“Me? You think I killed him? But why?”
“Maybe the Muse told you to do it,” Gamache suggested.
“The Muse? What’re you talking about?”
Gamache was still staring at him and Peter’s eyes widened.
“You think I’ve gone mad, don’t you? That this place has driven me insane.”
“Not just the place,” said Gamache. “But the company. Professor Norman lectured on the tenth muse. Isn’t that why you came here? To find him. And her?”
Peter flushed, either with rage or embarrassment at being caught out.
“Maybe it was all too much for you, Peter. You were lost, desperate to find a direction. Maybe the combination of Norman’s beliefs and this place was too much.” Gamache looked out at the vast, open, empty terrain. Sky and rock and water. “It would be easy to lose touch with reality.”
“And commit murder? I’m not the one who’s lost touch with reality, Armand. Yes, I can see how it might appear that I could’ve done it. And yes, Luc might’ve done it. But aren’t you forgetting something, or someone?”
“No,” said Gamache.
He wasn’t forgetting that someone was missing, besides Luc Vachon.
“Was Professor Norman surprised when Massey arrived?” Beauvoir asked.
“I think Professor Norman was beyond being surprised by anything,” said Peter. “He actually seemed pleased to see him.”
“And you left the two of them here, alone, last night,” said Beauvoir.
Peter nodded. Gamache and Beauvoir walked back into the cabin, and over to the bed.
Two young professors had met decades ago. Met and clashed. And then met again as old men. In the land God gave to Cain. They’d sat here. One on the chair. One on the bed.
And in the morning, one was dead. And one was missing.
Gamache looked down at the peaceful, almost joyous, face. And at the long, deep cut, from artery to vein.
Whoever did this had left nothing to chance.
He wanted to make sure Professor Norman, No Man, was dead.
And he was.
THIRTY-NINE
Armand Gamache didn’t know who had drawn the knife across Norman’s neck.
Professor Massey? Luc Vachon? Or Peter Morrow.
One of them had.
Gamache was sure of only one thing. He’d been wrong. Way off.
It wasn’t until that very morning, on the ship, in the pastel light of the new day, that he began to see the truth.
At about the same time Peter Morrow was staring down at this bed, he was staring down at Peter’s lip painting.
And once more Gamache had turned it around.
Changed the way he was looking at it.
That was what he’d needed to do with this case. Turn it around. They’d presumed so many things. Made so many conclusions fit the facts.
But they actually had it upside down.
If Professor Massey had painted that wonderful picture at the back of his studio, how had Norman, so far away, infected it with asbestos?
How? How?
The answer was, he couldn’t have.
The answer had to be that Professor Massey hadn’t painted that picture.
Norman had.
Norman hadn’t put the asbestos on. Massey had.
Gamache realized he had everything backward.
No Man wasn’t trying to kill Professor Massey.
Massey was trying to kill No Man.
And he’d succeeded.
Professor Norman’s throat might have been cut that morning, but this murder had actually been committed decades ago. With a sprinkle of asbestos on blank canvases. Shipped to the disgraced and dismissed Professor Norman. As a favor.
Norman had eagerly opened the containers of art supplies, like a child at Christmas. Inhaling the asbestos liberated into the air. Then he’d happily, gratefully, unrolled the blank canvases, further disturbing the deadly fibers. As though that wasn’t enough, Norman would then have stretched them onto a frame. And finally he’d have painted them.
All the while believing kindly Professor Massey was his friend.
If Reine-Marie’s and Myrna’s opinions were to be believed, Sébastien Norman had been a gifted, perhaps even masterful, painter. But each stroke of the brush had brought him closer to death. The very act of creation had killed him.
As Massey knew it would.
Gamache felt a fool. He should have seen this sooner, much sooner. Who had access to the asbestos? Not Norman. He was way far away in Baie-Saint-Paul by the time it was taken out of the walls of the art college.
No. Professor Massey had access to it.
