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While neither had children, and both were single, Debbie was divorced and Abby had never married. They’d eventually drifted apart, their lives taking them in different directions.

“You know she went to Oxford?” said Debbie. “While the rest of us were mooning over boys, she was reading about the curriculum, years before she was old enough to even go.” Debbie turned to the Chancellor. “That’s how you two met, right?”

The Chancellor nodded. She, like Gamache, had been sitting back. Observing.

“I knew Abigail’s father, Paul. He was a good friend and a great mathematician. Almost as gifted as his daughter.”

Abigail smiled. “Merci.”

“He died in Abby’s first year,” said Debbie. “We reconnected at the funeral.”

“I wonder what he’d make of what’s happening now,” said Abigail.

“I think we know,” said Debbie. “After all he did for you, he’d be very proud with what you’ve done with your life. And he’d be proud of your study. He felt strongly that the truth, no matter how awful, must come out. And sometimes, it’s pretty awful.”

Abigail stared at her friend and colored. She gave a curt nod and turned to the fire.

“I agree,” said the Chancellor. “He’d be proud of you for having the courage to speak up. He was a kind man, a brave man. A believer in mercy, in all its forms.”

Gamache tipped his head back so that he was looking at the support beams above his head. Giving himself that gap between thought and action. So that he didn’t speak his mind.

Merciful. Had Colette really just equated what Abigail Robinson was promoting with an act of mercy?

But he did have an answer to one of his questions. He lowered his head and looked at the Chancellor, who seemed to agree with Abigail Robinson after all.

“You two work together now,” Lacoste was saying to Debbie and Abigail.

“That’s a nice way of putting it,” said Debbie. “I work for Abby, yes. Though it doesn’t actually feel like work.”

“What do you do?”

“Everything,” said Abigail. “Debbie does everything.”

“Except the research, the writing, the meetings, the lectures. But yes,” Debbie said with a smile, “besides that, I do everything.”

“She finds the flights,” said Abigail, “books hotels, pays the bills, fixes the laptops, finds the chimney sweep, organizes the winter tires, the lawn mowing, the—”

“Social media?” asked Gamache.

“Yes.”

“You post videos of the events?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Debbie. “You wouldn’t believe how popular they’ve become.”

Gamache, who’d been watching the likes tick up, would.

“The videos seem to be getting better,” said Lacoste. “More professional.”

“They are. At first the footage was from what people sent in,” Debbie explained, “but we needed something easier to watch, so now I hire local videographers.”

“And yesterday? Was the event recorded?”

“If it had been, Inspector, we’d have given you the tape,” said Debbie. “It was too last-minute to find anyone.”

“I saw the recording of your event before Christmas,” said Gamache, his voice casual.

“Yes, well, most of that was taken by people in the audience,” said Debbie. “We decided not to put up the one we had.”