The Nature Of The Beast Part 54

"Was one of them in Brussels?" asked Beauvoir. "Did Fraser or Delorme take that picture and then order the murder of Dr. Bull?"

"I was wondering the same thing, though there are other possibilities."

"Professor Rosenblatt," said Beauvoir. The elderly scientist who stood on the edge of so much of what had happened in the past, and was happening now. He glanced over at Gamache, whose eyes were narrowed, following a path, but not the road they were on.

"Is there someone else, patron?"

"There is one other person, Jean-Guy. Another possibility."

Beauvoir went through all the people in the case who were of the right age to have been active in Brussels in the early 1990s.

"Monsieur Beliveau?" he asked. "He seems to know a lot about this, and really, what do we know about him? No one but Ruth even knew his first name."

"I wasn't thinking of him," said Gamache. "I was thinking of Al Lepage."

And as soon as he said it, Beauvoir could see the logic of it. In fact, it now seemed so obvious as to be almost unmissable.

Frederick Lawson might have snuck across the border with the help of Ruth and Monsieur Beliveau, but he'd been able to stay, to make a life for himself, to become Al Lepage, get married. How did a deserter about to be tried for a war crime manage that except with the blessing of the government, or one of its agencies?

Was that the price of admission to Canada? Every now and then Al Lepage would be called upon to do some of the government's dirty work?

Lacoste had let Lepage return to his home, but a.s.signed agents to watch him around the clock.

"Pardon," said Gamache, taking his phone out of his pocket, where it must have vibrated, because Beauvoir hadn't heard anything.

Gamache looked at who was calling, then answered.

"Chief Superintendent," he said.

"I take it you're not alone, Armand," said Therese Brunel. "I have some news."

"Oui?" By the tone of her voice he could tell he probably hadn't won the lottery.

"I had a call just now from the executive producer of the CBC national news."

Gamache took a deep breath, steeling himself.

Beauvoir glanced over. The Chief was alert, tense.

"Go on."

"It's what you think," she said. "They've found out about the gun."

"How much do they know?"

"They know about Project Babylon, about Gerald Bull, they know the gun's somewhere in Quebec, which is why they called me."

"But they don't know where it is?"

"Not yet. They're holding the story until the six o'clock national radio news tonight. By then they might know everything. And even if they don't, it'll still hit the headlines like a bomb. Every journalist will be all over the story. They'll find out everything eventually. You might have a day from the time of broadcast, or you might have hours."

"Can you stop it?" he asked.

"You know what's involved in censoring the press, Armand. I have an urgent request in for an injunction but judges are loath to give them. We have to a.s.sume the story will run."

Gamache looked at his watch. It was already one thirty.

"They don't know about Guillaume Couture?" he asked.

"No, but you found out within a matter of hours. They'll have that soon enough. Once it airs, someone in the village will talk. It's shocking that word hasn't leaked before now."

Three Pines was good at keeping its secrets, thought Gamache. But this one was about to escape.

"Merci." He hung up. "Stop the car, please."

Beauvoir pulled over and Gamache got out, bending over, one hand on the car, one on his knee, as though he was about to retch.

Jean-Guy hurried around the car. "Are you all right?"

Gamache straightened up and caught his breath. Then he walked away, along the dirt shoulder of the back road.

"What's happened?" asked Jean-Guy, pursuing him, but stopping when Armand waved at him to give him s.p.a.ce.

Beauvoir had only heard Gamache's end of the conversation, but it was enough to get the gist.

Armand turned to Jean-Guy, his face pale and haggard. "We have four hours before word of the gun is all over the CBC national news."

"s.h.i.+t."

Beauvoir felt his own stomach lurch. They both knew what that meant. Within moments of the broadcast it would be all over the Internet, social media, other media. NPR, CNN, BBC, Al Jazeera. News of Gerald Bull's gun would be blasted around the world.

"They don't yet know where it is," said Gamache. "They don't know about Three Pines. I'm not sure they know about Highwater yet. But they will. And when they do..."

Pandemonium, thought Jean-Guy.

Beauvoir studied his father-in-law and felt light-headed.

"My G.o.d, you can't be considering..."

But he could tell by the expression on Gamache's face that was exactly what he was considering.

"You'd release Fleming?" asked Beauvoir, barely able to make the words audible.

"We have to find the plans before the broadcast. The problem won't be journalists or curiosity seekers. Every arms dealer, every mercenary, every intelligence organization, every terrorist group and corrupt dictator will hear about it. These people aren't b.u.mbling opportunists. They're smart and motivated and ruthless. And they'll be coming here. Jesus, Jean-Guy, you know what'll happen if an arms dealer finds the plans before we do."

"If, if," shouted Jean-Guy. "It might not happen, but we know for sure what'll happen if Fleming's let out of that h.e.l.lhole. He'll kill again. And again."

"Don't tell me what Fleming will do. You have no idea what that man's capable of. I do."

