“Oui. Pierre Patenaude showed me his weather station. Between his readings and a call to Environment Canada we can say the rain began about then,” Agent Lacoste confirmed as she sipped her vichyssoise.
“Bon. Alors, what were people doing then?” His deep brown eyes moved from Lacoste to Beauvoir.
“Peter and Clara Morrow went to bed shortly after you left the room,” said Beauvoir, consulting the notebook beside him. “Monsieur and Madame Finney had already gone up. The housemaid saw them and wished them goodnight. No one saw Peter and Clara, by the way. Thomas and Sandra Morrow stayed in the library here with his sister Marianna discussing the unveiling for about twenty minutes then they went to bed too.”
“All of them?” Gamache asked.
“Thomas and Sandra Morrow went straight up, but Marianna stayed for a few minutes. Had another drink, listened to some music. The maître d’ served her and waited until she’d gone to bed. That was about ten past midnight.”
“Good,” said the Chief Inspector. They were getting the skeleton of the case, the outline, the facts, who did what when. Or at least what they said they did. But they needed more, much more. They needed the flesh and blood.
“We need to find out about Julia Martin,” said Gamache. “Her life in Vancouver, how she met David Martin. What her interests were. Everything.”
“Martin was in the insurance industry,” said Beauvoir. “I bet she was insured to the gills.”
Gamache looked at him with interest.
“I imagine you’re right. Easy enough to find out.”
Beauvoir lifted his brows then looked behind him. The large comfortable sofas and leather chairs had been rearranged and now a couple of tables were shoved together in the center of the library. Three sensible chairs sat round the tables, and in front of each, neatly arranged, was a notepad and pen.
This was Agent Lacoste’s solution to the computer problem. No computers. Not even a telephone. Instead they each had a pen and a pad of paper.
“I’ll start training the pigeons to carry the message. No wait, that’s silly,” said Beauvoir. “There must be a pony express stop nearby.”
“When I was your age, young man—” Gamache began, his voice creaky.
“Not the smoke signal story again,” said Beauvoir.