Louise Penny: Brutal Telling

“He’s been dead between six and ten hours,” the doctor said. “Sometime after midnight but before four or five this morning.”

Gamache stared at the back of the man’s head and the wound that killed him.

It was catastrophic. It looked like a single blow by something extremely hard. And by someone extremely angry. Only anger accounted for this sort of power. The power to pulverize a skull. And what it protected.

Everything that made this man who he was was kept in this head. Someone bashed that in. With one brutal, decisive blow.

“Not much blood.” Gamache got up and watched the Scene of Crime team fanning out and collecting evidence around the large room. A room now violated. First by murder and now by them. The unwanted guests.

Olivier was standing, warming himself by the fire.

“That’s a problem,” said Dr. Harris. “Head wounds bleed a lot. There should be more blood, lots more.”

“It might’ve been cleaned up,” said Beauvoir.

Sharon Harris bent over the wound again then straightened up. “With the force of the blow the bleeding might have been massive and internal. And death almost instantaneous.”

It was the best news Gamache ever heard at a murder scene. Death he could handle. Even murder. It was suffering that disturbed him. He’d seen a lot of it. Terrible murders. It was a great relief to find one swift and decisive. Almost humane.

He’d once heard a judge say the most humane way to execute a prisoner was to tell him he was free. Then kill him.

Gamache had struggled against that, argued against it, railed against it. Then finally, exhausted, had come to believe it.

Looking at this man’s face he knew he hadn’t suffered. The blow to the back of the head meant he probably hadn’t even seen it coming.

Almost like dying in your sleep.

But not quite.

They placed him in a bag and took the body away. Outside men and women stood somberly aside to let it pass. Men swept off their damp caps and women watched, tight-lipped and sad.

Gamache turned away from the window and joined Beauvoir, who was sitting with Olivier, Gabri and Myrna. The Scene of Crime team had moved into the back rooms of the bistro, the private dining room, the staff room, the kitchen. The main room now seemed almost normal. Except for the questions hanging in the air.

“I’m sorry this has happened,” Gamache said to Olivier. “How’re you doing?”

Olivier exhaled deeply. He looked drained. “I think I’m still stunned. Who was he? Do you know?”

“No,” said Beauvoir. “Did anyone report a stranger in the area?”

“Report?” said Olivier. “To whom?”

All three turned perplexed eyes on Beauvoir. The Inspector had forgotten that Three Pines had no police force, no traffic lights, no sidewalks, no mayor. The volunteer fire department was run by that demented old poet Ruth Zardo, and most would rather perish in the flames than call her.

The place didn’t even have crime. Except murder. The only criminal thing that ever happened in this village was the worst possible crime.

And here they were with yet another body. At least the rest had had names. This one seemed to have dropped from the sky, and fallen on his head.

“It’s a little harder in the summer, you know,” said Myrna, taking a seat on the sofa. “We get more visitors. Families come back for vacation, kids come home from school. This is the last big weekend. Everyone goes home after this.”

“The weekend of the Brume County Fair,” said Gabri. “It ends tomorrow.”

“Right,” said Beauvoir, who couldn’t care less about the fair. “So Three Pines empties out after this weekend. But the visitors you describe are friends and family?”

“For the most part,” said Myrna, turning to Gabri. “Some strangers come to your B and B, don’t they?”

He nodded. “I’m really an overflow if people run out of space in their homes.”

“What I’m getting at,” said an exasperated Beauvoir, “is that the people who visit Three Pines aren’t really strangers. I just want to get this straight.”

“Straight we don’t specialize in. Sorry,” said Gabri. This brought a smile to even Olivier’s tired face.

“I heard something about a stranger,” said Myrna, “but I didn’t really pay any attention.”

“Who said it?”

“Roar Parra,” she said, reluctantly. It felt a bit like informing, and no one had much stomach for that. “I heard him talking to Old Mundin and The Wife about seeing someone in the woods.”

Beauvoir wrote this down. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard about the Parras. They were a prominent Czech family. But Old Mundin and The Wife? That must be a joke. Beauvoir’s lips narrowed and he looked at Myrna without amusement. She looked back, also without amusement.

“Yes,” Myrna said, reading his mind. It wasn’t hard. The teapot could read it. “Those are their names.”

“Old and The Wife?” he repeated. No longer angry, but mystified. Myrna nodded. “What’re their real names?”

“That’s it,” said Olivier. “Old and The Wife.”

“Okay, I’ll give you Old. It’s just possible, but no one looks at a newborn and decides to call her The Wife. At least I hope not.”

Myrna smiled. “You’re right. I’m just so used to it I never thought. I have no idea what her real name is.”

Beauvoir wondered just how pathetic a woman had to be to allow herself to be called The Wife. It actually sounded slightly biblical, Old Testament.

Gabri put some beers, Cokes and a couple of bowls of mixed nuts on the table. Outside the villagers had finally gone home. It looked wet and bleak, but inside they were snug and warm. It was almost possible to forget this wasn’t a social occasion. The Scene of Crime agents seemed to have dissolved into the woodwork, only evident when a slight scratching or mumbling could be heard. Like rodents, or ghosts. Or homicide detectives.

“Tell us about last night,” said Chief Inspector Gamache.

“It was a madhouse,” said Gabri. “Last big weekend of the summer so everyone came by. Most had been to the fair during the day so they were tired. Didn’t want to cook. It’s always like that on Labor Day weekend. We were prepared.”

“What does that mean?” asked Agent Lacoste, who’d joined them.

“I brought in extra staff,” said Olivier. “But it went smoothly. People were pretty relaxed and we closed on time. At about one in the morning.”

“What happened then?” asked Lacoste.

Most murder investigations appeared complex but were really quite simple. It was just a matter of asking “And then what happened?” over and over and over. And listening to the answers helped too.

“I usually do the cash and leave the night staff to clean up, but Saturdays are different,” said Olivier. “Old Mundin comes after closing and delivers the things he’s repaired during the week and picks up any furniture that’s been broken in the meantime. Doesn’t take long, and he does it while the waiters and kitchen staff are cleaning up.”

“Wait a minute,” said Beauvoir. “Mundin does this at midnight on Saturdays? Why not Sunday morning, or any other reasonable time? Why late at night?”

It sounded furtive to Beauvoir, who had a nose for things secretive and sly.

Olivier shrugged. “Habit, I guess. When he first started doing the work he wasn’t married to The Wife so he’d hang around here Saturday nights. When we closed he’d just take the broken furniture then. We’ve seen no reason to change.”

In a village where almost nothing changed this made sense.

“So Mundin took the furniture. What happened then?” asked Beauvoir.

“I left.”

“Were you the last in the place?”