A Better Man (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #15)(81)

“Where’s Toby?”

“Dunno.”

He frisked her and came away with packets of foil and a switchblade.

He cuffed her to the railing and moved on.



* * *



Gamache chased another kid into an apartment, where he tackled him, both of them falling onto one of the stained mattresses pushed together on the floor. Getting quickly to his feet, Gamache put the kid in a hold, patting him for weapons and scanning the room for other occupants. It was then he noticed pill bottles neatly arranged on shelves lining all four walls.

“Are you Toby?”

The boy was silent.

Gamache pulled a knife, a bottle of pills, and an ID from his pockets.

Not Toby.

“Where is he?”



* * *



Beauvoir grabbed hold of the collar of the largest kid as he tried to escape down the alley and swung him around. Not a he. A she. A girl about fifteen.

“Let her go,” came a voice from above.

Beauvoir turned, still holding the girl, and saw a skinny kid on the fire escape. Pointing a gun.

“You a cop?” the kid asked. “Of course you are.”

The girl yanked her jacket out of Beauvoir’s grip and stepped away.

“Toby?” Beauvoir asked the kid holding the gun.

“Get his gun,” said Toby.

The girl reached out, but Beauvoir backed away. “You don’t want to do that.”

“Give her your gun, old man,” said Toby.

“Or what? You’ll kill a cop?”

Beauvoir looked at the large girl standing in front of him. Her eyes were wide, round. She was stoned and afraid.

Then he looked at the kid on the fire escape and felt his heart leap in his chest.

He was not afraid. Not stoned.

His gray eyes were empty. Not cold. But not hot. Not glaring, not even threatening.

Chief Inspector Beauvoir had seen eyes like that, often. But only in the recently dead.

“I’m a minor,” said Toby. “What’re they gonna do to me?”

“You know what they’ll do to you?” came a voice down the alley.

Toby immediately turned his gun on the older man walking toward them. His hands were out by his sides, his jacket was open to show he wasn’t armed.

“If you kill a cop, if you even hurt one, they’ll try you as an adult. You’re close enough, right? What’re you?” Gamache turned his attention to the girl beside Beauvoir. “Fourteen. Fifteen.”

“Almost fifteen,” she said.

“Shut up, Daph,” said Toby, not moving the gun from the newcomer.

“There’s a third cop, you know, Daphne,” said Gamache. “Is that your name?”

She gave a small nod.

“If your friend shoots Chief Inspector Beauvoir—” He saw the girl’s eyes widen even further, though Toby did not react.

Gamache stopped where he was and addressed himself now to Toby. “That’s right. Not just a cop, but Monsieur Beauvoir here is head of homicide for the S?reté. If you shoot him, you’ll have to shoot me, too. And our colleague will almost certainly then have to shoot you. Both.”

He let that sit there before speaking again, this time to Daphne. “Do you want to see fifteen?”

“I’m fifteen,” said Toby. “It’s not so great.”

“No,” said Gamache. He’d also noticed the look, or lack of it, in the boy’s eyes. “I don’t suppose it is. And I’m sorry about that. But it can get better.”

Just then Cameron rounded the corner, skidding in the slush as he tried to stop himself. Regaining his balance, he pulled out his gun. Pointing it at first one, then the other kid, finally settling on Toby on the fire escape.

“Put down your weapon, please,” said Gamache. And to everyone’s astonishment, it was clear he was talking to Cameron. “You might keep it at the ready. But just lower it.”

“But—”

“Do it,” said Beauvoir.

The girl Daphne had backed up and, quite sensibly, was now standing a few paces away from Chief Inspector Beauvoir.

But Daphne was not the problem. Nor was she the solution.

“We’ve come to ask you about a bottle of pills we found in a murder investigation,” said Beauvoir. “Mifegymiso. It’s an abortion drug.”

“I know what it is. I know all the shit I sell.”

“So you do sell it?” said Gamache. “But probably not a lot.”

As he spoke, he moved a step closer to the fire escape but away from Beauvoir. Dragging Toby’s attention, and his gun, toward him. Forcing Toby to choose between them. Making it more difficult for the boy to shoot both before Cameron could get off a shot.

“Stop,” snapped Toby before glancing at Daphne. “I said get his gun.”

To Beauvoir’s dismay, he felt his gun removed from its holster. This was, he knew, another reason Gamache never wore one.

Because it could be taken. Used against him. Them. Anyone and everyone. Most guns used in crime were stolen from people who had them legally.

And here was one more on the street.

Gamache looked over his shoulder at Cameron, warning him not to react. Not to overreact.

Nothing had happened yet. Not really. Nothing that could not be undone. But once a trigger was pulled, there was no going back.