The Long Way Home(114)

They learned a great deal about the mineral that was supposed to be a miracle. But wasn’t.

Asbestos turned out to be the thalidomide of building materials. A savior that killed.

Beauvoir leaned away from the screen, as though breathing so close to it would infect him.

“What was it doing in that tube?” he asked. “Where did it come from?”

“And where was it going?” asked Gamache. “And what else was in that tube, and was no longer there?”

They both knew the answer to that.

Canvases. Art. Deadly art.

* * *

When they found Myrna and Clara on the deck of the Loup de Mer, the women weren’t alone. A young woman had joined them.

“This is Julie Foucault.” Myrna did the introductions. “She’s a new teacher at the school in Blanc-Sablon.”

“Un plaisir,” said Armand, shaking her hand.

Jean-Guy nodded, impatient for this Julie to leave so they could tell Myrna and Clara what they’d found.

“Your first job?” Gamache asked, and sat beside her. She looked no more than twenty, and had bright orange hair down to her shoulders, and ruddy red cheeks. And that newly minted expression. Of excitement and anxiety.

“Yes. I could’ve flown, but I wanted to see the coast.”

“Julie was telling us she’ll be teaching everything. You have to, in small schools,” said Clara. “But her specialty is science.”

“I have a master’s,” she said. “And am working toward my PhD.”

Beauvoir sat down.

“Do you know anything about asbestos?” he asked without preamble.

“I hope that’s not a pickup line,” she said, and even Gamache laughed. She might look young, she might even be young, but she knew how to take care of herself.

Even Beauvoir smiled. “No. We’re looking into a few things, and asbestos has come up.”

“As a matter of fact, I do know something about it,” she said. “Not a lot. I’m not a specialist, but it was taught at the university. Used as a cautionary tale of science, industry, and government.”

“We’re not so much interested in the politics of asbestos,” said the Chief, “as the properties of the substance.”

“Then yes, I can definitely tell you about that. Why?”

“Some was found in a box,” said Gamache. “We’re trying to figure out why someone would have it, and how dangerous it might be.”

“Well, that depends on the form it’s in. If it’s a hunk, then not so much. Asbestos only really becomes dangerous when it can float in the air. And be inhaled.”

“This was like a powder,” said Beauvoir.

They all watched the young teacher, waiting for the answer, but they didn’t have to wait long. There was no hesitation, no doubt.

“That would be dangerous.”

“How does asbestos kill?” asked Gamache. “If someone swallowed it, would it be bad?”

“It wouldn’t be good. But with asbestos the real danger is inhaling it. Getting it into the lungs. It works its way into the tissue and causes asbestosis, or mesothelioma. Or lung cancer. Or both. Nasty, nasty stuff. And by the time it’s diagnosed, it’s too late.”

“How long does it take to kill someone?” Clara asked.

“Depends.” Now Julie had to pause to think. “One of the reasons it took so long for alarms to go off, besides the desire of the industry and government not to see it—and that was a travesty—”

“Not the politics,” Gamache reminded her.

“Sorry. The problem was that it does take a while for the effects to be noticed. The connection between asbestos workers and lung deaths took some time. A miner could be retired for years before showing symptoms.”

“And what are the symptoms?” asked Myrna.

“Coughing, of course. Shortness of breath.”

“Sounds like a lot of things,” said Myrna.

“And that was part of the problem too. Misdiagnosis. But finally the link was found. And asbestos was banned. But by then it was everywhere.”

“So,” said Beauvoir, thinking his way through this, “you’d have to get pretty close to it, to inhale it?”

“Right. Or it would have to be floating around in the air. Like in a mine. You say yours was a powder in a container?”

“Right.”

She shook her head. “That would get into the air pretty easily, I think.”

“And would the person necessarily die, if he inhaled it?” Gamache asked, and saw the immediate look of concern on Julie’s face. She looked from Gamache to Beauvoir and back again.

“Did one of you?”

“No,” Gamache smiled reassuringly. “But if we had, then what? Would we die?”