“But why would Massey want to kill Norman?” Beauvoir asked. “Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Massey got Norman fired. Why would he then send Norman infected canvases for years?”
Instead of answering, Gamache turned to Peter, who was now standing in the doorway. His eyes averted from the bloody bed.
“We found your paintings. The ones you gave to Bean.”
“Oh.” Peter looked as though Gamache had just pulled down his pants. “Did Clara see them?”
“Would it matter?”
Peter thought about that, and shook his head. “It would have, a year ago. Even a few months ago. But now?” He searched his feelings and almost smiled. “It’s okay.” He looked at them with wonder. “It’s okay. They’re a mess, but they’ll get better. What did Clara think of them?”
This was all that really mattered to him. Not their opinion, only Clara’s.
“Do you want to know?”
He nodded.
“She thought they were a dog’s breakfast.” Gamache studied Peter as he said it. The old Peter would have gotten huffy, taken offense. Been deeply insulted that anything he did could be greeted with anything short of wild applause.
But this Peter just shook his head and smiled. “She’s right.”
“It’s a compliment, you know,” said Gamache. “She said her first efforts were the same. A lump in the throat.”
“Oh, God, I miss her so much.” The little energy Peter had summoned disappeared and he seemed to deflate.
His lower lip trembled and tears welled up. Saltwater. A sea of emotion, withheld. He looked desperate to say all the things unsaid, for decades. But all that came out was ragged breath.
“I want to sit in our garden and hear about her year, and tell her about mine,” he finally said. “I want to hear all about her art. And how she paints and how she feels. Oh, God, what’ve I done?”
* * *
Clara grabbed Peter’s rolled-up paintings. “I can’t wait any longer.”
“Sit down,” Myrna commanded. “Sit.”
“Could we at least call them?” Clara pulled out her device.
“Give me that,” said Myrna, holding out her hand. “Give it.”
“But—”
“Now. Lives might be at stake. We don’t know what’s happening and we can’t interrupt. Armand said to wait for him.”
“I can’t.”
“You have to. This is what he does. What they both do. Leave them.”
Their coffees were cold and the lemon meringue pie sat untouched in the middle of the table.
“Do you think they’ve found Peter?” Clara asked.
“I hope so.” Myrna looked out the window and couldn’t imagine what might be beyond this place. Where else could they look? Where else could he hide?
“Does the Muse live here?” Clara asked. Of Chartrand.
“Why do you ask me?”
“Because you’ve been here before.”
“No, I haven’t.”
“Are you sure?” Clara’s eyes held his, and wouldn’t let them drop.
“I’ve never been here in my life,” said Chartrand. “But I’m glad I’m here now.”
“Why?” asked Clara.
He smiled weakly, got up, and left. They could see him through the window of the diner, his hands shoved into his pockets, his collar turne
d up against the wind. He stood hunched, staring out at the water.
Clara clasped one hand tightly in the other under the table. How long would she have to wait? How long could she wait? She looked at the Bakelite clock on the diner wall. But while it told time, it wasn’t helpful. Clocks were meaningless here.
Time seemed measured in other terms. Here.
The clock said they’d been in the diner for three quarters of an hour, but Clara knew it was really an eternity.
* * *
“Why did you come here?” Gamache asked.
“To find the tenth muse?” asked Beauvoir.
“You know about that?” asked Peter, and when they said nothing he went on. “No. I came to tell Norman what a shit he was. When I visited Professor Massey at the art college, it all came back to me. I’d always regretted not telling Norman about the damage he’d done.”
“With the Salon des Refusés,” said Gamache.
“Yes. He’d hurt Clara, and I’d said nothing at the time. When I left Three Pines, I had no idea how she would feel about me when I returned. I suspected she’d want to end our marriage for good, and I couldn’t blame her. But I wanted to take her one special thing. A gift. I thought and thought about it, and realized what a coward I’d been all our lives. Never defending her or her art. Letting everyone criticize and belittle. And finally even doing it myself when I realized how brilliant she really was. I tried to ruin her art, Armand.”
