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“Yes. Sam was bad-mouthing you, and Robert defended you. Though it all ended amicably enough.” She paused. “I think Harriet’s got a crush on Sam. Should I be worried?”

Armand remembered the young man putting his arm around Harriet’s waist in a way that spoke less of affection and more of ownership. Or even hostage taking.

“Honestly?” he said. “If it was my daughter, I would be.”

Myrna had known that would be the answer. Ever since she’d interviewed Sam Arsenault on the eve of his sister’s parole hearing, she’d felt something was wrong.

That hadn’t been part of the formal parole hearings, but Armand had wanted her professional opinion before committing Reine-Marie and himself to be Fiona’s sponsors.

So, Dr. Landers had gone to the women’s prison. She’d met Fiona before in Three Pines, when the young woman had stayed with the Gamaches on weekend parole. But that was social. Now she was a psychologist specializing in criminal behavior, interviewing a known murderer.

Fiona readily admitted she’d killed her mother. She also admitted attacking her brother. Dr. Landers found Fiona Arsenault to be open, well-balanced, truthful. Remorseful. And she said as much to Armand and Reine-Marie.

Sam was another matter. It wasn’t anything Myrna could put her finger on, which was strange given her experience with so many different, and often aberrant, personalities. And that was what disconcerted her to the point of ending the interview early. It was like talking to a blank spot.

“I want to say something to Harriet, but I don’t know what, and I have no proof that Sam is…,” said Myrna. What?

Sick.

“There is something else, Armand. Harriet told me Robert said he could see goodness in Sam.”

“Really? He said that?”

“Yes. And according to Harriet, he turned to Fiona, clearly wanting to say the same thing about her.”

Armand waited.

“But he didn’t. He just stared at her, then looked a little confused and looked away.” Myrna paused. “You don’t think…”

Armand knew what she was thinking.

That they were wrong, and Reine-Marie and Jean-Guy, and now it seemed Robert Mongeau, were right. As was the court. That the dangerous one wasn’t Sam. He was manipulative, angry, vengeful. But not murderous.

Maybe the really dangerous one was the one who looked, acted, seemed okay.

Evil is unspectacular and always human, Auden had written. And shares our bed and eats at our own table.

Armand had no proof that Sam was dangerous. Was unwell. But there was a great deal of proof that the sibling who ate at their table had been. And maybe still was.

When Gamache walked into the Old Train Station, familiar from past investigations, he expected to see chaos. The sort of turmoil that accompanies the setting up of an Incident Room.

Instead, he found a young plainclothes officer directing the operation. Though to say she was in plain clothes would be unfair to her clothes. They were anything but plain. They were, however, plaid. And frayed and ripped. A white T-shirt was visible under a sweater that looked eaten not just by moths, but ravens.

Tattoos covered her arms and crawled up her neck.

She stood in the middle of the room, and when not issuing orders, she was clicking her tongue post against her teeth.

It was grating. She was grating. But she was also getting results. Neither senior officer had ever seen an Incident Room come together so quickly. Mostly because the technicians just wanted to get out and away from Agent Amelia Choquet.

“I thought you didn’t like her,” Gamache said, going up to his second-in-command, who seemed to be cowering in a corner.

“I don’t. Who does? I brought her in right after you called me. We needed someone, but with Isabelle on vacation, and this not being officially a homicide yet, I thought it best to bring in someone who at least knows Three Pines and the people.”

It was, Armand thought, a very good idea. They were playing catch-up with this murder. Five weeks old, dismissed as suicide, body cremated.

The quicker they could get a handle on what was important and what was not, the better.

A conference table had been set up, and Jean-Guy pointed toward it. “Can we go over the timeline? I just need to be clear, patron.”