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“Now that I think about it, there was one funny thing in Morrow’s entries on the Empress. We could never figure it out. Thought he must’ve been drunk. It looks like he tried to erase the word, but it’s still there. Barely legible.”
“And the word was?”
“Ghost.”
CHAPTER 44
An elderly man opened the door.
“Monsieur Péladeau?” Reine-Marie asked.
“Oui?” His tone was more curious than guarded.
“Who is it?” a younger voice called from within the modest home in Cowansville.
“I don’t know.”
“My name is Reine-Marie Gamache. I’m…” Here she paused, wondering how charged the next word would be. “An archivist. I volunteer at the local historical society.”
A large woman in a work smock came out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a dishcloth. “What is it you want?”
“I hate to disturb you.” Reine-Marie looked from one to the other. “But something’s happened, and I wanted to ask you about Solange.”
The elderly man lifted his chin in the manner of soldiers facing the inevitable.
“What about her?” the woman snapped, then turned to Monsieur Péladeau. “You don’t have to say anything.”
“Gamache, you say?” said Péladeau. “Any relation to the Chief Inspector?”
“He’s my husband. We live nearby. I know you were once the commander of the local Sûreté detachment. Can we talk?”
He opened the door wider and she entered. “Merci.”
The home was neat as a pin. “Propre” was the word Reine-Marie’s cleaning woman mother used to say. Not just clean but gleaming, almost to the point of discomfort.
“You don’t have to,” the middle-aged woman repeated in a whisper.
He patted her hand. “I know. But she’s an archivist too. It’s all right. Can you bring us an iced tea?”
He led Reine-Marie onto the screen porch at the back of the bungalow. He was, she figured, in his early nineties.
They sat. “Tell me, Madame Gamache. What’s happened, and how does my daughter figure into it?”
Straight to the point, she thought. And appreciated.
“A body has been found in a place called Lost Nation. Your daughter did a series of interviews with Flossy Fuller about Lost Nation, as part of the Canadian Centennial celebrations.” As she spoke, she watched him carefully. There was, she knew, no way to talk about this without causing pain.
“That’s true,” he said, holding onto her eyes. His gaze steady. “Then there was the accident. Madame Fuller was also in the car.”
“Yes. You were first on the scene.”
“Yes.”
“I am sorry to ask. We have a daughter ourselves. I can only imagine what it would do to Armand…”
“What did you want to ask me?” He steeled himself. And Reine-Marie prayed this was worth it.
“In the wreckage, there was a tape machine with a cassette still in it.”
