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Back Dead Cold Save as PDF
Chapters (43)
  1. A Fatal Grace
  2. ALSO BY LOUISE PENNY
  3. A Fatal Grace
  4. CONTENTS
  5. ONE
  6. TWO
  7. THREE
  8. FOUR
  9. FIVE
  10. SIX
  11. SEVEN
  12. EIGHT
  13. NINE
  14. TEN
  15. ELEVEN
  16. TWELVE
  17. THIRTEEN
  18. FOURTEEN
  19. FIFTEEN
  20. SIXTEEN
  21. SEVENTEEN
  22. EIGHTEEN
  23. NINETEEN
  24. TWENTY
  25. TWENTY-ONE
  26. TWENTY-TWO
  27. TWENTY-THREE
  28. TWENTY-FOUR
  29. TWENTY-FIVE
  30. TWENTY-SIX
  31. TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. TWENTY-EIGHT
  33. TWENTY-NINE
  34. THIRTY
  35. THIRTY-ONE
  36. THIRTY-TWO
  37. THIRTY-THREE
  38. THIRTY-FOUR
  39. THIRTY-FIVE
  40. THIRTY-SIX
  41. THIRTY-SEVEN
  42. THIRTY-EIGHT
  43. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

‘Merci, madame.’ The terrible cold of the day was kind to the Inspector. It hid any blush he might have produced. As he looked at the rock sitting forlornly at his feet a grudging, and secret, respect for curlers was born in Beauvoir.

Gamache took out the photos his people had taken of the crime scene. Five curling stones were imbedded in the snow where Mother had ‘cleared the house’.

An idea started to form in Gamache’s mind.

imageTWENTY-FIVE image

‘I’m sorry, Chief Inspector Gamache isn’t in, Mrs Morrow,’ said Agent Lacoste, dragging her eyes from her screen to look at the woman in front of her.

‘When do you expect him?’

‘I’m not sure.’ She looked at the clock. Almost noon. ‘I would imagine he’ll be back soon. Is it important?’

Clara hesitated. She didn’t really know, but something told her it was.

‘No. It’ll wait.’ She turned to go and caught sight of Yvette Nichol working on another computer. There was no love lost between the two women, though Clara was still baffled by the hostility this young agent had shown when they’d first met a year ago. Now Agent Nichol looked up from her desk, caught Clara’s eye, and immediately looked back down.

Well, it’s better than the evil eye I used to get, thought Clara.

The Sûreté officers were alone on the ice now. Émilie Longpré had gone to have lunch with Kaye in Williamsburg and Billy Williams had mumbled something about either going to practice for the World Cup of skiing or cutting wood for blast-off. It seemed to Gamache that Billy made perfect sense to everyone but him. Gamache couldn’t understand a word the man said.

Gamache walked to the stands, sitting there for a long, cold moment staring at the ice, then at the spot where CC had sat, and died. Then he walked round the stands and over to where Billy Williams had parked his truck.

‘The murderer stood here,’ said Gamache firmly, planting himself on the snow. ‘He watched the curling, and waited. Just as CC got up to grab the chair in front, he attached the booster cables.’

‘The lab’s confirmed what we already knew,’ said Lemieux. ‘Mr Williams’s cables were the ones used. They were found in his truck all blackened. But he says he attached them from his generator to the heating lamp, so how did someone take them from the lamp to the chair in the middle of the curling without being seen?’