A Better Man (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #15)(131)
He’d let go of Homer. The man was gone. Vivienne’s father was gone, into the river. And Jean-Guy was turned to the bridge. Reaching for it. But it was just beyond his grasp.
He was falling.
Annie. Annie. Honoré.
* * *
And then he fell.
* * *
It all happened so fast it seemed in slow motion.
Gamache leaped off after him. Following Beauvoir over the edge.
With one hand, he grasped the post. With the other, he reached out.
Reaching, reaching.
Jean-Guy’s hand was stretching out toward him. Jean-Guy’s eyes, pleading.
Then their hands touched, and gripped.
There was a yank, as Jean-Guy’s fall was stopped. But not for long, Gamache knew. His arm and shoulder had been wrenched. Slivers from the rotten wood were pushing into his palm. Making it slippery with blood. He was losing his grip, on the post. On Jean-Guy.
Jean-Guy was staring up at him. Eyes wide with terror.
Neither spoke. Neither could.
In a moment they’d both be in the river. The freezing water closing over them. Not able to breathe for the shock, the cold, the turbulence. The roiling. Turning them over and over. Their bodies hitting rocks and tree trunks.
Until all struggle left them. All breath left them. And finally all life left them, as their bodies bobbed and thumped down the Bella Bella. Past St. Thomas’s Chapel. Past Miss Jane Neal’s home. Past Clara’s. Past the old railway station.
Under the stone bridge they’d go. And come to rest at the bend in the river.
He held Jean-Guy’s frantic eyes and saw his lips move. Annie.
And Armand could see what Jean-Guy was about to do.
“Don’t,” he rasped. “You. Dare.”
But Jean-Guy did.
Knowing Armand could not hold him and keep a grip on the bridge, Jean-Guy opened his grip. Released his hand.
Jean-Guy Beauvoir let go.
But Armand did not. He closed his hand even tighter, even as he felt Jean-Guy’s fingers squeezing through his own.
All this took just moments but felt like an eternity.
Just as his hold slipped completely, Armand twisted and heaved. Throwing Jean-Guy as far as he could. Toward the shore.
The effort pulled his hand from the bridge and turned his body onto its back, so that for a moment Armand was looking up. At the sky. Into the April sunshine.
Reine-Marie. Reine-Marie.
He heard a splash as Jean-Guy hit the water.
Then his back arched and arms spread out, and he saw the river roiling below.
* * *
Armand had managed to throw Jean-Guy clear of the worst of the torrent, but still he’d splashed down in deep water. Arms flailing, trying to get his head above the bone-chilling water, he felt the current grab him, sweeping him out into the river.
Just as he was about to go under, hands gripped him. Water washing over him, retching and coughing, he felt himself pulled to shore.
He looked up, through the brilliant sunshine and cascading water, to where he’d come from.
Afraid to see a void where Armand had been.
* * *
Eyes screwed shut, Armand prepared to hit the water, then fight for his life.
But instead he was jerked to a stop.
The blood rushed to his head, mixing with the rush of the river below, until the sounds were indistinguishable. Water into blood. Blood into water.
Then he looked up, into the smashed face of Bob Cameron. The tackle. Penalized for holding, too often and too tight.
Holding on, tight.
As Armand hung there, suspended. Between the bridge and the water.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Reine-Marie hugged him.
And he held her.
Finally letting go, Armand asked, “Is he all right?”
She nodded. “Hot bath, warm clothing. He’s in the kitchen by the fire. Annie’s on her way down. Homer?”
Armand shook his head.
Reine-Marie sighed. “God.” Then she turned and embraced Isabelle.
When they entered the kitchen, Jean-Guy got to his feet. He was clutching a blue blanket around his shoulders and looked a little, though Armand would never ever say it to his face, like Ruth. From Clara’s portrait.
Jean-Guy would not appreciate being told he looked like the old poet. Never mind the Virgin Mary.
When he’d gotten to the rocky shore, gagging and heaving, Jean-Guy had first made sure Armand was safe. Only then did he focus on the person bending over him.
* * *
Wiping the Bella Bella from his eyes, Jean-Guy looked at Isabelle Lacoste.
Through chattering teeth he managed, “Thank you. Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me,” she said, putting her warm coat over Jean-Guy’s shoulders. “I just arrived. He got to you first.”
She pointed to the person collapsed next to him.
Soaking and shivering, there was Carl Tracey. He’d seen Beauvoir fall and had slithered quickly down the embankment to the river.
“You?” said Beauvoir.
“Yeah, well,” mumbled Tracey through blue lips, “sometimes ya gotta do something stupid.”
Hands trembling, Jean-Guy took off the warm coat and gave it to Carl Tracey.