"Then tell me, for G.o.d's sake. What did he do? What is that man capable of?"

"He made the Wh.o.r.e of Babylon," shouted Gamache.

"The etching, I know."

"No, the real thing. Out of his victims."

Beauvoir stepped back, away from Gamache. From the words that had come out of his mouth and the image that came with them. Of what Fleming had done. Of what had been so horrific it was kept from the public.

"Ohhhhh" escaped Beauvoir, a sigh, as though his soul had withered and was sliding out.

"The children?"

"Everyone. All seven victims," said Gamache, and bent down again, his hands on his knees.

Beauvoir sank to his knees in the dirt. He watched Gamache trying to catch his breath. He'd had no idea of the weight this man had been carrying all this time. The images he must have seen. There were even rumors of a recording. Gamache had stood in that courtroom and absorbed it so that no other citizen had to. A few sacrificed for the many.

Gamache straightened up, stiffly, until he stood tall and resolute.

"If there was any other way, Jean-Guy..."

"You can't let him out. I'm begging you." Beauvoir, still on his knees, lifted his arms toward Gamache. "It won't even do any good. He was probably lying to you. He might not even know where the plans are." Beauvoir got up, angry now. "You were too close, you couldn't see it. He was playing with you, messing with you."

"You think I don't know that?" shouted Gamache. "You think I don't know he was probably lying, and even if he does know where the plans are, he almost certainly won't tell us? I know that."

"Then why do it? Why even consider it?"

"What happens if we leave Fleming where he is and those plans are found by another arms dealer?"

He stared at Beauvoir, challenging him. Daring him to go where Gamache himself stood. In the whirlwind.

The two men were ten feet apart, glaring at each other.

"You think," growled Gamache, "I want to release Fleming? To bring him to Three Pines? It sickens me. But we might have no choice. Fleming might not tell us where the plans are. And yes, he might escape. But I don't know where the plans are. You don't know where they are. G.o.d knows I've been desperate to find them."

"And Fleming probably doesn't either. He'd say anything to get out of there."

"But he might. He might know. He could be our only hope."

Beauvoir stared at him, appalled. "You're pinning hopes on that creature? What if the lives he takes next time belong to Madame Gamache, or Annie, or your granddaughters? Would you be so cavalier then?"

"Cavalier? You think that's what I am? If those plans are found, how many more wives and husbands, children and grandchildren will be killed? Tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands. No one would be safe."

It was a grotesque equation, and Gamache looked like he was about to pa.s.s out. He was contemplating being an accessory to a slaughter, for the greater good.

Mary Fraser had been wrong about Gamache. He'd done it before, and he'd do it again. Send a few to possible death, to save the many. Those decisions had finally torn him to shreds, and he'd crawled to Three Pines to heal. But not, it would appear, to hide.

Beauvoir opened his mouth, his breathing heavy, his eyes wide.

"Annie's pregnant, Armand."

It took a moment for the words to penetrate Gamache's defenses, to get through his turmoil. But then his shoulders dropped, his face softened.

And he understood.

"Oh my G.o.d," he whispered.

In long, swift strides he covered the distance between them, and gathering Jean-Guy in his arms, he held the sobbing man.

"We'll find the plans," he repeated over and over, until Jean-Guy had calmed down. "We'll find them."

Though he didn't know how.

Armand drove the rest of the way home, giving Jean-Guy a chance to recover and to talk about the new baby. And Annie.

"Please don't tell Madame Gamache," said Jean-Guy. "Annie would kill me. She wants to do it herself."

"I won't, but you have to tell her soon because she might pry it out of me. She's very cunning."

As they talked about this happy news, Gamache could almost forget where they'd been, and what lay ahead. After a few miles they once again lapsed into silence.

Gamache went back over his interview with Fleming, struggling to bring it into focus.

"Fleming admitted he knew Mary Fraser and Sean Delorme," he said, and Beauvoir nodded. Jean-Guy had also been replaying the meeting with Fleming, with growing urgency, pursued by the ticking clock and the realization of just how monstrous Fleming really was.

"But he said something," said Armand. "Something I thought at the time I needed to remember, but then it got lost."

"Misdirection," said Beauvoir. "Fleming probably knew he'd said too much and tried to hide it under a pile of c.r.a.p."

"But what was it?" asked Gamache.

They racked their brains. Al Lepage? Brussels. The agency. What was it Fleming had said?

Jean-Guy got there first. It wasn't something Fleming had said. It was something Gamache said.

"The play," he said. "You mentioned the play, and put it on the table, remember?"

"That's it," said Gamache. "He asked if I'd read it."

"You said it was beautiful, and that surprised him, but it was something else."

Beauvoir reached behind him to the backseat and, picking up the satchel, he took out the worn and dirty script.

"He touched it and said if you'd really understood it, you wouldn't need to be speaking with him."

"Yes, yes," said Gamache. "We wouldn't need to visit Fleming because we'd have the answer."