All the Devils Are Here(85)

Putting her hand to her face, she stared at it. Thinking.

She knew Stephen wasn’t a collaborator. The question was, how to prove it. They couldn’t let the smear mar a courageous man’s legacy. And they sure couldn’t let a lie undermine whatever truth Stephen and Alexander Plessner had discovered.

But there was another question that came to mind as she stared at the photos.

“The police investigating the murder of Monsieur Plessner had copies of some of these documents within hours of his death. Is that possible?”

“Non.” The answer was unequivocal.

“Why not? It didn’t take you long to find them.”

“I’m the Chief Archivist. I was practically born in a file drawer. I know this place, these files, better than I know my own family.”

“But Allida, you can’t know all the documents in the archives. Even just the ones on the war. There must be hundreds of thousands.”

“Which is why I know there’s no way anyone could’ve put their hands on that”—she pointed at the file in front of Reine-Marie, with the doodle of the ship in peril—“so quickly. It would take weeks, months, to dig through all the documents. I think they found what they needed, then left them here, to be used when needed.”

“Which means—”

“Someone must’ve been planning this for a while.”

Not just someone, thought Reine-Marie. The file was in the possession of the police.

She felt physically sick. Her head was spinning with the effort of trying to grab hold of something too immense to grasp.

“When was this file last requested?” she asked.

Madame Lenoir got back on the electronic catalog. It didn’t take long before she looked up, meeting Reine-Marie’s eyes.

“Five weeks ago.”

“Does it say by whom?”

Madame Lenoir was no longer able to make eye contact.

“Daniel Gamache.”

*

Armand stood outside Daniel’s apartment and stared at the door.

Then he knocked.

It was opened by Roslyn, who stepped outside into the corridor and closed the door behind her.

“I’m sorry, Armand. He doesn’t want to speak with you. What happened? I’ve never seen him so upset.”

“He’ll have to be the one to tell you. But please, Ros, I need to speak with him. It’s urgent.”

Roslyn looked at her father-in-law. Normally so well-groomed, he was disheveled, his eyes red and his hair messy. Dark strands, mixed with gray, were plastered across his forehead, and his coat was smeared with something brown.

It looked like merde, but smelled, thankfully, of chocolate.

“Stay here. I’ll see what I can do.”

A few minutes later the door opened again and Daniel stepped out.

Armand took a deep breath.

“I can understand that you won’t believe me, but I want you to know that I love you. With all my heart. Always have. Always will. I didn’t join Task Force Two because I wanted to be there for my family. For you. I didn’t want you to go through what I did. But I did agree to train them, and I am so, so sorry that wasn’t clear. This’s my fault and I’m sorry for all the pain I’ve caused you.”

“I don’t care anymore. You’re twenty-five years too late.”

Armand nodded. “Oui.”

The truth, too late.

He took another deep breath, exhaled. And took the plunge.

“If you don’t believe I’m saying this as your father, then please believe that I’m saying this as a homicide investigator. I know how these things work. How an investigator’s mind works. You need to go to the police and tell them everything you know about Alexander Plessner. They’ll find out anyway.”

“From you?”

“No. Not from me. I won’t tell Commander Fontaine anything. I know you had nothing to do with Plessner’s murder, and I know for sure you’d never ever do anything to hurt Stephen. But there’s a sophisticated, powerful organization behind this, and what they need is someone to take the blame. Someone to set up. And I’m very afraid it’s you.”

“Thanks for your advice, Chief Inspector. I’ll consider it.”

Armand nodded and held out his son’s umbrella, which he’d picked off the grass in the garden. Daniel looked at him then closed the door in his face.

Resting the umbrella against the wall, Armand left.

Jean-Guy waited in the shadows.

Pedestrians glanced at him, then moved along. Not wanting to draw the attention of this tightly coiled man.

And then, there he was.

Loiselle paused for just an instant at the opening to the narrow side street, but it was all Beauvoir needed.

He grabbed him, swinging the much larger man around. With his knee he dropped Loiselle to the pavement and knelt on his back as he patted him down, coming away with a Sig pistol.

People shouted, some screamed, all leaped away. But before anyone could raise their phone and take photographs, Beauvoir hauled Loiselle to his feet and shoved him into a boutique.

“I’m a cop. I need your back room.”

The wide-eyed manager pointed. Then, rushing ahead, he unlocked a door.

“Lock it after us,” commanded Beauvoir.

“Should I call the police?”