“If, if,” shouted Jean-Guy. “It might not happen, but we know for sure what’ll happen if Fleming’s let out of that hellhole. He’ll kill again. And again.”
“Don’t tell me what Fleming will do. You have no idea what that man’s capable of. I do.”
“Then tell me, for God’s sake. What did he do? What is that man capable of?”
“He made the Whore of Babylon,” shouted Gamache.
“The etching, I know.”
“No, the real thing. Out of his victims.”
Beauvoir stepped back, away from Gamache. From the words that had come out of his mouth and the image that came with them. Of what Fleming had done. Of what had been so horrific it was kept from the public.
“Ohhhhh” escaped Beauvoir, a sigh, as though his soul had withered and was sliding out.
“The children?”
“Everyone. All seven victims,” said Gamache, and bent down again, his hands on his knees.
Beauvoir sank to his knees in the dirt. He watched Gamache trying to catch his breath. He’d had no idea of the weight this man had been carrying all this time. The images he must have seen. There were even rumors of a recording. Gamache had stood in that courtroom and absorbed it so that no other citizen had to. A few sacrificed for the many.
Gamache straightened up, stiffly, until he stood tall and resolute.
“If there was any other way, Jean-Guy…”
“You can’t let him out. I’m begging you.” Beauvoir, still on his knees, lifted his arms toward Gamache. “It won’t even do any good. He was probably lying to you. He might not even know where the plans are.” Beauvoir got up, angry now. “You were too close, you couldn’t see it. He was playing with you, messing with you.”
“You think I don’t know that?” shouted Gamache. “You think I don’t know he was probably lying, and even if he does know where the plans are, he almost certainly won’t tell us? I know that.”
“Then why do it? Why even consider it?”
“What happens if we leave Fleming where he is and those plans are found by another arms dealer?”
He stared at Beauvoir, challenging him. Daring him to go where Gamache himself stood. In the whirlwind.
The two men were ten feet apart, glaring at each other.
“You think,” growled Gamache, “I want to release Fleming? To bring him to Three Pines? It sickens me. But we might have no choice. Fleming might not tell us where the plans are. And yes, he might escape. But I don’t know where the plans are. You don’t know where they are. God knows I’ve been desperate to find them.”
“And Fleming probably doesn’t either. He’d say anything to get out of there.”
“But he might. He might know. He could be our only hope.”
Beauvoir stared at him, appalled. “You’re pinning hopes on that creature? What if the lives he takes next time belong to Madame Gamache, or Annie, or your granddaughters? Would you be so cavalier then?”
“Cavalier? You think that’s what I am? If those plans are found, how many more wives and husbands, children and grandchildren will be killed? Tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands. No one would be safe.”
It was a grotesque equation, and Gamache looked like he was about to pass out. He was contemplating being an accessory to a slaughter, for the greater good.
Mary Fraser had been wrong about Gamache. He’d done it before, and he’d do it again. Send a few to possible death, to save the many. Those decisions had finally torn him to shreds, and he’d crawled to Three Pines to heal. But not, it would appear, to hide.
Beauvoir opened his mouth, his breathing heavy, his eyes wide.
“Annie’s pregnant, Armand.”
It took a moment for the words to penetrate Gamache’s defenses, to get through his turmoil. But then his shoulders dropped, his face softened.
And he understood.
“Oh my God,” he whispered.
In long, swift strides he covered the distance between them, and gathering Jean-Guy in his arms, he held the sobbing man.
“We’ll find the plans,” he repeated over and over, until Jean-Guy had calmed down. “We’ll find them.”
Though he didn’t know how.
* * *
Armand drove the rest of the way home, giving Jean-Guy a chance to recover and to talk about the new baby. And Annie.
“Please don’t tell Madame Gamache,” said Jean-Guy. “Annie would kill me. She wants to do it herself.”