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"I’ve found out about Lillian Dyson’s family" Lacoste pulled her chair forward and opened her notebook "She’d divorced No children Her parents are both alive They live on Harvard Ave in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce"

"How old are they?" Gahty-two Lillian was an only child"

Gamache nodded This was, of course, the worst part of any case Telling the living about the death

"Do they know?"

"Not yet," said Lacoste "I wondered if you--"

"I’ll go into Montréal this afternoon and speak to them" Where possible he told the family himself "We should also search Madauest list froents to interview everyone on this list? They were at the party last night or the vernissage, or both I’ve marked the people we’ve already spoken to"

Beauvoir put out his hand for the list

It was his role, they knew, to coordinate the interviews, asseents

The Chief Inspector paused, then handed the list to Lacoste Effectively handing control of the investigation to her Both agents looked surprised

"I’d like you with me in Montréal," he said to Beauvoir

"Of course," said Beauvoir, perplexed

They all had delineated roles within the hos the Chief insisted on That there be no confusion, no cracks No overlap They all knehat their jobs were, kneas expected Worked as a tea

Chief Inspector Gamache was the undisputed head of homicide

Inspector Jean Guy Beauvoir was his second in coent And below theators And several hundred support staff

The Chief er Not just internal squabbles and politics, but so If they weren’t clear and cohesive, if they didn’t work together as a teaain

Murderers hid in the tiniest of cracks And Chief Inspector Ga to let his department provide one

But now the Chief had broken one of his own cardinal rules He handed the investigation, the day-to-day operations, over to Agent Isabelle Lacoste instead of Beauvoir