He could lose them in the dark. He knew these woods better than most. Better than them.

His hand dropped to the pocket of his torn and muddy jacket. His fingers, knuckles scraped and bleeding, felt inside. And there it was. Safe.

But he was not. His pursuers were gaining on him, closing on him. He didn’t seem able to lose them.

He stopped. Turned. Pulled out the gun. Leveled it at the two men and one woman chasing him. And when they were close, too close to miss, he pulled the trigger.

*   *   *

Armand and Isabelle and Jean-Guy had left the bistro, and walked swiftly, quietly, across the village green, keeping to the shadows of the pines, until they arrived at the Gamaches’ home.

Jean-Guy stood on tiptoes and looked into the study window, then crouched down again.

“He’s not there,” he whispered.

“Has he found it?” Lacoste asked.

“One way to find out,” said Gamache. He motioned to Beauvoir to go around back while he and Lacoste, bent over, ran along his verandah to the front door.

Isabelle Lacoste drew her gun and opened the door slowly, carefully. Then stepped inside. Scanning the room. It was empty. She moved swiftly to the study while Gamache went down the hall to one of the bedrooms.

Lacoste opened the desk drawer in the study, then closed it and left, meeting Gamache in the living room.

“Beauvoir’s gun’s missing from his bedroom,” he said.

“The firing mechanism for the Supergun is also missing.” She waved toward the study.

The verandah door opened and Jean-Guy called in, “He’s in the woods. I can hear him.”

They ran out the door, a few paces behind Jean-Guy, who was racing between the trees. He forced himself to slow down now and then to listen. To make sure they were still on the right track. It was pitch-dark but a man running through the autumn forest, through the dead and withered leaves, made a lot of noise. And that’s what they followed.

It was a headlong pursuit. It was no use trying to hide the fact they were after him. It was a race now, through the dark woods. After the man who’d murdered Laurent Lepage. The man who’d murdered Antoinette Lemaitre.

The man who, with the stolen firing mechanism, would murder millions.

Up ahead the running stopped. But they did not. They kept going, straight into the raised gun.

*   *   *

He had them in his sights. He waited until he couldn’t miss, and then pulled the trigger.

But nothing happened. He pulled it again. But by then it was too late, they were on him, Isabelle Lacoste tackling him, and Beauvoir piling on.