‘Especially in the middle of winter. She had to not just touch a power source, but she had to be standing in a puddle with metal boots and…’

He left it dangling. Dr Harris thought about it for a moment. Tried to see the scene in her mind. The woman standing in a puddle at the chair, reaching out – ‘Bare hands. She had to have bare hands. That’s how he did it. And I thought you’d asked for the extensive blood work in case of poisoning.’

‘The gloves. I kept asking myself, why did she take off her gloves? Why would anyone?’

‘Because she was hot,’ said Dr Harris. She loved her job but she envied Gamache and Beauvoir the ability to put all the pieces together.

‘Someone at the community breakfast slipped her enough niacin to produce a flush. How long would it take?’ Gamache asked.

‘About twenty minutes.’

‘Enough time for her to be at the curling when it came on. At some point she began to get flushed and removed her gloves and probably her hat. We’ll see in the pictures tomorrow.’

‘What pictures?’

‘There was a photographer there. CC hired him to take publicity shots of her mingling with the common folk. His film gets to the lab tomorrow.’

‘Now why would she do that?’

‘She was a designer, a kind of minor Martha Stewart. Just came out with a book and was considering a magazine. The pictures would have been for that.’

‘Never heard of her.’

‘Most people hadn’t. But she seemed to have this image of herself as a successful and dynamic motivator. Like Martha, her business went beyond what colors the walls should be – white, by the way – into a personal philosophy of life.’

‘Sounds odious.’

‘I can’t get a grasp of it,’ admitted Gamache, leaning back comfortably. ‘I don’t know whether she was completely delusional or whether there was something almost noble about her. She had a dream and she pursued it, and damn the doubters.’

‘You agree with her philosophy?’

‘No. I spoke to someone today who described it as a kind of Frankenstein. I think that was quite accurate. Actually, that reference keeps popping up in this case. Someone else talked about the villagers celebrating the death of the monster, like in Frankenstein.’

‘The monster wasn’t Frankenstein,’ Dr Harris reminded him. ‘Dr Frankenstein created the monster.’

Gamache felt his chest tighten as she spoke. There was something there. Something he’d been approaching and missing throughout this case.

‘So what now, patron?’ she asked.

‘You’ve taken us a huge step forward with the niacin. Thank you. Now we just follow the headlights.’

‘Sorry?’