They ate it up. But this time it hadn’t worked. He’d been unable to see the simple truth. Instead, he’d painted this.
When Clara left Peter plopped down in his chair and stared at the bewildering piece of work on his easel and repeated silently to himself, I’m brilliant, I’m brilliant. Then he whispered, so quietly he barely heard it himself, “I’m better than Clara.”
* * *
Olivier stood on the terrasse outside the bistro and looked into the dark forest on the hill. In fact, Three Pines was surrounded by forest, something he’d never noticed, until now.
The cabin had been found. He’d prayed this wouldn’t happen, but it had. And for the first time since he’d arrived in Three Pines he felt the dark forest closing in.
* * *
“But if all these things,” Beauvoir nodded to the interior of the single room, “are priceless why didn’t the murderer take them?”
“I’ve been wondering that myself,” said Gamache from the comfort of the large wing chair by the empty fireplace. “What was the murder about, Jean Guy? Why kill this man who seems to have lived a quiet, secret life in the woods for years, maybe decades?”
“And then once he’s dead, why take the body but leave the valuables?” Beauvoir sat in the chair opposite the Chief.
“Unless the body was more valuable than the rest?”
“Then why leave it at the old Hadley house?”
“If the murderer had just left the body here we’d never have found it,” reasoned Gamache, perplexed. “Never known there’d been a murder.”
“Why kill the man, if not for his treasure?” asked Beauvoir.
“Treasure?”
“What else is it? Priceless stuff in the middle of nowhere? It’s buried treasure, only instead of being buried in the ground it’s buried in the forest.”
But the murderer had left it there. And instead, had taken the only thing he wanted from that cabin. He’d taken a life.
“Did you notice this?” Beauvoir got up and walked to the door. Opening it he pointed upward, with a look of amusement.
There on the lintel above the door was a number.
16
“Now, you can’t tell me he got mail,” said Beauvoir as Gamache stared, puzzled. The numbers were brass and tarnished green. Almost invisible against the dark wooden door frame. Gamache shook his head then looked at his watch. It was almost six.
After a bit of discussion it was decided Agent Morin would stay at the cabin overnight, to guard the possessions.
“Come with me,” Gamache said to Morin. “I’ll drive you in while the others finish the job. You can pack an overnight bag and arrange for a satellite phone.”
Morin got on the ATV behind the Chief Inspector and searched for something to grip, settling on the bottom of the seat. Gamache started up the machine. His investigations had taken him into tiny fishing outports and remote settlements. He’d driven snowmobiles, power boats, motorcycles and ATVs. While appreciating their convenience, and necessity, he disliked them all. They shattered the calm with their banshee screams, polluting the wilderness with noise and fumes.
If anything could wake the dead, these could.
As they bounced along Morin realized he was in trouble, and letting go of the seat he flung his small arms around the large man in front of him and held on tight, feeling the Chief’s wax coat against his cheek and the strong body underneath. And he smelled sandalwood and rosewater.
The young man sat up, one hand on the Mountain, the other to his face. He couldn’t quite believe what the Mountain had told him. Then he started to giggle.
Hearing this, the Mountain was puzzled. It wasn’t the shriek of terror he normally heard from creatures who came near him.
As he listened the Mountain King realized this was a happy sound. An infectious sound. He too started to rumble and only stopped when the people in the village grew frightened. And he didn’t want that. Never again did he want to scare anything away.
He slept well that night.
The boy, however, did not. He tossed and turned and finally left his cabin to stare up at the peak.
Every night from then on the boy was burdened by the Mountain’s secret. He grew weary and weak. His parents and friends commented on this. Even the Mountain noticed.
Finally, one night well before the sun rose the boy nudged his parents awake.
“We need to leave.”
“What?” his bleary mother asked.
“Why?” his father and sister asked.
“The Mountain King has told me of a wonderful land where people never die, never grow sick or old. It’s a place only he knows about. But he says we need to leave now. Tonight. While it’s still dark. And we need to go quickly.”
They woke up the rest of the village and well before dawn they’d packed up. The boy was the last to leave. He took a few steps into the forest and kneeling down he touched the surface of the sleeping Mountain King.
“Good-bye,” he whispered.
Then he tucked the package under his arm, and disappeared into the night.
* * *
Jean Guy Beauvoir stood outside the cabin. It was almost dark and he was starving. They’d finished their work and he was just waiting for Agent Lacoste to pack up.
“I have to pee,” she said, joining him on the porch. “Any ideas?”
“There’s an outhouse over there.” He pointed away from the cabin.
“Great,” she said and grabbed a flashlight. “Isn’t this how horror movies start?”
“Oh no, we’re well into the second reel by now,” said Beauvoir with a smirk. He watched Lacoste pick her way along the path to the outhouse.
His stomach growled. At least, he hoped it was his stomach. The sooner they got back to civilization, the better. How could anyone live out here? He didn’t envy Morin spending the night.
A bobbing flashlight told him Lacoste was returning.
“Have you been into the outhouse?” she asked.
“Are you kidding? The Chief looked in, but I didn’t.” Even thinking about it made him gag.
“So you didn’t see what was in there.”
“Don’t tell me, the toilet paper was money too.”
“Actually it was. One- and two-dollar bills.”
“You’re joking.”
“I’m not. And I found this.” She held a book in her hand. “A first edition. Signed by E. B. White. It’s Charlotte’s Web.”
Beauvoir stared at it. He had no idea what she was talking about.
“It was my favorite book as a child. Charlotte the spider?” she asked. “Wilbur the pig?”
“If they didn’t get blown up I didn’t read it.”
“Who leaves a signed first edition in an outhouse?”
“Who leaves money there?” Beauvoir suddenly felt an urge to go.
* * *
“Salut, patron,” waved Gabri from the living room. He was folding tiny outfits and putting them into a box. “So, the cabin in the woods. Was it where the guy lived? The dead man?”
“We think so.” Gamache joined him. He watched Gabri fold the small sweaters.
“For Rosa. We’re collecting them from everyone to give to Ruth. Is this too big for Rosa?” He held up a boy’s blazer. “It’s Olivier’s. He says he made it himself but I can’t believe that, though he’s very good with his hands.” Gamache ignored that.