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As he got closer to St. Thomas’s, Armand heard a nails-on-blackboard sort of sound.

He looked up and saw the caretaker at the top of the steps scraping white paint off the clapboard.

“Bonjour,” called Armand as he mounted the stairs.

The man ignored him.

At the top, he paused and looked over the village. To the roofline of the shops below.

“You were the one who noticed that there’s an attic room attached to the bookstore,” he said to the caretaker.

Still the man continued to work, his knobbly backbone visible under the worn work shirt.

Armand realized he’d never actually spoken to him, and had only really seen him at a distance. Now he looked more closely. At the thinning gray hair. The almost fragile frame.

His age indeterminant, but well north of middle age.

The only reply was the screeching of the scraper, as though the man was torturing the building.

Gamache stepped between the caretaker and the wall. The man had to stop, unless he wanted to scrape the Chief Inspector’s legs.

The caretaker slowly straightened up. He was at least four inches shorter than the six-foot-one Gamache.

He glanced down at the village and shrugged. “I said the roof would soon need replacing. I never mentioned a hidden room.”

“But it doesn’t,” said Gamache. “Look.”

The man did not. “I made a mistake. I’m not a roofer.”

Gamache stared at him, but the man kept dropping his eyes.

“Your name is Claude, is that right?”

“Oui.”

“And your last name?”

The man hesitated. It was clear to Gamache that there was enmity there. This man did not like him. At all. And yet Gamache could not imagine why that would be.

“Boisfranc.”

“Monsieur Boisfranc, where were you before you came here?”

Now he did raise his eyes and met Gamache’s. “Piss off.”

Gamache raised his brows. “Pardon?”

“You heard me. Piss off. Fuck off. I don’t have to answer any questions. Get out of my way. I have a job to do.” He brandished the scraper as though it were a shiv.

Gamache looked deep into Claude Boisfranc’s eyes and saw … nothing. Well, he didn’t see a monster, a lunatic. He did see anger, but that was not uncommon for a cop.

This aggression was a puzzle but not, Gamache felt, a worry.

“I’m sorry for disturbing you.” Stepping aside, he opened the door to the church.

It was dark and cool inside and smelled of old books and wax polish. It smelled of calm and, best of all, stability.

Robert Mongeau sat in a pew, surrounded by cheery light through the immortal boys.