Louise Penny - Cruelest Month

Sandon was speechless, his eyes wide, his mouth wide.

‘I loved her. I couldn’t kill her.’

‘Gilles,’ Odile whispered.

‘And she loved someone else.’ Gamache moved in closer, thrusting his words home. ‘She loved Monsieur Béliveau. Every day you saw it, every day it was in your face, undeniable, even for you. She didn’t love you at all.’

‘How could she?’ He rose from his chair, his massive hands clenched like mallets. ‘You don’t know what it was like, to see her with him.’ He turned to look at meek Monsieur Béliveau. ‘I knew she couldn’t care for someone like me, but…’

He faltered.

‘But if she couldn’t love you, she couldn’t love anyone?’ said Gamache softly. ‘It must have been horrible.’

The lumberjack collapsed into his chair. They waited for the crack as the wood gave way, but instead it held him, as a mother might a hurt child.

‘But the stuff that killed her was in the Smyths’ medicine cabinet,’ said Odile wildly. ‘He couldn’t get it.’

‘You’re right. He didn’t have access to their home.’ Gamache turned to Odile. ‘I mentioned the lab report. It said the ephedra that killed Madeleine wasn’t from a recent batch. It was much more natural. I’d been a fool. Over and over people had told me and it never registered. Ephedra’s an herb. A plant. Used for centuries in Chinese medicines. Maybe Gilles didn’t need access to their home. Maybe you didn’t either. You know what I took from your store?’

He stared at Odile, who stared back, frantic and frozen.

‘Ma Huang. An old Chinese herb. Also known as Mormon’s tea. And ephedra.’

‘I didn’t do it. He didn’t do it. He didn’t love her. She was a bitch, a horrible, horrible person. She tricked people into thinking she cared.’

‘You spoke to her, warned her, as you were walking here that night, didn’t you? You told her she could have anyone, but Gilles was the only man you ever wanted. You pleaded with her to stay away from him.’

‘She told me not to be so stupid. But I’m not stupid.’

‘By then it was too late. The ephedra was already in her.’ Gamache looked at the circle of staring faces. ‘You all had reason to kill her. You all had the opportunity to kill her. But there was one more necessary ingredient. What killed Madeleine Favreau was ephedra and a fright. Someone had to provide the fright.’

All eyes turned to Jeanne Chauvet. Her own were hooded, sunken and dark.

‘You were all trying to get me to consider Jeanne a suspect. You told me you didn’t trust her, didn’t like her. Were frightened of her. I’d put it down to a kind of hysteria. The stranger among you. The witch. Who else would you want to be guilty?’

Clara stared at him. Gamache had put it so simply, so clearly. Had they really thrown this mousy woman to the inquisition? Turned her in? Lit the pyre and warmed themselves by it like smug Puritans, confident the beast wasn’t one of them. No thought for the truth, no thought for the woman.

‘I’d all but dismissed her as being too obvious. But dinner last night changed my mind.’

Clara thought she heard creaking again, as though the house had woken up, could sense a kill. Her heart thudded and the candle began flickering as though trembling itself. There was something about in the old Hadley house. Something had come to life. Gamache seemed to sense it too. He cocked his head to one side, a puzzled look on his face. Listening.

‘Ruth Zardo was talking about the burning times and called you Joan of Arc,’ he said to Jeanne. ‘And I remembered that Jeanne is French for Joan. Joan of Arc becomes Jeanne d’Arc. A woman burned for hearing voices and seeing visions. A witch.’

‘A saint,’ corrected Jeanne, her voice detached, far away.

‘If you prefer,’ said Gamache. ‘That first séance you thought was a joke, but the next one you took seriously. You made sure it was as atmospheric, as frightening, as possible.’

‘I’m not responsible for other people’s fears.’

‘You think not? If you jump out of the dark and say boo, you can’t blame the person for being frightened. And that’s what you did. Deliberately.’

‘No one forced Mad to come that night,’ said Jeanne, then stopped.

‘Mad,’ said Gamache quietly. ‘A nickname. Used by people who knew her well, not by someone who’d only just met her. You knew her, didn’t you?’

Jeanne was silent.

Gamache nodded. ‘You knew her. I’ll come back to that in a moment. The final element for murder was the séance. But no one here was going to lead one, and who’d expect a psychic to show up for Easter? It seemed far too fortuitous to be chance. And it wasn’t. Did you send this?’

Gamache handed Gabri the brochure for the B. & B.

‘I’ve never sent these out,’ said Gabri, barely looking at the brochure. ‘Only made them to satisfy Olivier who said we weren’t doing enough advertising.’

‘You’ve never mailed any out?’ Gamache persisted.

‘Why would I?’

‘You’re a B. & B.,’ suggested Myrna. ‘A business.’

‘That’s just what Olivier says, but we get enough people. Why would I want more work?’

‘Being Gabri is work enough,’ agreed Clara.

‘It’s exhausting,’ said Gabri.

‘So you didn’t write that across the top of the brochure.’ Gamache pointed to the glossy paper in Gabri’s large hand. Leaning into the candlelight Gabri strained to see.

‘Where lay lines meet – Easter Special,’ he read, guffawing. ‘As if. Is that what you meant when you said I wouldn’t get laid?’ he asked Jeanne, shifting his croissant.

‘I didn’t say that. I said ley lines don’t meet here.’

‘I thought you said they don’t work here,’ said Gabri, relieved. ‘But I never wrote that.’ He handed the brochure back to Gamache. ‘Don’t even know what it means.’

‘You didn’t type those words and you didn’t send it. So who did?’ It was clear he wasn’t expecting an answer. He was talking to himself. ‘Someone who wanted to lure Jeanne to Three Pines. Someone who knew her well enough to know talk of ley lines would pique her interest. But someone who doesn’t themselves know enough about ley lines to spell it correctly.’

‘I’d have to say that means all of us,’ said Clara. ‘Except one.’ She looked at Jeanne.

‘You’re thinking I wrote it myself? So that it only looks as though someone tried to trick me into coming? And even misspelled the word? I’m not that clever.’

‘Maybe,’ said Gamache.

‘That first séance, Gabri,’ said Clara, ‘you put up posters saying Madame Blavatsky would be contacting the dead. You lied about her name –’

‘Artistic license,’ explained Gabri.

‘It must be exhausting being him,’ said Myrna.

‘– but you knew Jeanne was a psychic. How’d you know?’

‘She told me.’

After a moment Jeanne spoke. ‘It’s true. I keep telling myself not to say anything, and of course it’s the first thing out of my mouth. I wonder why?’

‘You want to be special,’ said Myrna, not unkindly. ‘We all do. You’re just more open about it.’

‘Well,’ said Gabri, in a voice uncharacteristically small, ‘I did kinda wheedle it out of her. I ask all my guests what they do. What passions they have. It’s interesting.’

‘And then you put them to work,’ said Sandon, still smarting from the time he lost two hundred dollars to Gabri’s poker champ guest.

‘A village gets quiet,’ Gabri explained to Gamache with dignity. ‘I bring culture to Three Pines.’

No one chose to mention the shrieking opera singer.

‘When Jeanne checked in she read my palm,’ Gabri continued. ‘In my past life I was the Keeper of the Light at the Acropolis, but don’t tell anyone.’