Beauvoir brought the car up to the house, yet again. It skidded as he applied the brakes, as though it too didn’t really want to stop there.

The old Hadley house was in near darkness, the path to the front door unshoveled and without footprints. No one had been in or out of the place all day.

‘Should I call for backup?’

‘No. I don’t think he’ll be surprised to see us. He might even be relieved.’

‘I still don’t understand why CC married him,’ mumbled Beauvoir, looking at the closed door.

‘His name,’ said Gamache. ‘Nichol gave me that answer.’

‘How’d she figure it out?’

‘Well, she didn’t really, but she told me that she went into the fire to save Saul Petrov because of his name. Saul. She had an Uncle Saul and there’s a collective guilt in her family about those who died in Czechoslovakia. Including Uncle Saul. It worked on a primal level. It wasn’t rational.’

‘Nothing she does makes sense.’

Gamache stopped, halfway up the path, and turned to Beauvoir. ‘Everything makes sense. Don’t underestimate her, Jean Guy.’ He held the younger man’s gaze a moment longer than necessary then continued his story. ‘This whole case has been about belief and the power of the word. CC de Poitiers married the only man she could. She married another royal. Eleanor of Aquitaine’s favorite son was Richard Coeur de Lion. Richard the Lionhearted. Richard Lyon.’

‘She was attracted to the name, not the man?’

‘Happens all the time. If you like someone named Roger, suddenly you feel kindly toward all Rogers.’

Beauvoir snorted. He couldn’t remember ever feeling kindly, period.

‘And the opposite is true,’ Gamache continued. ‘You hate a Georges, chances are you won’t like any Georges at first. I know I do that. Not proud of it, but it happens. One of my best friends is Superintendent Brébeuf. Every time I meet a Michel I think of him, and immediately like the person.’

‘You immediately like everyone. It doesn’t count. Give me a bad example.’

‘Okay. Suzanne. A Suzanne in junior school was mean to me.’

‘Oh, she was mean to you?’ Beauvoir’s face was writhing in laugh lines.

‘Very mean.’

‘What did she do? Knife you?’

‘She called me names. For four years. She followed me down the halls, through the arches of the years, down the labyrinthine ways of my own mind.’

‘That last was a quote, wasn’t it?’ Beauvoir accused him.

‘Afraid so. “The Hound of Heaven”. And maybe she was. She taught me that words wound and sometimes they kill. And sometimes they heal.’

They were at the door and ringing the bell and it opened.

‘Monsieur Lyon,’ said Beauvoir, stepping across the threshold. ‘We need a word.’

Gamache knelt beside Crie. A purple bathing suit was strangling her arms and legs.