear the outrage simmering just below the surface. Gamache, as head of homicide and, for a time, head of the entire Sûreté, had worked to change all that. But it was the work of a lifetime.

“So, you’re saying when they saw a badly disabled child, and were given a story by a prominent member of the community, they chose to believe it?” asked Jean-Guy.

“It’s possible,” said Gamache. “Especially if they had sympathy for him and could see no benefit to digging deeper. Yes. I can see it happening.”

“But Paul Robinson had his doubts,” said Isabelle. “His suspicions. He was covering up for Abby, but he actually suspected Debbie, is that what you’re thinking?”

“It’s one way that picture got into Debbie’s possession,” said Beauvoir. “He might have sent it to her as a warning. An accusation.”

“Could be,” said Gamache. “But if so, why would she keep it? And for so long?”

They stared at each other. There seemed no answer and yet, obviously, there was one.

“And why would Debbie have killed Maria?” asked Isabelle, breaking the silence.

“Jealousy?” said Beauvoir. “Maria was taking up too much of Abigail’s time and attention.”

Isabelle could see that he might have a point. Fifteen-year-old girls weren’t famous for having the best grasp on their emotions, and jealousy was an especially toxic one.

They turned to Gamache, whose eyes had narrowed. What he was thinking, what he was feeling, went against all his beliefs.

“I think it’s possible Debbie did it out of love, not jealousy. Not hate.”

“Love?” said Beauvoir. “Of Maria? To free her?”

“No. Love of Abigail. To free her.”

Armand Gamache believed with all his soul that love could never, ever kill. Not real love. A counterfeit one, something that masqueraded as love, yes. But real love? Never.

Was he wrong? he asked himself. Could love murder? Could it put a pillow over a helpless child’s face?

This was the second time in two days it had been justified as a motive.

Haniya Daoud had killed, in cold blood, apparently out of love. Out of a mother’s driving need to protect and free her “children.”

And now Debbie might have killed Maria, out of love. To free Abigail.

And Armand Gamache was forced to finally see something he didn’t want to. That the only thing that could possibly drive him to murder wasn’t hate.

It was love. For his family.

So why not Haniya?

Why not—he looked down at the photograph—Debbie? If she thought that Maria threatened Abigail’s life. Not her physical life, but her intellectual, her emotional life.