Chapter 20
“Do you believe him?” Lacoste asked as they drove back.
The roads were even worse now. The sleet had turned to snow that wanted only one thing: to tug vehicles into a ditch, or a tree, or each other.
S?reté SUVs were patrolling, and tow trucks were assisting cars that had slid off the road. Flares marked accidents up and down the highway. It was no use stopping to help. The highway cops had it under control. Besides, in trying to stop, they’d almost certainly make it worse.
Lacoste’s knuckles were white on the steering wheel, and her lips were compressed as she silently cursed Nichol and her father for the bald tires. And herself for suggesting they take this car and not Clara’s. Or Myrna’s or—
“Do you?” Gamache asked.
“Believe the Prime Minister? I want to. Does it seem strange to you, patron, that the Prime Minister of Canada knows about FEDS? An obscure technology to track ash? A technology he admits is interesting but essentially useless.”
“That did occur to me. It also seems odd that he’s in daily contact with the Chief Meteorologist.”
“Well, we are a nation addicted to the weather. It’s our main topic of conversation.”
He gave a grunt of laughter. It was true.
“I noticed you didn’t tell him about being in touch with General Whitehead.”
“Non.”
“Or the map.”
“Non.”
She took her eyes off the road for a second to look at Gamache. “You don’t really think we’re about to attack the US, do you?”
He gave one quick burst of laughter and looked at her. “No, I don’t. Do you?”
She laughed now too, her sharp eyes back on the road. “Non. But it might not be an official, overt invasion. Maybe it’s by some marginal militia group. Could that be what Moretti’s involved in?”
“A sort of Canadian Bay of Pigs?”
“A what?”
“An American misadventure in the ’60s, using the Cuban mafia to reclaim Cuba from the communists.”
“It’s still communist. I take it the plan didn’t work.”
She’d been to Cuba a few times on vacation. Loved the people, the music, the culture. The level of education and literacy. Not so much the poverty and the fact the citizens were prisoners on their little island.
“Foolish scheme to begin with. A debacle.” Still, it got him thinking.
They both knew that the tendrils of organized crime reached deep into legitimate business, corporations willing to fork out billions to further their own needs.
On top of that, the mafia had its fangs in the judiciary, the armed forces, powerful interest groups, including the media, not to mention elected officials and the civil service. On both sides of the border.
So that begged the question, why would they need an armed invasion? Didn’t they already have enough control?
Talk of an invasion was ridiculous, a smoke screen.
There was something else planned. Canada attacking the US would be like that animated short “Bambi Meets Godzilla.” Bambi did not fare well.
Though he now spent a few kilometers wondering what would happen if an invasion was launched.
Not by the official armed forces, but some ragtag militia.
Or maybe not so ragtag. Trained and organized by the Montréal mafia, in collaboration with the Five Families, and God knew who else they could pull in.
Far-right militia? Former special ops? Mercenaries?
Commandos. Funded with cartel drug money, prostitution, gambling, arms sales, and by any third parties or countries with an interest in destabilizing the US, even momentarily.
It was a long list.
If he were in charge of the attack, how would he go about it?
First, a covert war. Create a common enemy.
Subvert the media. Form their own outlets, broadcast media, newspapers, social media platforms, to spread lies.
Scare the population into believing their way of life, their very lives, were threatened.
Condition them. Groom them. Then, when the moment was right, get rid of any leader likely to oppose them and install a dummy regime, including a charismatic but not overly bright bully sold as a strong leader who could bring order to chaos.
The UN would be powerless, of course. Paralyzed by fear and endless debate and vetoes.
Yes, he thought as they slid down the highway, it could be done. But it would take years of preparation, of groundwork, of placing conspirators in key roles.
Even then it would almost certainly fail. Just one thing needed to go wrong. And there was a fair chance more than one element would immediately go pear-shaped.
Another Bay of Pigs. Equally ill-advised. He could not see any tactician agreeing to lead such a scheme. Not even Napoleon could pull it off.
Napoleon …
Still, even a failed attempt would throw both countries into chaos, even momentarily. Perhaps just long enough for a regime change. And that could lead to—
“A watershed,” he muttered.
“What was that, patron?”
