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That had haunted Armand, and never more so than when, a few years later, he and Reine-Marie had Annie. He tried not to imagine, but couldn’t help …

Many of the families and survivors returned to the École Polytechnique each year to attend the graduation. For more than thirty years they’d supported and applauded those who walked across the stage to accept their degrees. In some ways surrogates for their daughters, sisters, friends. Fellow students. Who never made it that far.

These graduates were testaments to the fact that the gunman had not won. Hate and ignorance had not won. Though even now, those who listened closely could hear the mutterings, the talk of demons. That never really went away.

Many of the first responders, the cops and ambulance attendants from that day, also came to each graduation. In solidarity.

Gamache’s paramedic supervisor had died a few years earlier of breast cancer, after having joined the campaign for gun control. As had Armand. And he continued to press for even tougher gun control. Arguing as a now senior Sûreté officer that there was absolutely no reason a member of the public should have a handgun. And certainly not an assault-style weapon. They were only designed, and intended, to shoot humans.

A few months after the shootings, Nathalie Provost found Agent Gamache and returned his paramedic coat.

“I had it cleaned,” the young woman said, holding it out to him. “But…”

There were stains that would never come out. Nor should they.

Yes. Armand Gamache hated guns.

Finally, after all the testimony before Parliament, it was the clear, thoughtful, powerful voices of the families of the victims and survivors that swayed lawmakers to enact stricter legislation. Though some politicians privately complained that tougher gun control was a huge overreaction. The fact only women were killed was a coincidence.

The Montréal Massacre, while tragic, held no greater lesson. It was the act of a single deranged individual. Not an indictment of society, they said.

These women, they said, were understandably upset. Emotional. But there was no need to pander to them. That would be wrong.

The shootings, the denials, the scoffing at all evidence of institutionalized misogyny, the pushback against gun control, the patronizing attitude of editors and politicians, only served to radicalize those women.

Before the shooting, they were students.

Now they were warriors.

Before I was not a witch, wrote Ruth Zardo. But now I am one.

Before that day, that long night, Agent Gamache had wanted to go into the Criminal Intelligence Division of the Sûreté. Had applied. Was waiting to hear.

The next day he withdrew his application. And instead applied to homicide.

CHAPTER 4

“Patron?”

Both Chief Inspector Gamache and Agent Beauvoir turned to look at Inspector Chernin.

A man, a stranger, had joined her by the woman’s body, still half in, half out of the lake. He was looking a little lost, very cold, and a lot unhappy.

The coroner, Gamache guessed. Called up from the nearest large town.

The Chief Inspector let go of Beauvoir’s arm, and the young agent suddenly felt set free, but also adrift. For the first time he realized how close “free” and “lost” were.

Gamache brushed by him, then turned. “Coming?”

“Oui, oui” was all Beauvoir could manage as he stumbled along the shore, losing his footing now and then on the wet rocks.

“And no more talking, right? You’ve probably said enough.”

“It’s murder,” Agent Beauvoir called after him. “She was murdered.”

Gamache stopped and turned. “You don’t take orders well, do you.”

“You need to know. It wasn’t suicide or an accident. The wound. Look at the shape. Look at what’s stuck in its”—at a scowl from Gamache, he adjusted—“her skull. It, she … her, it…” He was completely confused now about what he should say. Pointing to his own head, he said, “It wasn’t crushed by a rock or stone in the lake.”