A Great Reckoning (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #12)(140)

“We’re coming to that,” said Nathaniel.

“According to the Bureau of Records, Monsieur Valois was a mapmaker,” said Amelia, picking up the story. “Not a particularly good one, but serviceable. Good enough to keep food on the table. He made maps mostly for mining companies. Until one day he walked off a cliff.”

“Was he…?” Reine-Marie asked.

“Killed?” said Jacques. “Yes. The next piece of information we found was a record of Marie Valois renting here.”

“My place?” asked Clara.

“No, here, here,” said Nathaniel, pointing to the ground. “The bistro, though it was a private home at the time, owned by a Monsieur Béliveau.”

“I knew he was older than me,” said Ruth.

“Not, perhaps, the current one,” suggested Myrna.

“I’ll see if he’s in.” Armand got up, and as he walked across the terrasse, past the boulangerie to the grocer, he checked his watch.

Past six. It was a warm, still evening, the scent of peony and old garden roses in the air. The sun was still well up in the clear sky and wouldn’t set for another few hours.

When he returned, the elderly grocer was with him.

“You’re wondering about the Valois family?” he asked.

Armand indicated his chair, and Monsieur Béliveau bowed slightly and sat.

“Did you know them?” asked Nathaniel.

Monsieur Béliveau’s somber face broke into a smile. “I’m not quite that old.”

“Told you,” Myrna whispered to Ruth.

“But my grandfather knew them. He owned this building at the time and rented to Madame Valois. She was a widow, I believe.”

“Yes, with three sons,” said Huifen. “She must have been memorable, for your grandfather to tell you about them.”

“She wasn’t,” said Monsieur Béliveau. “And neither were the boys. They were just regular kids. What was memorable was what happened to them. All three died on the same day. At the Somme. My grandfather said he could still hear her wail, years later. Just the wind through the pines, my grandmother would tell him. But he insisted it was her.”

Reine-Marie looked at Armand. How often had they heard that howl from the forest?

“Why didn’t you tell us all this before?” asked Huifen.

“Because you were asking about Antony Turcotte,” said Monsieur Béliveau. “Not Madame Valois. I’d never heard of Turcotte.”

“Well, where does he come in then?” asked Gabri.

“After her sons were killed, Marie Valois went to live in Roof Trusses,” said Jacques. “She died just after the war.”

“Spanish flu probably,” said Myrna. “Judging by the date on the headstone. It killed millions in 1919.”

“Why would she leave Three Pines?” asked Gabri.

“You’ve never been a mother,” said Reine-Marie.

“He’s been a mother—” began Ruth.

“Ah,” said Jean-Guy, holding up Honoré, his little feet dangling. “Not in front of the baby.”

“She didn’t leave,” said Monsieur Béliveau, and all heads turned to him.

“Pardon?” said Clara.

“Madame Valois. She didn’t leave Three Pines. At least, she didn’t mean to. Not forever. She kept renting the place from my grandfather.”

“But, Roof Trusses?” said Olivier, not sure how to form the question.

“She wanted to get away,” said Monsieur Béliveau. “But just for a while. I think it was too painful for her here. But she always planned to come back. This was her home. She left most of her things here.”

“Including that,” said Myrna, pointing to the old map that had been placed on the table.

“But if all the boys were killed, how did the map get back to their mother?” asked Clara.

“It didn’t,” said Armand. “This map never left. It was made after the boys were missing in action. Before she left for Roof Trusses. In case.”

“In case?” Jacques asked.

“In case they weren’t dead,” said Reine-Marie.

“This whole village is one big orienteering exercise,” said Jean-Guy. “The map, the stained-glass window, the compass rose.”

“She made them each a map, to take with them,” said Armand. “So they could find their way home, and then she made another, so they could find her.”

“You mean she commissioned the maps,” said Huifen. “Antony Turcotte actually made them. The man in the toponymie office was certain. He must’ve been her father, or maybe a brother or uncle.”

“No,” said Gamache. “I mean she made them.”

The cadets, confused, looked at him, then at each other.

“Marie Valois was Antony Turcotte,” said Gamache. “She used her maiden name when she started making maps.”

“I don’t understand,” said Huifen.

“Probably a good thing that you don’t,” said Myrna. But she understood. “Back then, a hundred years ago or so, women weren’t encouraged to have jobs, and they sure weren’t encouraged to have a profession.”

“So they often took men’s names,” said Clara. “Painters did it. Writers and poets often used men’s names. She might have learned mapmaking by watching her husband, and then discovered that she was far better at it.”