The Murder Stone Read Free

the Manoir’s full up. One family, the Finneys, has taken the other five rooms. They’re here—’
    She stopped suddenly and dropped her eyes to the ledger in an act so wary and uncharacteristic the Gamaches exchanged glances.
    ‘They’re here … ?’ Gamache prompted after the silence stretched on.
    ‘Well, it doesn’t matter, plenty of time for that,’ she said, looking up and smiling reassuringly. ‘I’m sorry about not saving the best room for you two, though.’
    ‘Had we wanted the Lake Room, we’d have asked,’ said Reine-Marie. ‘You know Armand, this is his one flutter with uncertainty. Wild man.’
    Clementine Dubois laughed, knowing that not to be true. She knew the man in front of her lived with great uncertainty every day of his life. Which was why she deeply wanted their annual visits to the Manoir to be filled with luxury and comfort. And peace.
    ‘We never specify the room, madame,’ said Gamache, his voice deep and warm. ‘Do you know why?’
    Madame Dubois shook her head. She’d long been curious, but never wanted to cross-examine her guests, especially this one. ‘Everyone else does,’ she said. ‘In fact, this whole family asked for free upgrades. Arrived in Mercedes and BMWs and asked for upgrades.’ She smiled. Not meanly, but with some bafflement that people who had so much wanted more.
    ‘We like to leave it up to the fates,’ he said. She examined his face to see if he was joking, but thought he probably wasn’t. ‘We’re perfectly happy with what we’re given.’
    And Clementine Dubois knew the truth of it. She felt the same. Every morning she woke up, a bit surprised to see another day, and always surprised to be here, in this old lodge, by the sparkling shores of this freshwater lake, surrounded by forests and streams, gardens and guests. It was her home, and guests were like family. Though Madame Dubois knew, from bitter experience, you can’t always choose, or like, your family.
    ‘Here it is.’ She dangled an old brass key from a long keychain. ‘The Forest Room. It’s at the back, I’m afraid.’
    Reine-Marie smiled. ‘We know where it is, merci.’
    One day rolled gently into the next as the Gamaches swam in Lac Massawippi and went for leisurely walks through the fragrant woods. They read and chatted amicably with the other guests and slowly got to know them.
    Up until a few days ago they’d never met the Finneys, but now they were cordial companions at the isolated lodge. Like experienced travellers on a cruise, the guests were neither too remote nor too familiar. They didn’t even know what the others did for a living, which was fine with Armand Gamache.
    It was mid-afternoon and Gamache was watching a bee scramble around a particularly blowsy pink rose when a movement caught his attention. He turned in his chaise longue and watched as the son, Thomas, and his wife Sandra walked from the lodge into the startling sunshine. Sandra brought a slim hand up and placed huge black sunglasses on her face, so that she looked a little like a fly. She seemed an alien in this place, certainly not someone in her natural habitat. Gamache supposed her to be in her late fifties, early sixties, though she was clearly trying to pass for considerably less. Funny, he thought, how dyed hair, heavy make-up and young clothes actually made a person look older.
    They walked on to the lawn, Sandra’s heels aerating the grass, and paused, as though expecting applause. But the only sound Gamache could hear came from the bee, whose wings were making a muffled raspberry sound in the rose.
    Thomas stood on the brow of the slight hill rolling down to the lake, an admiral on the bridge. His piercing blue eyes surveyed the water, like Nelson at Trafalgar. Gamache realized that every time he saw Thomas he thought of a man preparing for battle. Thomas Finney was in his early sixties and certainly handsome. Tall and distinguished with grey hair and noble features. But in the few days