Page 47

“You thought guacamole was made from lawyers,” said Myrna.

“Well, that’s just sensible,” said Harriet. “Avocado. Avocats. I’m still not convinced…”

“And yet, you still order it,” said Olivier.

“Meh,” she said. “It’s tasty. What can I tell you.”

“I also have eaten my share of—” began Gabri before Olivier snapped.

“Stop it!”

“I felt safe here, for the first time in my life. Not physically. I knew that bad things can happen, do happen, anywhere.” She looked at the bouquet of white roses on the banquet table. Then she looked around at the homes and shops. At the three huge pines. “Bad things can happen even here.”

“She got that right,” said Ruth, and Rosa nodded. Though ducks often did.

“But I knew if something did happen, I’d be okay. Because I wasn’t alone.”

She approached her aunt and handed her the towel. Myrna unwrapped it, then stared at the object in her hands.

“Is it a sculpture?” asked Clara. “A work of art?”

“Is it a cake?” asked Gabri. It was hard to see in the demi-light.

“A book?” asked Sylvie Mongeau.

“Is it a joke?” asked Ruth. “For fuck’s sake, the woman paid for four years of university, and you give her that?”

Everyone was so focused on the gift, no one noticed the expression on Armand’s face.

Well, that was not totally true. Two people did. The brother and sister standing across the festive village green were watching him.

While he stared at the brick in Myrna’s hands.

It wasn’t over yet, Gamache knew.

They had the weapons. The cell phones. They had Dagenais. They’d regained control of the building. But it was temporary. There were off-duty agents, Dagenais’s officers, out there. Once they got wind of what was happening, things might change. And not for the better.

The Chief Inspector knew the only reason Dagenais had called off his people was to buy time. To regroup and give them another chance to attack.

It wasn’t a surrender, it was a tactical retreat.

He could, of course, go back on his promise to let the agents go. That seemed a pledge it would be insane to keep.

But. But.

Gamache knew there were holes in their case. A clever lawyer might get these agents off, claiming they were just defending their captain. Their detachment. That it was reasonable for them to assume they were under attack from Gamache and his people.

There were two pieces of crucial evidence they had to find if they were going to build a solid case.

Clotilde’s records and the weapon Dagenais or one of his agents had used to kill her. The brick.

There was work to be done and done quickly. He took Chernin aside. “Get a search warrant for Dagenais’s house. Fast.”

“Oui, patron.”

To Beauvoir he said, “Lock him in a cell.”

“Oui. What about them?” Beauvoir looked at the agents glaring back through the window in Dagenais’s office.