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Myrna thought for a moment, holding a book in her hand. She always thought better when holding a book.
She’d been crying this night and Clara knew why. At Christmas homes were full of the people there and the people not there.
‘It’s so hard being a woman,’ said Gabri. ‘There’s our periods, then losing our virginity to you beasts, then the kids leave and we no longer know who we are—’
There’s a fine line between noble perseverance and insanity, reflected Gamache.
That’s how Armand Gamache felt now. He felt happy and satisfied. He loved his work, he loved his team. He’d rise no further in the Sûreté, and he’d made his peace with that because Armand Gamache wasn’t a competitive man. He was a content man. And this was one of his favorite parts of the job. Sitting with his team and working out who could have committed the murder.
I think wisdom comes with age and life and pain. And knowing what matters.’
And he remembered hugging Sonny to him a few months later when the vet came to put him to sleep. And he remembered saying soothing things into the stinky old ears and looking into the weepy brown eyes as they closed, with one final soft thump of the ragged, beloved, tail. And as he felt the final beat of Sonny’s heart Gamache had had the impression it wasn’t that his old heart had stopped but that Sonny had finally given it all away.
‘I’ve been desperately unhappy in my life.’ Her voice was quiet. ‘Have you, Chief Inspector?’ It wasn’t a response he could have predicted. He nodded. ‘I thought so. I think people who have had that experience and survived have a responsibility to help others. We can’t let someone drown where we were saved.’
‘Their deaths changed me. At some point I was standing in my living room unable to move forward or back. Frozen. That’s why I asked about the snowstorm. That’s what it had felt like, for months and months. As though I was lost in a whiteout. Everything was confused and howling. I couldn’t go on. I was going to die. I didn’t know how, but I knew I couldn’t support the loss any longer. I’d staggered to a stop. Like you in that snowstorm. Lost, disoriented, at a dead end. Mine, of course, was figurative. My cul de sac was in my own living room. Lost in the most familiar, the most comforting of
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‘When does a bush that burns become a Burning Bush?’ Em asked and Gamache nodded. ‘My despair disappeared. The grief remained, of course, but I knew then that the world wasn’t a dark and desperate place. I was so relieved. In that moment I found hope. This stranger with the sign had given it to me. It sounds ridiculous, I know, but suddenly the gloom was lifted.’
There’s a crack in everything, That’s how the light gets in.’
‘Just because it’s the truth doesn’t make it less insulting.’
