Penny, Louise - All the Devils Are Here

“Yes. We’re categorizing this as a hit-and-run, but”—he put up his hand to stop any protest—“treating it as attempted murder.”

Claude Dussault looked at his friend. And spoke the words Armand Gamache needed to hear: “I believe you.”

Both men looked over as a doctor stepped through the swinging doors.

CHAPTER 6

The moment she heard the creak of the front door, Reine-Marie was instantly awake and out of bed.

“Armand?”

“ Oui,” he said, whispering, though without knowing why.

Reine-Marie switched on the hall light.

“Stephen?” she asked as she embraced him.

“Still alive.”

“Oh, thank God.” Though even as she spoke, she wondered if thanks were really owing. “How is he?”

“Critical. He’s in recovery. They wouldn’t let me see him.”

“How are you?”

She looked into his haggard face and saw his eyes well. She grabbed him to her again, and they held on to each other.

Weeping for Stephen.

For themselves.

For a world where this could happen as they strolled happily along a familiar street.

They stepped apart and wiped their faces and blew their noses, then Armand followed her into the kitchen.

All the way home in the taxi, all he’d wanted to do was hug Reine-Marie, have a hot shower, and crawl into bed. But now he just sat at the kitchen table, staring ahead.

Reine-Marie put the battered kettle on the gas ring and brought out the teapot.

The kitchen was old-fashioned. They’d discussed updating it, but somehow it never got done. Probably because neither really wanted to change it. It was the same as when Armand’s grandmother Zora was alive and had bustled around it, chatting away in her strange mix of Yiddish and German and French.

She’d learned Yiddish and French growing up in Paris. And German in the camps.

She’d left the apartment to him in her will, along with all she possessed. Which mostly amounted to her love, which was plentiful, and which he carried with him always.

“Nein. Opshtel,” Armand could almost hear her say. “Stop. Tea always better when wasser isn’t quite bouillant. You should know by now,” she’d chastise him.

“Don’t plotz ,” he’d invariably reply, which amused her greatly.

His grandmother was long dead, and now he watched Reine-Marie, brushing gray hair from her eyes, move about the kitchen. She brought the teapot over, nicely steeped, with a jug of milk from the cranky old fridge.

“Merci,” he said, stirring in sugar. “They say he probably has brain damage, but at least there’s activity there.”

Reine-Marie sipped her tea. She knew Armand was thinking the same thing, but couldn’t yet say it.

When they finished their tea, Armand had a hot shower, turning his face into the water. Tasting the salt from his face.

Crawling into bed beside Reine-Marie, he fell immediately into a deep sleep.

Three hours later he woke up, with light streaming through the lace curtains. In the first flush of consciousness he felt completely at peace. Here in this familiar apartment. Surrounded by familiar scents that evoked such a deep contentment.

But a second later he remembered and immediately reached for his phone, checking for messages.

There was none from the hospital.

Reine-Marie was already up. She’d been out to the shops along rue Rambuteau, and brought back fresh croissants from their favorite patisserie, Pain de Sucre.

He followed the scent of strong, rich coffee into the kitchen and saw cheese and raspberries and ripe pears on the table. Along with the croissants. And a pain aux raisins , bought with Stephen the day before.

“Up already?” she asked. “How did you sleep?”

“Well. Very well,” he said, kissing her. “Not long, but deeply.”

“Nothing more from the hospital?”

“ Non. How are you?”

“I think I’m still in shock. I can barely believe it even happened.”

He hugged her, then went off and showered again and shaved. As he dressed, he saw his clothing from the night before, tossed onto the chair. Even from across the room, he could see the blood.

He checked again for messages, scanning for the one he dreaded. But it wasn’t there. Surely the hospital would have gotten in touch if …

Over breakfast he called Daniel, then Annie. He’d texted them the night before with an update, but wanted to find out how they were.

Jean-Guy got on the phone. “Any word from the cops?”

“ Non. I’m just about to call.”

“Are they treating this as attempted murder?”

“Yes.”

Jean-Guy heaved a sigh. “Thank God for that. What can I do?”

“You talked to Stephen last night, more than I did. Did he say anything at all that might be important? Anything he was working on, or worried about?”

“Annie and I have been going over our conversation with him. There was nothing.”

In the background Armand heard Annie call, “The phone, tell him about the phone.”

“ Oui. He did keep checking his phone, like he was expecting a call or message.”

“Huh,” said Armand. Stephen normally despised it when people brought out their phones over a meal, never mind actually used them.

“How did he seem to you?” Armand asked.

“The usual. In a good mood.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Nothing really. Well—” Jean-Guy gave a small laugh. “I mentioned a project at work, and he seemed interested, but then accused me of wasting his time.”

Armand took that in. He’d also been going over their conversation at the Musée Rodin. And while Stephen had seemed his old self, there was that strange moment. When talking about the devils.

“Not here, here,” he’d said. Leading Armand to think Stephen knew where they were.

He wished now he’d pressed more, but it had seemed so innocuous.

And then there was Stephen’s comment. That he wasn’t afraid to die.

Armand hoped that was true, but now he also saw something else in it. Not that his godfather was prescient, but that Stephen actually knew something.

“If this was deliberate,” Jean-Guy asked, “who would do it?”

“Stephen made a lot of people angry,” said Armand.

“You think this was revenge?”

“Or a preemptive strike. Hitting him before he hit them.”

“Mrs. McGillicuddy would know if Stephen was planning something,” said Jean-Guy.

Damn , thought Armand. Mrs. McGillicuddy. I should have called her last night.

She was Stephen’s longtime secretary and assistant.

He looked at his watch. It was six hours earlier in Montréal. Which made it one a.m. Let the elderly woman have a few more hours of peace, he thought, before the anvil dropped. Besides, he’d have more news on Stephen’s condition by then.

After saying goodbye to Beauvoir, he called Claude Dussault.

“We have the CCTV images,” said the Prefect. “The van was a delivery truck reported stolen earlier in the evening. We have it turning onto rue de Rivoli right after Monsieur Horowitz was hit. From there it crossed Pont de la Concorde, to the Left Bank, and headed southeast. But the van disappeared into back streets. We’ll find the vehicle. I have no doubt. How much it’ll tell us is another matter. Any more word on Monsieur Horowitz’s condition?”

“Not since last night. We’re heading over there now.”

“Armand …” The Prefect hesitated. “After some sleep and time to reflect, do you still think it was a deliberate attempt on Monsieur Horowitz’s life?”

“Yes.”

It was a clear answer, and the one Dussault had expected. But Gamache’s insistence and his involvement were both unsettling and problematic.