Page 53

“Here? In the middle of nowhere?” The biologist looked around. She’d always thought of organized crime as an urban scourge, when she thought of it at all. Though she now remembered that gruesome scene from Goodfellas where De Niro and Pesci dig up the body in the woods.

When she’d agreed to Armand’s request to accompany Inspector Lacoste, she thought she’d be testing lakes, not re-creating that scene. And playing the part of Ray Liotta.

Isabelle went through Castonguay’s pockets without expecting to find anything. And sure enough, there was nothing. No ID. No phone. No money. Nothing.

She sat back on her heels and looked around.

Why was he here? How would Frederick Castonguay even know about this lake?

Why are you here?

Why are you here?

Why were you killed, here?

Then there was the most important question. Not Who did this to you? but—

“Who were you working for?” she asked, looking into that wretched face.

CHAPTER 13

“Delicious,” said Marcus Lauzon. “It’s been a while.”

“No Sunday roast in prison?” asked Evelyn Tardiff.

“Non,” he said and smiled, as though her question had been serious. “But I didn’t mean that. It’s been a while since I was treated like a human being.” He carefully folded his linen napkin and placed it beside his clean plate, smoothing it gently. Then he looked at his host. “I know you have an ulterior motive, and I can guess what it is. Still, I’m grateful.”

Armand was trying not to leap across the table and strangle the man who’d almost killed his son. A man who was clearly unrepentant. It was a temptation that had been growing since Lauzon had arrived.

He’d wondered if the former Deputy Prime Minister would take this opportunity to apologize, as Jeanne Caron had done.

Part of him hoped he would, and that it would help sever the ties between them. Gamache knew, better than most, that hate bound a person to the one they hated. They were taken prisoner by that loathing, while the one they despised went merrily about their life, often oblivious.

He was tired of being tied to this man. And yet he was so used to it, part of him did not want to be unbound. And a big part of him did not want to be in the position of having to say, I forgive you. And then work toward making that true.

But it seemed, this sunny Sunday afternoon in October, it would not come to that.

Over warm apple crisp, made from fruit picked in the orchard in their back garden, and Coaticook vanilla ice cream, Armand finally asked the question. The one that had hung over them, creating an almost unbearable tension. Though Lauzon seemed the least tense and Chief Inspector Tardiff appeared the most.

“You’ve claimed all along not to be the one behind the plot to poison Montréal’s water, despite all the evidence against you—” Lauzon had opened his mouth, but Gamache shut him down with a look. “If not you, then who?”

“I’ve waited a long time for you to ask that question.”

The Sûreté officers around the table waited for the answer. Had it been a movie, this would be, Jean-Guy knew, the time when a shot would ring out and Lauzon would slump to the table, face down in his apple crisp.

But nothing happened. Though beside him, Jean-Guy noticed Armand’s hands slip below the table and grip his knees so tightly they would, Jean-Guy knew, leave a mark.

But Chief Inspector Gamache’s face was placid, almost blank.

“I’m tempted to ask you who you think it could be,” Lauzon continued, taunting the man across from him. Teasing him. But Gamache would not rise to it.

Though he did stand up. “Coffee?”

Beauvoir lowered his gaze and fought to suppress a grin at the look of surprise, degenerating into annoyance, on Lauzon’s face.

He thought he was toying with Gamache. Now the Deputy PM looked puzzled, no longer sure what was happening. And who was playing with whom.

When Lauzon didn’t answer, Armand turned to Evelyn. “Café? Or perhaps tea?”