A Rule Against Murder

Gamache took a forkful of scrambled eggs with Brie and stared out of the window. Beauvoir was right. But then, it wasn’t any more likely that Peter or Thomas had done it. They were looking at an impossible murder. No one could have budged Charles Morrow, never mind shove him a foot or more until he’d tumbled. And if they did, it would have taken time and made noise. Julia wouldn’t have just stood there and let it happen. But Charles Morrow, like the rest of his family, had been silent.

Besides, the statue scraping along the marble would have made not just noise but scratches and blemishes, but the surface was pristine.

Impossible. The whole thing was impossible. And yet it’d been done.

But another thought dawned and Gamache looked over to the family. Bean couldn’t have done it. Finney couldn’t have done it. Nor could Madame Finney or Marianna or even the men. Not alone.

But together?

“Peter’s mistaken about Julia’s life insurance,” said Beauvoir. He’d waited all breakfast to tell them his news. He soaked up the maple syrup with the last bit of crêpe. “Madame Finney doesn’t get her daughter’s insurance.”

“Who does?” asked Lacoste.

“Nobody. She wasn’t insured.” Ha, he thought, loving the looks on their faces. He’d had the night to absorb this unexpected news. The wife of the wealthiest insurance executive in Canada, uninsured?

“You need to speak to David Martin,” said Gamache, after a moment’s thought.

“I have a call in to his lawyer in Vancouver. I hope to be speaking to him by noon.”

“Honoré Gamache?”

The name sped across the quiet room and landed on their table. Both Beauvoir and Lacoste jerked their heads up, then over to where the Morrows were sitting. Madame Finney was looking at them, a smile on her soft, attractive face.

“So Honoré Gamache was his father? I knew the name was familiar.”

“Mother, shhhh,” said Peter, leaning across the table.

“What? I’m not saying anything.” Her voice continued to pierce the dining room. “Besides, I’m not the one who should be embarrassed.”

Beauvoir looked over at the chief.

Armand Gamache had a curious smile on his face. He looked almost relieved.

TWENTY-ONE

Clara had left the table. She’d heard enough. She’d tried to feel sympathy for Peter’s mother, had tried to be compassionate and patient. But really, damn her, damn them all, thought Clara as she stomped across the lawn.

She could feel her heart racing and her hands trembling as they always did when she was enraged. And of course her brain didn’t work. It had run away with her heart, the cowards, leaving her defenseless and blithering. Proving to the Morrows once again she was an ill-bred idiot. Because leaving the breakfast table early was rude, but apparently insulting other people wasn’t.

The Morrows seemed to believe there was a special code that allowed them to say what they liked about others, deliberately within their hearing, without its being discourteous.

“Isn’t that the ugliest baby you’ve ever seen?”

“You shouldn’t wear white if you’re fat.”

“She’d be prettier if she didn’t scowl all the time.”

That last had been said about her, on her wedding day, as she’d walked down the aisle smiling and joyful on her father’s arm.

The Morrows could be counted on to choose the right fork and the wrong word. Their comments were always casual. And when confronted they’d look hurt, offended, perplexed.

How often had Clara apologized for being insulted?

And what Mrs. Morrow had just said about Gamache’s father was about as insulting as Clara had ever heard her.

“It’s all right, Jean Guy,” said Gamache a few minutes later as they drove down the rough dirt road toward the local cemetery and the man who made Charles Morrow. “I’m used to it. Bert Finney told me he’d known my father at the end of the war. I suppose he said something to his wife.”

“He didn’t have to.”

“My father isn’t a secret, you know.” The Chief Inspector turned to look at Beauvoir, who stared straight ahead at the road, not daring to look at the boss.

“I’m sorry. It’s just that I know what people think.”

“It was a long time ago, and I know the truth.”

Still, Beauvoir stared ahead, hearing the man beside him but also hearing the plummy, rounded voice of Madame Finney and the word that stuck in his head, that stuck in everyone’s. That seemed attached forever to the name Honoré Gamache.