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Agent Nichol is a controversial character. What do you think of her? What purpose does she serve? Why do you think Inspector Gamache doesn’t like her? What exactly did she do wrong?
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I’ve not hidden my dislike for Agent Nicol in Still Life. She has qualities that grate on my nerves. It’s surprising how she turns from someone I thought would be a naive and eager young agent to someone with a very extreme arrogance and vindictive streak. She is a perplexing character in many ways. I think she was there to contrast with Jean Guy and Isabelle (who are both competent agents and good at reading people) and to show how compassionate and patient Gamache is with new recruits. But even she pushes his patience too far. In having to deal with her odd behaviour, Gamache shows that he may be kind, but he is not a pushover or fool.
I think she did several things wrong that made her run out of chances with Gamache. The first big one was when she tried to be empathetic towards Mrs. Croft and interfered with Jean-Guy’s interrogation and did not obey Gamache’s command to remain silent. He notes she is too self-involved and interested in scoring points with him than in actually investigating or thinking. He also doesn’t like that she doesn’t listen. She runs out of chances with Gamache when she is rude to Clara and wants to “get one up” on her when they are looking at Fair Day.
Although he says she is smart and has a brain, she has zero EQ and at several points just seems very stupid. How can she not connect the dots about the phrase on Ruth’s mirror? I have a tiny bit of sympathy for her because she does have a bit of recognition that what Gamache told her — “something is missing” — is true. She doesn’t have the natural empathy or sociability that would make her likeable. Her excuse for talking to Mrs. Croft is she wanted to prove that she is “nice.” And when she’s sent away by Gamache, she looks into the room with villagers and “turned away, the sight too painful, of people having fun and her own lonely reflection.” So you can see there’s a dim light of awareness in there. I’ll add that I actually enjoy her arc through the series, but she’s a villain who’s easy to dislike, so she’s difficult to root for.
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Like Tara, I also struggle with Agent Nichol. I would not want to work with her and certainly not have to depend on her in a matter that clearly requires team work and cohesion.
She is gratuitously cruel to people in Three Pines. The most egregious example for me was when Gamache and the Surete team are speaking with Clara about a possible connection between the deaths of Timmer Hadley and Jane Neal. Clara asks why one might consider Timmer Hadley’s death had any connection to Jane’s.
“‘Just being thorough,’ said Beauvoir. Two elderly women dying within a few weeks of one another in a very small village, well, it begs some questions. That’s all.’
‘But as you said, they are elderly. It’s what you’d expect.’
‘If one hadn’t died with a hole in her heart,’ said Nichol. Clara winced.”I don’t think this was intentional cruelty, but it speaks to a self absorption that is incapable of considering the impact of one’s words.
I must say, though, that I can see some basis for Nichol’s insecurity. Her father’s pressure on her to redeem the family’s integrity, her lack of emotional intelligence and her inability to be part of a group would have been incredible obstacles to overcome. So, I am sympathetic in one sense and still not wanting to work with her.
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Tara and Jane, you two voiced what I thought of Nichol more eloquently than I could. I can have sympathy for her faults, more so than Gamache and others, because as a reader I get a window into her thoughts and feelings, while they do not. But like Jane says I wouldn’t want to work with her, she’d be a serious liability in the workplace and an unpleasant and unpredictable person to be around.
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This may be way off base, but I’ve always thought that Nichol perhaps had some form of Autism Spectrum Disorder, which, according to the National Institute of Mental Health website, is “a neurological and developmental disorder that affects how people interact with others, communicate, learn and behave.” She has something lacking in her ability to read people and “get” what’s going on. She often doesn’t grasp the obvious, or have much of a sense of humor, it seems. And yet she’s got a good brain, and she’s capable of having loving family ties, if not social. I inwardly cringed at her behaviors, but couldn’t help but wonder if this is why she couldn’t quite get what was missing in herself. I also wondered if her choosing to sit apart from the team all the time was from shyness, fear of rejection, arrogance, or a dislike of being physically close to others— I wanted her to see a therapist!
I’m not sure that Gamache doesn’t like her, per se. She’s certainly not his favorite person that he’d love to hang out with socially, and he certainly is frustrated by her, angered by her behavior, and eventually feels that she is too much of a liability to do effective work on this case, but I didn’t see his sending her packing as something so personal as like or dislike; he made a good executive decision, based on her actions. As we learn throughout the series, he’s dealt with numerous cantankerous, irritating people in his life and often grows to like or even love them, because he seeks out and often finds the good in people, but in her case, I felt he was not invested personally in her so much as professionally, and he didn’t have time to deal with her attitude and mistakes.
I think that perhaps her biggest sin in his book during this investigation was her lack of empathy and inability to follow orders (lying wasn’t appreciated, either). He needed her to be capable of these things to get the job done, and she wasn’t.-
I have thought of the ASD similarity also, both in “Still Life” and when we meet her again. Yes, I want her to see a therapist too. While there is a lot of one’s emotional range and capacity is innate, a lot of how one relates to others is learned from the family and people around the person. I recall the scene where Nichol’s father hides her warrant card and badge; that struck me as cruel and manipulative. Perhaps, with guidance, she could learn.
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I don’t think you’re off base, Susan. I initially thought the same thing when reading. Nichol doesn’t seem to be able to pick up on social signals well. She also doesn’t seem to always understand what I would think would be transparent – like when she takes Gamache’s “I forget” literally and again with the phrase on Ruth’s mirror. That was just so odd to me. But, she has other behaviors that I puzzled over that I don’t associate with ASD. Gamache observes how she dresses and how she isolates herself in a room of people. She seems to have to put in a lot of effort into thinking about how to appear to be “nice” and her thoughts seem to always veer towards feeling as if she’s being denigrated or attacked. Jane, you are right Nichol’s father hiding her badge and card was cruel, but so too was lying for years about the heroic uncle in order to raise his family’s status and garner sympathy. So I can see that Nichol may have picked up on more than one negative behavior from her father. Going to a therapist would definitely help. And I think Gamache did the best he could given they were in the middle of an investigation.
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I agree, Maureen– she didn’t entirely fit the profile, from what I understand of the disorder, and I definitely think she’s got issues stemming from some learned behaviors from her home life. Plus she’s young and insecure on top of everything else. She certainly is a mixed bag of emotions! And I’m with you, Jane, in thinking that if she could be reached, she might just learn. In many ways, in the future, she does just that, but still has her issues and quirks. I wonder if LP will ever let us glimpse her future life? I would like to know what has become of her.
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I think Nicole tries too hard, doesn’t listen and therefor doesn’t learn. And like all of you I would not want to work with her. But, she is perceptive and could possibly make a homicide investigate, if her social skills can be improved. And I think Gamache definitely has a touch of the Rescuer in his personality. He wondered why she sat apart from everyone in the incident room, somehow he knew she wanted to be included. She is definitely not a nice character but there may be more so I wouldn’t throw the baby out with the bath water!
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