The Brutal Telling Read Online Free PDF

instantaneous.”
    It was the best news Gamache ever heard at a murder scene. Death he could handle. Even murder. It was suffering that disturbed him. He’d seen a lot of it. Terrible murders. It was a great relief to find one swift and decisive. Almost humane.
    He’d once heard a judge say the most humane way to execute a prisoner was to tell him he was free. Then kill him.
    Gamache had struggled against that, argued against it, railed against it. Then finally, exhausted, had come to believe it.
    Looking at this man’s face he knew he hadn’t suffered. The blow to the back of the head meant he probably hadn’t even seen it coming.
    Almost like dying in your sleep.
    But not quite.
     
    T hey placed him in a bag and took the body away. Outside men and women stood somberly aside to let it pass. Men swept off their damp caps and women watched, tight-lipped and sad.
    Gamache turned away from the window and joined Beauvoir, who was sitting with Olivier, Gabri and Myrna. The Scene of Crime teamhad moved into the back rooms of the bistro, the private dining room, the staff room, the kitchen. The main room now seemed almost normal. Except for the questions hanging in the air.
    “I’m sorry this has happened,” Gamache said to Olivier. “How’re you doing?”
    Olivier exhaled deeply. He looked drained. “I think I’m still stunned. Who was he? Do you know?”
    “No,” said Beauvoir. “Did anyone report a stranger in the area?”
    “Report?” said Olivier. “To whom?”
    All three turned perplexed eyes on Beauvoir. The Inspector had forgotten that Three Pines had no police force, no traffic lights, no sidewalks, no mayor. The volunteer fire department was run by that demented old poet Ruth Zardo, and most would rather perish in the flames than call her.
    The place didn’t even have crime. Except murder. The only criminal thing that ever happened in this village was the worst possible crime.
    And here they were with yet another body. At least the rest had had names. This one seemed to have dropped from the sky, and fallen on his head.
    “It’s a little harder in the summer, you know,” said Myrna, taking a seat on the sofa. “We get more visitors. Families come back for vacation, kids come home from school. This is the last big weekend. Everyone goes home after this.”
    “The weekend of the Brume County Fair,” said Gabri. “It ends tomorrow.”
    “Right,” said Beauvoir, who couldn’t care less about the fair. “So Three Pines empties out after this weekend. But the visitors you describe are friends and family?”
    “For the most part,” said Myrna, turning to Gabri. “Some strangers come to your B and B, don’t they?”
    He nodded. “I’m really an overflow if people run out of space in their homes.”
    “What I’m getting at,” said an exasperated Beauvoir, “is that the people who visit Three Pines aren’t really strangers. I just want to get this straight.”
    “Straight we don’t specialize in. Sorry,” said Gabri. This brought a smile to even Olivier’s tired face.
    “I heard something about a stranger,” said Myrna, “but I didn’t really pay any attention.”
    “Who said it?”
    “Roar Parra,” she said, reluctantly. It felt a bit like informing, and no one had much stomach for that. “I heard him talking to Old Mundin and The Wife about seeing someone in the woods.”
    Beauvoir wrote this down. It wasn’t the first time he’d heard about the Parras. They were a prominent Czech family. But Old Mundin and The Wife? That must be a joke. Beauvoir’s lips narrowed and he looked at Myrna without amusement. She looked back, also without amusement.
    “Yes,” Myrna said, reading his mind. It wasn’t hard. The teapot could read it. “Those are their names.”
    “Old and The Wife?” he repeated. No longer angry, but mystified. Myrna nodded. “What’re their real names?”
    “That’s it,” said Olivier. “Old and The Wife.”
    “Okay, I’ll give you Old. It’s just