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“Okay, we can go,” he shouted.
He’d seen enough. He’d seen shame and sorrow made manifest. Now all he wanted was to go home.
The pilot made an A-OK sign with his fingers, then pointed up as the plane climbed. Armand opened his mouth to relieve the sudden pressure and watched as Lacoste hit the pilot on the shoulder and pointed down.
Seeing this, Armand sat back in the tiny float plane. His brow furrowed in what Lacoste assumed was pain but was, in fact, thought. He stared at the pilot’s back, then suddenly leaned forward again.
“Take us back to the lake.”
“Pardon?” the pilot shouted.
“The lake. Take us back.”
The pilot repeated what the Chief Inspector said, to confirm; then, with a shrug, he turned the plane around.
Isabelle cocked her head inquiringly at Gamache, but he was staring out the window looking down as the charred stumps slowly turned to healthy evergreens as they crossed the border between hell and heaven.
“‘FEDS’ stands for Fire Event Detection Suite,” said Whitehead, his voice low. The chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was obviously unhappy about needing to share this information, but was prepared to do so.
Jean-Guy had to lean across the Formica table to hear. When he went to write it down, Whitehead stopped him.
“Best to just remember it. It’s a new technology that tracks megafires.”
“I’ve never heard that term.”
“‘Megafire’? Not surprising. We had no words to describe what happened with those forest fires in Canada. There are now. I’m not sure if you can appreciate just how shocking, how horrifying it was for the millions of people in the path of those ash clouds.”
“I saw the news reports, those photos of New York—”
“Yes, that’s what people saw because that’s where the reporters live. New York. Washington, Minneapolis. But other places were hit even worse by the toxic clouds from Canada. Reservoirs for drinking water were poisoned. Fertile fields ruined. Crops failed. Lives were ruined. Health was ruined. The elderly. Babies with health conditions.”
Whitehead suddenly stopped. After a long pause, in which he studied Beauvoir so intently the younger man felt stripped, he continued.
“It was different on the ground. In war it always is. The videos and photographs can never capture the horror. It’s being called, in some quarters, the worst assault on America since 9/11.”
“Now wait a minute, sir. I appreciate your job is to protect Americans and American soil, but this isn’t a war, and we didn’t attack you. There was nothing deliberate about it.”
“Perhaps not, but if you run down someone in an accident, they’re still dead.”
“There’s no ‘perhaps’ about it. Canada would never deliberately do that to the US.”
For some reason the Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff seemed almost amused.
“Look, you and I both know that, but that’s not how it’s seen in many quarters, and not just by the crazy conspiracy theorists and the far-right lunatics. There’s a growing sentiment here, even among policymakers. They’re looking for an excuse.”
“To do what?”
“The Fire Event Detection Suite can tell us how and when and where the ash from the next megafire will land. And there will be a next. FEDS is predictive.”
His eyes again bore into Jean-Guy’s, asking him, begging him, to understand. But Jean-Guy was lost.
Finally, Whitehead decided to help him out. “What happens, son, if you can predict the future?”
Beauvoir took a deep breath and considered. “If you actually knew what was going to happen? That would be pretty powerful.”
“Not pretty powerful, it would make that person omnipotent. And then let’s take it another step. Suppose in knowing the future, you could also control it?”
Jean-Guy looked at the head of the most powerful military on earth and wondered if he was a madman. Because what he’d just said was lunacy.
