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Once home, the children had gotten into warm dry clothes and sat on the sofa with a hot chocolate while the dogs, Henri and old Fred, slept by the hearth along with little Gracie. Who might, or might not, be a dog. Or a ferret.

The smart money among the villagers was on the tiny creature being a chipmunk. Though Stephen Horowitz, Armand’s godfather, who now lived with them, took pleasure in insisting Gracie was a rat.

“They’re very intelligent, you know,” the ninety-three-year-old told the children when they crawled onto the sofa beside the former financier.

“How do you know?” Zora, the serious one, asked.

“Because I used to be one.”

“You were a rat?” Florence asked.

“Yes. A big fat one, with a long, long silky tail.”

Their eyes widened as he regaled them with tales of his adventures as a rat on Wall Street and Bay Street. On rue Saint-Jacques in Montréal and at the Bourse in Paris.

That was in the afternoon. They were all in bed now. Asleep.

Though one was still stirring.

Armand hit pause on his screen and looked up. He heard the familiar creaks and cracks as the temperature dropped and frost settled into the bones of the old home. There was something profoundly peaceful about knowing his family was safe in their beds.

“Merci.” Armand nodded toward the tart and smiled his thanks to Jean-Guy.

Then he took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.

“This the person you’re protecting?” Jean-Guy asked, taking a seat and gesturing toward the computer.

“Oui.”

Armand’s answers were unusually curt, and now Jean-Guy paid more attention to the image on the screen.

It showed a middle-aged woman at a podium, smiling. It was a pleasant smile. Not a sneer. There was no malice, no guile. It was neither smug nor maniacal. She looked nice.

“Something wrong?”

Jean-Guy looked at his father-in-law and what he saw was a man deeply unsettled.

Armand tossed his glasses onto the desk and nodded toward the screen. “This’s a recording made at Abigail Robinson’s last event just before Christmas. After I watched it this afternoon, I called the President of the University to ask that the event tomorrow be called off.”

“Really? What did he say?”

“That I was overreacting.”

Armand had wanted to believe the President. He wanted to roll up the blueprints, close his notebook, put on his parka and join his family.

He wanted to sit with his grandchildren, a heavy rug covering their legs, and watch Gloria’s swaying tail as the horse pulled the big red sleigh up the north road out of the village.

Instead he’d gotten in his car and driven over to North Hatley to see the Chancellor.

Chapter 4

Chief Inspector Gamache took off his parka and boots and followed the Chancellor into her living room.

“S’il vous plaît, Armand.” She indicated a comfortable armchair by the fireplace.

The room was lined with books, and above the mantel there hung an A. Y. Jackson. Gamache glanced at it but kept walking to the French doors at the end of the gracious room. Standing in front of them, his hands clasped behind his back, he looked out over Lac Massawippi. The large lake, surrounded by thick forest, was frozen over. A great field of sparkling white. Except. Right in front of the house, just offshore, a rectangle had been cleared, and flooded, and frozen again so that it formed an ice rink.

A hockey match was under way, though how they could tell who was on which team he didn’t know. They all wore Montreal Canadiens, Habs, sweaters.