Jean-Guy Beauvoir entered first, and this time he brought out his Sûreté ID.

“Yes, sir. What can I do for you?”

Beauvoir waited for the young agent behind the counter to size him up, and when she didn’t he looked at her. She was young. Very young. Fifteen years younger than him. She could almost be …

But while a brave man, he wasn’t quite brave enough to go there. But he did wonder how, and when, it had happened. That he’d gone from clever, young, whip-smart Jean-Guy Beauvoir, the enfant terrible of homicide, to Inspector Beauvoir. Sir.

Not all transformations were miracles or magical. Or improvements.

“We’d like to speak to your station chief.”

The young agent looked at him, then behind him to the others who were crammed into the entrance of the small Sûreté detachment.

And then her eyes widened.

Standing at the back, patiently waiting, was a man she recognized.

She stood up, then sat down. Then stood up again.

Jean-Guy Beauvoir suppressed a grin. He was used to this reaction and had been expecting it. Waiting for it.

“Chief Inspector,” the agent said, practically bowing.

“Armand Gamache.” He stepped forward and, squeezing his arm between Clara and Chartrand, offered his hand.

“Agent Pagé,” she said, feeling his grip. “Beatrice Pagé.”

She could have cursed. Why’d she give him her first name? He doesn’t care. He’s the Chief Inspector of fucking Homicide. Or was. Until that whole rotten business. Until he retired.

Agent Pagé had joined the Sûreté months before it all blew up. And she knew that while she’d spend most of her career with other superiors, this man would always be, in her mind, the Chief Inspector of homicide.

“I just started,” she said, and her eyes widened. Stop talking, stop talking. He doesn’t care. Shut the fuck up. “My shift, I mean. And in the Sûreté.”

Oh, dear God. Take me now.

“This is my first posting.”

She stared at him.

“And where are you from?” Gamache asked.

He looked interested.

“Baie-Comeau, up the coast.”

Merde, merde, merde, she thought. He knows where it is. Merde.

Gamache nodded. “They’ve cleaned up the bay there. A beautiful place.”

He smiled.

“Yes, sir. It is. My family’s been working in the mills for a long time.”

“Are you the first of your family in the Sûreté?” he asked.

“Oui. They didn’t want me to join. Said it wasn’t respectable.”

Maudit tabarnac, she thought, and looked around for a gun to stick in her mouth.

But the large man in front of her, with the scar by his temple, just laughed and lines radiated from his kind brown eyes. “And do they still feel that way?”

“No, sir, they don’t.” And now all her nerves calmed and she met his gaze. “Not after what you did. Now they’re proud of me.”