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But didn’t most people want to believe, to hope, their life’s work was of value? She could be deluded. Inheriting her father’s hubris.

He looked again at the names, not just written around the ceiling but dug right into it. Deep. So that they could not easily be erased. Would not be lost or forgotten.

Salvia rosmarinus. Rosemary. That one he knew. The rest? Not so much. Happily, he’d downloaded that horticultural app.

Catharanthus roseus was also known as Madagascar primrose or periwinkle. His brows rose. Its nickname was “graveyard plant.”

Nicotiana rustica was etched up there. It was a type of tobacco used by the Indigenous peoples of Québec in ceremonies. As a doorway to the spirit world, but also as a pain reliever when made into a poultice.

And what of the demon seed? Was its name etched up there?

If it was, he would not recognize it.

It was maddening in the extreme to think the answer was in her documents, which had probably been stolen by the failed and unfortunate Professor Russell, then stolen again and buried by Clybourne and Morrow, then dug up by Fillmore and his killer.

And here, at the home of Daisy Wolcott, was another body. Another victim.

The seed, the ghost, had left behind a trail of death.

He stared up at the ribbon of words dug into the folly. Might the answer be up there? Yet again, he needed a botanist. Armand thought for a moment, then sent a message and a series of photographs to a professor at Christ’s College, Cambridge, his old alma mater, inviting him for dinner in the pub a short walk from the college. Then he got up and stepped off the folly and went looking for something else.

Where, he asked himself, would this remarkable woman want to be laid at rest? In the churchyard next to her parents?

He thought not. The answer seemed obvious.

He stood still for a moment, then turned to the east. To where the first rays of a new day would appear. To where flowers, hungry for sunshine, would turn. After struggling a few feet into the thick jumble of flowers and bushes, he came across it.

A stone. No, two.

The larger was etched with letters now partly filled in with dirt and moss and lichen. It said Daisy Wolcott 1845–1910.

Nothing else. No inscription. There was, in the end, nothing left to say. Her papers, her collection, her garden spoke for her.

The smaller of the two said Peduncle, Beloved Companion. And below the writing was etched a floret of rosemary.

Remembrance.

After cleaning off the headstones, he cleared a small area around Daisy and Peduncle. Then he returned a few minutes later and laid a small bouquet on each grave.

“Did you tear up the floorboards?” he asked. It might seem to anyone watching that he was speaking to the graves, but in fact, he was speaking to the person he now knew was behind him.

“No.”

Gamache rose and turned and faced Gaston Comeau.

CHAPTER 53

Jean-Guy clicked his phone closed with a grimace.

“Pretty gruesome. At least we now know what happened to Jeanette Bouchard.”

“The Chief thinks it was an accident. What in the world was she looking for at the old Wolcott estate?” mused Isabelle.

“Probably the same thing the Chief is.”

“Do we know what that is?” she asked.

“No. And I doubt he does. He’s doing exactly what we are.”