A Great Reckoning (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #12)(83)

“Now, how did your prints get on the murder weapon?”

Armand Gamache gave him a tight, cold smile.

“Partials,” Beauvoir reminded Charpentier, and anyone else in the room who harbored doubt.

“Did you handle the weapon?” Lacoste asked Gamache.

“I did not.”

“Good. Then can we move on, please?”

“I spoke to the head of public affairs at the gun manufacturer,” said Beauvoir, changing the subject. “McDermot and Ryan. A woman named Elizabeth Coldbrook in,” he checked his notes, “Dartmouth, England.”

He forwarded copies of her email and the attachments.

The second page was the receipt, which they all scanned.

“I see that Madame Coldbrook-Clairton insists they didn’t make the silencer,” said Lacoste.

“I believe her,” said Beauvoir. “She had no reason to lie, and it would be easy enough to disprove. We’re trying to trace it now. She’d assumed by my email that it was a suicide. She was upset to find out it was murder.”

“You’d think she’d be used to it by now,” said Gélinas. “Why else have a handgun?”

“Did she say why he might have ordered a revolver instead of, say, an automatic weapon?” Gamache asked.

“She said collectors like them, but when I pointed out that Leduc wasn’t a collector, she had no answers.”

Lacoste nodded, then looked up as Gamache cleared his throat.

The Commander was still studying the first page, then he looked over his reading glasses to her. Taking them off he used them to point to a paragraph.

“This is interesting.”

They consulted their screens again.

“How?” asked Chief Inspector Lacoste. “It’s a boilerplate sales pitch giving the history of this model.”

“Yes. The McDermot .45 came into its own in the First World War,” said Gamache. “In the trenches.”

“Oui,” said Lacoste. “Soooo?”

“It’s probably nothing,” admitted Gamache. “But you know that a copy of the map that was in Leduc’s bedside table was found in the stained-glass window in Three Pines. The one of the soldiers from the Great War. The soldier had the map, but he also wore a revolver. I’m guessing a McDermot.”

“Pardon?” said Gélinas. “I’m not following.”

“Are you saying the two are connected?” Beauvoir asked.

“Wait a minute,” said Gélinas, holding up his hand. “A map?”

“Yes. A few months ago, an old map was found in a wall of the bistro in Three Pines,” said Gamache. “We were talking about it yesterday in the meeting.”

“I remember, but you didn’t say a copy was found in Leduc’s bedside table.”

“It’s in the report,” said Lacoste.

Gélinas turned to her. “There’s a lot in the report. Not all of equal weight. That’s why context is important, don’t you think?”

He spoke as though lecturing a failing cadet. Then he returned to Gamache.

“You kept this from me.”

“We’re telling you now,” said Gamache. “A couple of weeks ago, before any of this happened, I decided to use the map as a training tool. A few of the cadets were invited to investigate it. I gave them copies of the map.”

“And one of them was found in the dead man’s bedroom?” Gélinas asked. “How did it get there?”

“Well, that’s the question, isn’t it?” said Lacoste.

“Whose fingerprints are on it?” Gélinas scanned the report.

“There’re three sets,” said Beauvoir, not needing to consult his iPad. He’d read the report when it had arrived in his inbox that morning. And while not everything was memorable, a few things leapt out. Including this.

“Leduc’s, Cadet Choquet’s, and Commander Gamache’s.”

“Monsieur Gamache made the copies and handed them out,” said Lacoste. “So his prints would naturally be there. Cadet Choquet’s copy of the map is missing.”

“Then it’s his,” said Gélinas. “Who is this Cadet Choquet? He seems very involved.”

“She,” said Gamache. “Amelia Choquet. A freshman.”

Gélinas went back a page in the report. “I see her name in the list of people whose prints were on the revolver case and might be on the revolver itself.”

“Right next to Nelson Mandela’s,” Lacoste pointed out.

“Still, we need to speak to her,” said Gélinas. “Can you have her brought here now?”

“She’s not in the building,” said Chief Inspector Lacoste.

“Where is she?”

Lacoste looked at Gamache, who said, “Three Pines. I had her and three other cadets taken there the day of the murder.”

Gélinas stared at Gamache, his mouth open. Unable to process what he’d heard.

“You what?” he rasped. “Is that what was meant by the four cadets in the village? Not Saint-Alphonse, but your own village? Who are they?”

“The students closest to Professor Leduc,” said Gamache. “Amelia Choquet and Nathaniel Smythe are freshmen—”