A Trick of the Light (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #7)

by Louise Penny

And so he walked back, past the old railway station and down the dirt road, one of the spokes that radiated out from the village green. He’d taken a lot of walks around Three Pines but never down this particular road. Huge maples lined the road, their branches meeting overhead. Their leaves almost blocking out the sun. But not quite. It filtered through and hit the dirt, and hit him and hit the book in his hand in soft dots of light. Gamache found a large gray rock, an outcropping by the side of the road. Sitting down he put on his reading glasses, crossed his legs and opened the book. An hour later he closed it and stared ahead. Then he got up and walked some more, further down the tunnel of shade and light. In the woods he could see dried leaves and tight little fiddlehead ferns and hear the scrambling of chipmunks and birds. He was aware of all that, though his mind was somewhere else.