The Long Way Home(13)

“Not the same one,” Gamache assured her, and Clara could see that it wasn’t. The one that was in his hand, that he was now placing in his pocket, was thin and old. Worn. Read and reread.

“One of Myrna’s?” Clara asked.

“Non.” He examined her. “Do you want to talk about Peter?”

“No.”

The Paris Peace Conference had hit a stalemate. He sipped his coffee. The morning mist had almost burned away and the forest spread green as far as he could see. These were old-growth trees, not yet discovered and felled by the lumber industry.

“You never finish the book,” she said. “Is it difficult to read?”

“For me, yes.”

She was quiet for a moment. “When Peter left, I was sure he’d come back. I was the one who forced the issue, you know. He didn’t want to go.” She lowered her head and studied her hands. As hard as she scrubbed, she couldn’t seem to get the paint out of her cuticles. It was as though the paint was part of her. Had fused there. “And now, he doesn’t want to come home.”

“Do you want him back?”

“I don’t know. I won’t know until I see him, I think.” She looked at the book just poking out of his pocket. “Why’s it so difficult for you to read? It’s in English, but I know you read English as well as French.”

“C’est vrai. The words I understand, it’s the emotions in the book that I struggle with. Where it takes me. I find I need to tread carefully.”

Clara looked at him full on. “Are you all right?”

He smiled. “Are you?”

Clara pushed her large hands through her hair, leaving croissant flakes behind. “May I see it?”

Gamache hesitated, then tugged the book out of his pocket and gave it to her, watching closely, his body suddenly taut as though he’d handed her a loaded gun.

It was a slender hardback, the cover worn. She turned it over.

“There is a balm in Gilead,” she read from the back, “to make the wounded whole—”

“There’s power enough in Heaven / To cure a sin-sick soul.” Armand Gamache finished the phrase. “It’s from an old spiritual.”

Clara stared at the back cover. “Do you believe it, Armand?”

“Yes.” He took the book from her and grasped it so tightly in one hand she half expected words to squeeze out.

“Then what are you struggling with?”

When he didn’t answer, she had her answer.

The problem wasn’t with the words, it was with the wounds. Old wounds. And maybe a sin-sick soul.

“Where’s Peter?” she asked. “What’s happened to him?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you know him. Is he the sort to just disappear?”

Gamache knew the answer to that, had known since the day before when Clara had brought her problem to him.

“No.”

“So what happened to him?” she pleaded, searching his face. “What do you think?”

What could he say? What should he say? That Peter Morrow would have come home if he could? That for all his faults, Peter was a man of his word, and if he couldn’t for some reason show up in person he’d have called, or emailed, or written a letter.

But nothing had come. Not a word.

“I need to know, Armand.”

He looked away from her, across the forest that went on and on forever. He’d come here to heal and, perhaps, to hide. Certainly to rest.

To garden, and walk, and read. To spend time with Reine-Marie and their friends. To enjoy Annie and Jean-Guy’s weekend visits. The only problem he wanted to solve was how to hook up the garden hose. The only puzzle was whether to have the cedar plank salmon or the Brie and basil pasta for dinner at the bistro.

“Do you want my help?” he asked at last, not daring to look at her in case his face betrayed his offer.

He saw Clara’s shadow on the ground. It nodded.

He lifted his eyes to hers. And nodded. “We’ll find him.”

His voice was reassuring, confident.

Clara knew she was hearing the same voice, seeing the same face, so many others had. As the large, calm man had stood before them. And handed them their worst fears. And assured them he’d find the monster who had done it.

“You can’t know that. I’m sorry, Armand, I don’t mean to be ungrateful, but you don’t know for sure.”

“C’est vrai,” Gamache conceded. “But I’ll do my best. How’s that?”

He didn’t ask if she was prepared for the answer to her question. He knew that while Clara wanted Peter, she also wanted peace. She was as prepared as she could be.

“You don’t mind?” she asked.

“I don’t mind at all.”

She studied him. “I think you’re lying.” Then she touched his large hand. “Thank you for that.” She got up, and he rose with her. “A brave man in a brave country.”

He was unsure what to say to that.

“It’s a prayer, from the other Gilead,” Clara explained. “It’s a dying father’s prayer for his young son.” She thought for a moment, remembering. Then she recited, “I’ll pray that you grow up a brave man in a brave country. I will pray you find a way to be useful.”