The Brutal Telling (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #5)

“Who was the last to leave?” Agent Lacoste asked.

“Young Parra,” said Olivier.

“Young Parra?” asked Beauvoir. “Like Old Mundin?”

Gabri made a face. “Of course not. His name isn’t ‘Young.’ That’d be weird. His name’s Havoc.”

Beauvoir’s eyes narrowed and he glared at Gabri. He didn’t like being mocked and he suspected this large, soft man was doing just that. He then looked over at Myrna, who wasn’t laughing. She nodded.

“That’s his name. Roar named his son Havoc.”

Jean Guy Beauvoir wrote it down, but without pleasure or conviction.

“Would he have locked up?” asked Lacoste.

It was, Gamache and Beauvoir both knew, a crucial question, but its significance seemed lost on Olivier.

“Absolutely.”

Gamache and Beauvoir exchanged glances. Now they were getting somewhere. The murderer had to have had a key. A world full of suspects had narrowed dramatically.

“May I see your keys?” asked Beauvoir.

Olivier and Gabri fished theirs out and handed them to the Inspector. But a third set was also offered. He turned and saw Myrna’s large hand dangling a set of keys.

“I have them in case I get locked out of my place or if there’s an emergency.”

“Merci,” said Beauvoir, with slightly less confidence than he’d been feeling. “Have you lent them to anyone recently?” he asked Olivier and Gabri.

“No.”

Beauvoir smiled. This was good.

“Except Old Mundin, of course. He’d lost his and needed to make another copy.”

“And Billy Williams,” Gabri reminded Olivier. “Remember? He normally uses the one under the planter at the front but he didn’t want to have to bend down while he carried the wood. He was going to take it to get more copies made.”

Beauvoir’s face twisted into utter disbelief. “Why even bother to lock up?” he finally asked.

“Insurance,” said Olivier.

Well, someone’s premiums are going up, thought Beauvoir. He looked at Gamache and shook his head. Really, they all deserved to be murdered in their sleep. But, of course, as irony would have it, it was the ones who locked and alarmed who were killed. In Beauvoir’s experience Darwin was way wrong. The fittest didn’t survive. They were killed by the idiocy of their neighbors, who continued to bumble along oblivious.

FOUR

“You didn’t recognize him?” asked Clara as she sliced some fresh bread from Sarah’s Boulangerie.

There was only one “him” Myrna’s friend could be talking about. Myrna shook her head and sliced tomatoes into the salad, then turned to the shallots, all freshly picked from Peter and Clara’s vegetable garden.

“And Olivier and Gabri didn’t know him?” asked Peter. He was carving a barbecued chicken.

“Strange, isn’t it?” Myrna paused and looked at her friends. Peter—tall, graying, elegant and precise. And beside him his wife Clara. Short, plump, hair dark and wild, bread crust scattered into it like sparkles. Her eyes were blue and usually filled with humor. But not today.

Clara was shaking her head, perplexed. A couple of crumbs fell to the counter. She picked them up absently, and ate them. Now that the initial shock of discovery was receding, Myrna was pretty sure they were all thinking the same thing.

This was murder. The dead man was a stranger. But was the killer?

And they probably all came to the same conclusion. Unlikely.

She’d tried not to think about it, but it kept creeping into her head. She picked up a slice of baguette and chewed on it. The bread was warm, soft and fragrant. The outer crust was crispy.

“For God’s sake,” said Clara, waving the knife at the half-eaten bread in Myrna’s hand.

“Want some?” Myrna offered her a piece.

The two women stood at the counter eating fresh warm bread. They’d normally be at the bistro for Sunday lunch but that didn’t seem likely today, what with the body and all. So Clara, Peter and Myrna had gone next door to Myrna’s loft apartment. Downstairs the door to her shop was armed with an alarm, should anyone enter. It wasn’t really so much an alarm as a small bell that tinkled when the door opened. Sometimes Myrna went down, sometimes not. Almost all her customers were local, and they all knew how much to leave by the cash register. Besides, thought Myrna, if anyone needed a used book so badly they had to steal it then they were welcome to it.

Myrna felt a chill. She looked across the room to see if a window was open and cool, damp air pouring in. She saw the exposed brick walls, the sturdy beams and the series of large industrial windows. She walked over to check, but all of them were closed, except for one open a sliver to let in some fresh air.