“Nothing. Just imagining…”
Though what he could not imagine was why Canada would want, or need, to take over the United States. It made more sense the other way around. For the US to invade Canada. Now that would be relatively easy. As the PM implied, Luxembourg could probably do it.
But again, why bother?
No, all this talk of invasion was misdirection. What they were dealing with was something to do with water. And maybe fire. FEDS.
He stared out the window at the first snow of the year and tried to see clearly.
That night Jean-Guy again drove him to the theater. Snow was still falling, but lighter. Just fluffy flurries now. The roads were clear, having been plowed and sanded and salted.
They took Myrna’s all-wheel drive vehicle this time.
The volunteer at the door looked perplexed when they handed her their tickets. She’d been on the night before when the same two men had come to the show.
She almost asked, but seeing their grim faces, she decided best to just rip the tickets in half, hand them back, and leave it at that.
“He’s not coming, patron,” whispered Beauvoir, two-thirds of the way through.
Gamache took a deep breath but said nothing. He waited until the end. Until the scattered applause had died and the cast had left the stage. Until the lights had come up and there was the sound of a vacuum cleaner.
Until the usher approached, asking them to leave.
And they did, Jean-Guy walking beside Armand and silently cursing Whitehead.
“Let me call the General,” said Jean-Guy over coffee the next morning. They were alone in the kitchen. “Better still, I can go back to DC, see him in person.”
“Why?” asked Armand.
“You know why. To convince him to come up, to see you.” Beauvoir felt the sting of insult. That Chief Inspector Gamache should sit for two nights running, like some heartsick teen hoping his date showed.
It had broken Jean-Guy’s heart to see Gamache walking slowly back to the car. It was humiliating. If nothing else, Beauvoir wanted to give the General a piece of his mind.
“I didn’t really expect him to show,” admitted Armand.
“Why not?”
“You do know what I was asking him to do,” said Armand, getting up.
“But you sent him another ticket for tonight.”
“Never give up hope. Isabelle?” he called.
“Ready, patron,” came the reply from the study. “She’ll meet me at headquarters.”
“Bon.” He looked at his watch. Just enough time to get to his own appointment in Montréal.
Snow, not thick but heavy, coated the village. In the early-morning light Three Pines and the surrounding forest sparkled. The snow, fresh and bright, lay on the ground, on the roofs, on the cars. The trees were bowed and bent close to breaking under the weight of it.
All around the village residents were swatting branches with brooms to knock the snow off the limbs before they broke. As they did, the branches sprang back, sending puffs of snow into the air, so that the village looked like a series of very small blizzards.
On his way to the car Armand took hold of a large pine branch that was bowed to the ground and about to break. When he gave it a yank, it detached so quickly it dumped snow all over him.
“How could you not see that coming?” laughed Reine-Marie, using her broom to brush him off.
He smiled and thought, if it was the only thing he failed to see coming, it would be a good day.
A few minutes later Armand and Isabelle were heading into Montréal. Once in the city, Isabelle dropped him off on boulevard René-Lévesque for his meeting, while she continued on to S?reté headquarters.
Armand stood on the pavement and tipped his head back, looking up at the thirteen saints standing on top of the magnificent Marie-Reine-du-Monde Cathedral.
This was where Reine-Marie had gotten her name.
Her mother’s water had broken while she took communion there.
Because of that drama, the archbishop himself agreed to baptize the baby girl in the cathedral.
Overwhelmed and nervous, her godmother, when asked the name of the child, had said “Reine-Marie” instead of “Marie-Reine.” Her mother, also nervous, didn’t notice until the holy water was already dribbling down her shrieking baby’s head.
She decided, since that was the name God had heard, it was best to keep it.
Armand, while not a huge fan of organized religion, had affection for this church for that reason. He’d go there sometimes to get away from the turmoil of the great city. Sitting in a pew, he’d stare at the altar and imagine those events. Both, as it turned out, involved water.
As did his visit there today.
“God bless you,” said the guard at the front door when he arrived. And seemed to mean it.
“And you,” said Armand, smiling. And meant it.
At the top of the long aisle Armand, out of habit, genuflected. Huge seashell fonts with holy water were on either side. He did not dip his hand in. The only magic water he knew of had been spilled on the altar decades ago.