He looked down at his hands, as though he had blood all over them. The hollow gaze of a sin-sick soul.
“When Professor Massey mentioned Norman, I remembered the Salon des Refusés and knew what I could give her,” said Peter, raising his eyes again. “My apology. But not just words. A deed. Even if I had to go to hell and back, I’d find Professor Norman, and confront him. Only then could I go home. And face her.”
“You’d bring her the head of Professor Norman,” said Gamache.
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
When Gamache continued to stare at him, Peter blanched.
“You don’t still think—” He waved toward the bed.
“Go on,” said Gamache, not taking his eyes off Peter.
“I went to Baie-Saint-Paul, where the files said Norman’s last check had been mailed, years ago. He wasn’t there, but it was so beautiful, and peaceful, and I’d been on the road for so long. So I rented a room and caught my breath. It was only then I remembered the paintings from my mother’s house. The ones I’d stared at for hours. Wishing myself into them. The Clarence Gagnons. They were done in Baie-Saint-Paul. So I found the Galerie Gagnon, and when I wasn’t painting I spent hours staring at them.”
“Why?” asked Beauvoir.
“Have you seen them?” Peter asked. Beauvoir nodded. “How did they make you feel?”
Jean-Guy answered without hesitation, “Homesick.”
Peter nodded. “They became like a window for me, back to Three Pines. Back to Clara and what I had. And what I’d lost. At first they made me indescribably sad. But then, the more I looked, the calmer I became. They gave me a sort of settled happiness. A hope.”
“The lips,” said Gamache.
Peter turned to him and smiled. “Yes. That’s when I painted the lips.”
“How’d you know No Man was here?” asked Beauvoir.
“Luc Vachon told me. He was still in contact with Professor Norman.”
“He’d belonged to the art colony Professor Norman created,” said Beauvoir.
Peter nodded. “But ‘create’ is probably the wrong word. It sorta grew up around him. People were drawn to him. Because he seemed to know.”
“Know what?” asked Beauvoir.
“That there was a tenth muse. And he knew how to find it,” said Peter. Then, unexpectedly, he laughed. A derisive, unpleasant sound.
“You think it’s bullshit,” said Beauvoir.
“I think I didn’t have to come all the way to the end of the earth to find it,” said Peter. “It was there all along. Beside me in bed. Sitting in the garden. It was in the studio next to mine. In the chair next to mine. I came here to find what I already had.”
“You came here to confront Professor Norman,” Gamache reminded him.
“True. When I arrived it was clear Norman was very sick. This was a couple of months ago. He was dying and alone.”
Now Peter took a step forward, crossing the threshold.
“Did you confront him?” asked Beauvoir.
“No. The place was a mess. So I thought I’d clean it up first. After that, I’d let him have it. But then I realized he hadn’t eaten in a while, so I bought some food and cooked it. I’m not much of a cook, but I made scrambled eggs and toast. Something nutritious and light.”
“Did you tell him after that?” asked Beauvoir.
“No. His clothes and bedding were filthy. So I took them to the Laundromat in Tabaquen and washed them.”
Beauvoir had stopped asking, and was now just listening.
“His clothes and linen were clean then,” said Peter. “But he hadn’t had a bath in days. He was too weak.” Peter took a deep breath. “So I bathed him. I poured a bath and put in rosewater and lavender and a little essence of lily. Anything I could find.” Peter smiled. “I might’ve overdone it.” He looked down at the man in the bed. “I picked him up and put him in the bath. And washed him. It smelled like our garden in Three Pines.”
By now he’d come all the way into the room and was looking at the dead man with such tenderness. Seeing past the blood and the gaping wound. To the man.
“I stayed on, to look after him.”
Beauvoir’s voice broke the spell. “Did you know what was wrong with him? Did he?”
