Page 92 of A Better Man

“Came close,” she said, pointing to the ones that had been pushed over by the force of the river.

Beauvoir grunted.

How close they all were, without knowing it, to disaster. All the time.

They walked over the stone bridge to the old brick train station. It had seen its share of reunions. And partings. Its share of tears. And shouts of joy.

Even he, fairly immune to fantasy, could feel that every time he entered the familiar building.

It had also seen its share of murder investigations, having been used in the past by Chief Inspector Gamache as temporary headquarters for the homicide unit.

Now Chief Inspector Beauvoir directed his team to set up shop.

Abandoned decades earlier by the railway, the building was now home to the Three Pines Volunteer Fire Department, overseen by its chief, Ruth Zardo, who glared down at them from the official photo, taken when she’d been given the Governor General’s Award for poetry.

“I didn’t feel the aimed word hit,” Beauvoir said, looking up at the embittered old poet. “And go in like a soft bullet.”

I didn’t feel the smashed flesh

closing over it like water

over a thrown stone.

“What was that, patron?” asked one of the agents.

“Nothing.”

“Sounded like poetry,” she said with some alarm.

“Keep working.” Beauvoir caught Isabelle Lacoste’s eye and saw amusement there. And recognition.

My God, he thought. I’m turning into Gamache.

But while he feigned alarm, what he actually felt was a sort of contentment. That on his last case he should finally turn into his mentor.

He stood still amid the activity and let the evidence come to him. But what came to him was an image. Clear as day. Young and pregnant Vivienne Godin, breaking through the railing. Arms out. The duffel bag, her worldly possessions, falling with her.

Her blue eyes wide, as realization hit.