“I’m not afraid.” She also sat back, wriggling a bit into the soft corner of the large chair. As a small creature might in a warm den.

“You should be afraid. Someone’s found Bull’s gun and is almost certainly looking for the plans,” said Armand. “You’re afraid they’ve already been found.”

“They haven’t been.”

“How do you know?”

“It’s been three days since the gun was found. If the plans had been there, the killer would have started sending out feelers, looking for buyers. Setting up an auction.”

“How do you know he hasn’t?”

It was just the two of them and the real Mary Fraser was beginning to appear, seeping out from the ladder in the stocking, the undyed roots of her hair, the clotted mascara. The file clerk was receding. But then, the real Armand Gamache was also appearing. The kindly retired cop was receding.

She gave him a patient smile. “We know.”

“You don’t know everything. You didn’t know about the gun.” But even as he said it he wondered if that was true.

“We knew Dr. Bull was working on it, of course, but not that he’d actually built it. That came as a surprise.”

“An unpleasant one, I’m guessing.”

“Well, not necessarily. After all, we now have the world’s only Supergun. It might come in handy.”

“Until another one’s built,” said Gamache. “Where are the plans?”

“Nowhere. They were destroyed by Gerald Bull.”

“Then why are you so worried?”

“I’m not.”

“Then why are you still here?” he asked.

She had nothing to say to that.

“And why are you reading a file on Dr. Bull?”

Her hand splayed further, to better conceal the cover.

“You’re not a fool, Madame Fraser, so why are you pretending to be?”

“Am I?”

“Word is spreading about the Supergun. The villagers now know, and while they’ve been asked to keep it quiet, it’s just a matter of time before it breaks out of this valley. And then journalists, gawkers, other scientists will arrive. And who knows who else might come out of the shadows. Come looking. Time is not on your side.”

“It wasn’t ‘someone’ who leaked the news, Monsieur Gamache. It was Isabelle Lacoste.”

Gamache sat absolutely still. Trying not to give anything away. Not a word, an expression, a twitch.

“That was foolish of her,” said Mary Fraser. “She has no idea the world she’s entered, and neither do you. You think you do, but you don’t. There are no rules, monsieur. No laws. No gravity. Nothing binding us, holding us down or back.”

“I thought you were a file clerk.”

She looked at the manila folder on her lap. “I am. And what are files? They’re information. Knowledge. And what is knowledge?”

He didn’t need to answer that, and neither did she.

“Why are you here?” he asked. “Why you?”