“If he did, he didn’t tell me. It was something to do with his lungs. I wanted him to go to the hospital in Sept-Îles, but he didn’t want to leave. I could understand that. He wanted to die at home.”
Peter looked at Beauvoir, then over to Gamache.
“Do you know what was wrong with him?” Peter asked.
“Do you know why Professor Massey came here?” Gamache countered.
“No.” Peter looked at Gamache closely. “But I get the feeling you do.”
“I think it might have been to confess,” said Gamache.
“Confess? To what?”
“You were right,” said Gamache. “Professor Norman was dying. Had been dying for a long time. Well before he realized it. Massey had killed him.”
“Massey? But that’s ridiculous. Why? How? Voodoo?”
“No. Asbestos.”
That stopped Peter.
“I think when Massey heard we were looking for you,” Gamache continued, “and that you were looking for Professor Norman, he realized we’d almost certainly find both of you. And learn everything.”
“But what’s there to learn?” Peter asked, lost.
“That Professor Massey had been sending him asbestos-infected canvases, for years.”
“Why?” Peter asked, astonished.
“Because Norman was a threat,” said Gamache. “Just like Clara was a threat to you. You loved Clara, but that didn’t stop you from trying to destroy her art, and actually destroying your marriage.”
Peter looked as though he’d been kicked in the gut. But Gamache didn’t let him off. He stood firm, staring at Peter until Peter nodded agreement.
“You loved her, and still you did that,” said Gamache. Drilling it home again. “Imagine what you might have done had the love not been there? Had there been hate instead? Love of Clara gave you some brakes, at least. A line beyond which you wouldn’t cross. But Massey had none. He felt he had everything to lose. And that Norman was about to take it away.”
“But he got Professor Norman fired,” said Peter. “Wasn’t that enough?”
“This wasn’t about revenge or vindictiveness,” said Gamache. “For Massey it was about survival. The art college was everything to him. It was his home, physically, emotionally, creatively. And the students were his
children. He was the respected, revered professor. The brilliant one. The one they idolized and adored. But suppose a better painter, a more courageous artist, a truly avant-garde teacher appeared?”
Peter’s face had gone slack. And finally he conceded. He knew how that felt. To be usurped. Left behind. To see it all slipping away.
Massey was fighting for his survival. And getting Norman fired wasn’t enough. If Norman’s paintings started appearing in shows, then questions would be asked of the man who’d gotten rid of him.
Massey could not let that happen.
“When the asbestos was taken out of the walls of the college, he kept some, and sent asbestos-infected canvases to Norman,” said Beauvoir. “As a gift. One artist to another.”
“But how’d he do that, just logistically?” asked Peter. “Professor Norman lived in the middle of the woods, in Charlevoix.”
“He had help,” said Beauvoir. “Luc Vachon.”
Peter opened his mouth to protest, but paused, then closed it. And thought. And rethought all he knew.
“But if Professor Massey came to confess, then where is he?” Peter looked around. “And if he confessed, there’d be no need to kill Norman, would there? So who did that?”
He pointed to the bed.
Gamache turned to Jean-Guy. “Can you find Luc Vachon?”
“Oui, patron.”
“Arrest him. But be careful. He might still have the hunting knife.”
“Oui. And I’ll keep an eye out for Professor Massey.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that right now, Jean-Guy.”
“True.”
Beauvoir left, and Peter turned to Gamache.
“What was that about? Why shouldn’t he worry about Professor Massey?”
“Because he’s almost certainly dead,” said Gamache. “We’ll start a search once we’ve arrested Vachon.”
“Dead? How do you know?”
“I don’t know, for sure. But you were right—if he came here to confess, he’d have no reason to kill Professor Norman. And he allowed you to see him, so he didn’t try to hide his presence. No, I think Professor Massey might have regretted what he did. What seems acceptable, even reasonable, in youth can look very different in old age. I think he came here to confess to Norman, perhaps even ask for forgiveness. And then he was going to turn himself in. But Luc Vachon couldn’t allow that.”