Glass Houses (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache #13)(96)

Only when he’d brought up a fresh search engine did he motion Anton forward.

Anton sat, hit a few keys, clicked on a few links. Waited. Waited.

Eventually he pushed his chair back so Beauvoir could get a better look.

There on the screen was a report from a Spanish news program. A man was being scrummed on the steps of what looked like a courthouse.

“Is that Antonio Ruiz?” Beauvoir asked.

“No, that’s his lawyer. Se?or Ruiz is in the background. There.”

He pointed to an elegant man in a well-tailored suit. In his late forties, maybe early fifties. Looking pleased and confident.

“What’re they saying?”

“I don’t know, but I can guess. Se?or Ruiz was arrested for money laundering. The entire company was under investigation, but exonerated.”

“They got off?”

“The verdict came with a public apology.” He stared at the screen. “Someone got to someone.”

Beauvoir pursed his lips. Where there was dirty money, there was organized crime. And where there was the syndicate, there were drugs. Lots of them.

He wondered if Anton knew that too.

The news story continued. The lawyer answering questions and finally, waving reporters aside, he took Ruiz’s arm and guided him through the melee.

And then the report was over.

“Did you see it?” Anton asked.

“What?”

Anton replayed the video. And hit pause.

Just as the image started to dissolve, as the black seeped over the screen, it appeared.

From the top of the courthouse steps.

“A cobrador,” said Beauvoir.

And not the top hat and tails, Fred Astaire type.

This was the carrier of the conscience.

“How did you find this?” Beauvoir asked.

“Someone from Spain came for dinner,” said Anton. “A colleague of Se?or Ruiz. I was serving, and the man used the word cobrador, before Ruiz shut him up. The man turned so pale, I decided to look it up. That’s what I found.”

“Did you tell Jacqueline?”

“Yes.”

“What happened to Ruiz? Did the family really return to Spain?”

“That’s what they told us, but I don’t really know, and I don’t really care.” He sighed. “I’ll tell you, when that cobrador showed up here, I thought I’d piss my pants. Scared the crap out of me.”

“You thought it’d come for you?”

Anton opened his mouth, then shut it and shook his head. “I thought Ruiz had sent it, to scare us. Or worse.”

“But why would he want to scare you? Do you know something about him?”

“No.”

“About the murder of Katie Evans? If you do know something, Anton, you have to tell me.”

“I don’t. I promise.”

“But there is something, isn’t there,” said Jean-Guy. “You have to tell me.”

“Just between us?”

“Depends what it is, you know that. Is it to do with Antonio Ruiz?”

“Promise you won’t tell anyone.”

“I can’t. Come on, Anton. Tell me. I know you want to.”

*

Myrna was shaking her head.

“I wish I knew Katie better and could help. But what I do know is that those friends really do like each other. They’re not pretending. I just can’t see one of them plotting to kill her. Katie was bright and kind. The mother hen of the group. Not the wild child she once was. We all grow up.”

Not all, thought Gamache. Some, like Edouard, fall down. And never get up. Never grow up.

His mind left the warm loft and the murmur of conversation, and traveled across the cold village green, through the snow and ice, to his home. And the book in his desk. And the notes written there, in black ink. Like charcoal.

His plague diary.

Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.

“And the cobrador?” Clara’s voice cut through Gamache’s wandering mind and brought him back to the loft. “Who the hell was he? How does he fit in?”

“Well, he obviously wasn’t one of them,” said Isabelle. “Or even someone from the village. No one was missing.”

“Then who was he?” asked Reine-Marie.

“There’re a couple of other possibilities,” said Lacoste. “He could’ve followed Madame Evans here, playing out some old grudge. Or he was hired by someone here. Someone who knew that Matheo Bissonette had written about the cobrador phenomenon and would recognize it.”

“There is, of course, a simpler answer,” said Reine-Marie.

“Matheo Bissonette himself hired the cobrador,” said Isabelle. “And then told everyone, including Madame Evans, what it was. Yes, we thought of that. For it to work, she had to know what the thing was. Though it doesn’t answer why he, or anyone, would do it.”

They looked at Myrna.

“I don’t know why. Lea didn’t come to me to say Matheo was planning to kill Katie. Not that I remember, anyway.”

“Maybe he wasn’t,” said Armand. “Maybe the cobrador was just there to shame her. Murder was never part of the plan. But someone saw an opportunity, and took it. And you’re right,” he said to Clara. “It’s possible the cobrador’s target was someone else completely. Would you excuse me?”