“I’m hoping this will make him act,” said Lacoste, also rising. She examined his face. So familiar from so many conversations just like this. Except he’d always been the one making the decisions.

“Did I make a mistake?” she asked.

“If you did, it was one I’d also have made,” he said, and smiled. “It’s dangerous, but necessary. This is not a time for timidity. Or secrets.”

“Except ours,” said Beauvoir.

Chapter 18

CHAPTER 18

Michael Rosenblatt looked up from his French toast and saw the Sûreté officers get up to leave.

He’d been reading and making notes and eating. The trip to this little village had been a revelation. The village itself had been a revelation. As had the excellent French toast and sausages and maple syrup almost certainly made from the sap of trees he could see out the window.

But mostly that gun had been a revelation. When he’d crawled through that tiny opening on his hands and knees and looked up, he half expected to hear the celestial choir singing, “Ahhhh.”

There was Gerald Bull’s Supergun. Bathed in light.

Goddamned Gerald Bull. Dead, but never gone. How had he done it?

How had he built the goddamned gun?

Professor Rosenblatt looked at the papers by his plate, then over to his notebook, slightly stained by drops of maple syrup. One word had been written large, and circled.

How.

Then he wrote, Why?

That too seemed a good question.

But now that he thought about it, he added another.

Who?

Professor Rosenblatt put down his pen and watched Gamache say good-bye to his colleagues.

John Fleming. When the former Chief Inspector had said that name it had rattled the professor. He hadn’t heard it in years. He knew, of course, who Gamache meant, and he could see the CSIS people knew too. The serial killer. A man gone badly wrong.

But to make the connection between Fleming and Bull? It seemed incredible.

Professor Rosenblatt watched as Gamache and the Sûreté officers parted. He could see the expressions on the young officers’ faces as they looked at Gamache. With some concern and a great deal of affection.

Here was a nice man, Rosenblatt felt, and he realized that he did not himself know many nice people. Clever people, smart people, accomplished people, certainly. But not very nice. And not always good.

“I hope I’m not disturbing you,” said Gamache, walking across the wide-plank floor to the professor’s table.

“Not at all, please.” Rosenblatt indicated a seat in the booth across from him.

“Did you sleep well?” Armand asked, sliding in.

“Not so well,” admitted Rosenblatt. “New bed. New Supergun.”

Gamache grinned. The professor did, in fact, look tired. But his eyes still glowed with intelligence.

Here is a formidable man, thought Gamache.