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Just as she lost consciousness, she saw something on the ground a short distance from her. It looked like a body. It looked like …

“Sam?”

“Got it. The information on McNee,” said Beauvoir, standing outside Gamache’s car. “He worked in northern Québec, building bridges. Married. Two daughters. Born and raised—”

“Yes, yes, I know all that. But his schooling. His training?”

Beauvoir skimmed. Then looked up. “He was a civil engineer.”

Gamache called Nathalie Provost again and this time got through.

“I just sent it off to you,” she said. “Is everything all right? You sounded stressed.”

“Just fine, better now that I have the list. Thank you.”

He hung up, then clicked on the list. And there was the confirmation.

“Conner McNee was the last person to wear the ring,” he told Beauvoir.

The full horror of what Gamache was saying struck Jean-Guy. John Fleming had kept the ring, for years. And dropped it there, like a land mine for Gamache to step on.

It was a message, a warning. He could go anywhere. Do anything. He could get deep in Gamache’s home, into his life, and Armand could not stop him. He moved, seen but unseen, through the community, through their lives, with impunity.

The engineer’s ring, a symbol of what could happen when mistakes were made, was now used to taunt Gamache with his own mistakes. And the deaths that resulted.

“We need to arrest Godin,” said Gamache, striding through the late- afternoon sun toward the old farmhouse. “Take him in for questioning. We can keep him for twenty-four hours before having to charge.”

“You think he’s Fleming?” asked Beauvoir, running to catch up.

“I don’t know, and we don’t have time to find out. We have to get him off the streets.”

But Godin wasn’t there, and neither was his car.

“Damn,” snapped Gamache. “I should have had him under surveillance.” He turned to Beauvoir. “We need to send out a province-wide alert. And get local agents out here. We need a ground search. And, Jean-Guy, get up to the lake house. Make sure they’re safe.”

“You don’t think—”

“I think Fleming has had years to plan this, and I don’t think he’ll stop at me.”

“I can send members of our own team, and I can stay with you.”

“No. Fleming has too much information. I have no idea how he’s getting it. If he bribed the head guard and the warden, it’s possible he also got to someone inside the Sûreté.”

Inside the homicide unit. Gamache was loath to think that, but he had not grasped quickly enough exactly what was happening, who was behind it, the lengths he’d gone to, and the size of the threat. So far at least two people had been murdered, perhaps more.

Now was not the time to underestimate. He needed to assume the very worst.

Matthew 10:36.

“There are members of our team we can trust, have trusted with our lives,” said Beauvoir. “I’ll call Isabelle. She’s vacationing at Mont-Tremblant. That’s close to Manitou. I’m as anxious as you to protect the family. Annie. My own children. But I also know that the best way to do that, the only way to do that, is to catch Fleming. And he’s here.”

He stood rigid, his arms taut at his side, fists in balls, staring, glaring at Gamache.

“All right,” Gamache conceded. “Call Isabelle. Then you lead the search for Godin. I’m going back to pick up the caretaker.”

As Gamache drove, he whispered, “I’m coming for you.”

Then, from inside his own head, he heard the sneered reply.