Coward.
Clara, are you all right?”
Peter walked quickly across the lawn.
“I suppose you set your mother straight?” said Clara, staring at him. His hair stuck out in all directions as though he’d run his hands through it over and over. His shirt was untucked and there were croissant crumbs clinging to his slacks. He stood silent. “For God’s sake, Peter, when’re you going to stand up to her?”
“What? She wasn’t talking about you.”
“No, she was smearing a friend of yours. Gamache heard every word she said. He was supposed to.”
“You didn’t say anything.”
“You’re right.” Clara remembered the tablecloth tucked into her waistband and giving the breakfast china a tug as she’d jerked to her feet.
All eyes were on her. Do it, they seemed to be saying. Humiliate yourself again.
And, of course, she had. She always did. She’d arm herself with the mantras “One more day, just one more day” and “It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter.” She’d meditate and surround herself with white, protective light. But eventually it all failed against the Morrow onslaught, and she’d be standing, quaking like an aspen, in front of them. Incensed, appalled and struck dumb.
And it’d happened again this morning, as Mrs. Morrow had explained it all to her family.
“You’ve never heard the story?”
“What story?” Thomas had asked, thrilled. Even Peter seemed eager to hear it. It took the heat off him.
“Tell us,” said Peter, throwing Gamache into the fire so that he himself could escape.
“Irene,” Bert Finney warned. “It was a long time ago. History.”
“This is important, Bert. The children should hear it.” She turned back to them, and Clara, God help her, was curious herself.
Irene Finney looked down the table at them. She’d spent most of the night begging, praying, bargaining for sleep. For oblivion. For a few hours away from this loss.
And in the morning, when she awoke, her soft, pink, crusty cheek to the pillow, she’d lost her daughter again. Julia. Now gone, but she’d taken disappointment with her. No more birthdays forgotten, no more empty Sundays waiting for phone calls that never came. Julia at least would never hurt her again. Julia was safe. Safe now to love. That was what the void had coughed up. A dead daughter. But a beloved one. Finally. Someone safe to love. Dead, true. But you can’t have everything.
Then Bert had returned from his morning walk with this wonderful gift. Something else to think about.
Honoré Gamache. Somehow the void had coughed him up as well. And his son.
“It was just before the war. We all knew Hitler had to be stopped. Canada would join with Britain, that was a given. But then this Gamache started giving speeches against the war. He said Canada should stay out of it. Said no good ever came of violence. He was very articulate. Educated.”
She sounded surprised, as though a beluga had graduated from Laval University.
“Dangerous.” She appealed to her husband. “Am I wrong?”
“He believed what he was saying,” said Mr. Finney.
“That only makes him more dangerous. He convinced a lot of others. Soon there were protests in the streets against going to war.”
“What happened?” asked Sandra. She looked up. The ceiling was smooth. Swept clean by the Manoir staff without comment. Not a cookie left. Sandra couldn’t help but feel sad for Bean and all that work. But Bean didn’t seem bothered. In fact, Bean was riveted to the story.
“Canada delayed entering the war.”
“Only by a week,” said Finney.
“Long enough. It was humiliating. Britain in there, Germany brutalizing Europe. It was wrong.”
“It was wrong,” agreed Finney sadly.
“It was that Gamache’s fault. And even when war was declared he convinced a lot of Quebecers to be conscientious objectors. Conscientious.” She loaded the word with loathing. “There was no conscience involved, only cowardice.”
Her voice lifted, turning the sentence into a weapon and the last word a bayonet. And across the room, the human target.
“He went to Europe himself,” said Finney.
“With the Red Cross. Never in the front lines. He never risked his own life.”
“There were a lot of heroes in the ambulance corps,” said Finney. “Brave men.”
“But not Honoré Gamache,” said Irene Finney.
Clara waited for Finney to contradict her. She looked over at Peter, some jam on his ill-shaven cheek, eyes down. Thomas and Sandra and Marianna, eyes aglow. Like hyenas falling on prey. And Bean? The child sat on the tiny chair, feet planted firmly, gripping Myths Every Child Should Know.