Chap­ter 8 of We Solve Mur­ders delves deep­er into the com­plex psy­che of François Lou­bet, a char­ac­ter whose actions blur the lines between cal­cu­lat­ed ruth­less­ness and dark humor. Lou­bet opens the chap­ter reflect­ing on his desire to write, which he admits stems part­ly from van­i­ty. How­ev­er, there is also a deep­er rea­son behind his incli­na­tion to doc­u­ment his deeds—the need to ensure his crim­i­nal lega­cy is pre­served for pos­ter­i­ty. Through this lens, Lou­bet approach­es his busi­ness of mur­der not only as a means of sur­vival but as a way to immor­tal­ize him­self in a world where the con­se­quences of his actions are hid­den behind the veneer of suc­cess and wealth. Despite the increas­ing dan­gers of his line of work, Lou­bet reas­sures him­self with a non­cha­lant atti­tude, mak­ing it clear that he has no inten­tion of fad­ing into the shad­ows any­time soon. This eerie con­fi­dence is inte­gral to his char­ac­ter, show­ing how far he is will­ing to go to main­tain con­trol over his des­tiny.

The chap­ter takes a dark­er turn when Lou­bet receives a mes­sage from his busi­ness part­ner, Joe Blow, who express­es con­cern about the string of killings they’ve been orches­trat­ing. Joe, feel­ing the weight of their actions, urges Lou­bet to cease the mur­ders, with the lat­est vic­tim, Andrew Fair­banks, caus­ing Joe to ques­tion the ethics of their work. His mes­sage reveals a grow­ing dis­com­fort with the esca­lat­ing vio­lence, expos­ing a con­trast between the two men’s out­look on their crim­i­nal enter­prise. While Joe’s plea comes from a place of unease, Lou­bet remains detached, even find­ing amuse­ment in Joe’s hes­i­ta­tion. Lou­bet humor­ous­ly won­ders whether Joe is now rely­ing on mod­ern tech­nol­o­gy, like Chat­G­PT, to help him form his moral argu­ments, reflect­ing Loubet’s play­ful dis­re­gard for the seri­ous­ness of the sit­u­a­tion. For Lou­bet, these con­cerns are mere­ly dis­trac­tions from his goal, and he remains unfazed by Joe’s change of heart, fur­ther empha­siz­ing his unre­lent­ing nature.

Loubet’s response to Joe’s plea reveals the stark dif­fer­ences in their per­son­al­i­ties and approach­es to the crim­i­nal world. He dis­miss­es Joe’s con­cerns with cold prag­ma­tism, remind­ing him that their part­ner­ship is built on shared respon­si­bil­i­ty and mutu­al under­stand­ing. For Lou­bet, the line between right and wrong is blurred, and he sees no room for hes­i­ta­tion in their line of work. He believes that their suc­cess hinges on their abil­i­ty to car­ry out these dark deeds with­out regret or sec­ond-guess­ing, and he makes it clear that Joe must accept this real­i­ty. While Joe’s moral com­pass appears to be waver­ing, Loubet’s is unwa­ver­ing, rein­forc­ing his posi­tion as a man will­ing to do what­ev­er it takes to achieve his goals.

The con­ver­sa­tion shifts to Loubet’s plan to elim­i­nate Amy Wheel­er, a deci­sion he approach­es with a chill­ing sense of con­fi­dence. He sees Amy as an obsta­cle that must be removed to ensure the con­tin­u­a­tion of his oper­a­tions. Her con­nec­tion to Jeff Nolan, whom Lou­bet also con­sid­ers a nui­sance, com­pli­cates mat­ters fur­ther, mak­ing her elim­i­na­tion a pri­or­i­ty. Lou­bet, how­ev­er, seems to take delight in the idea of cross­ing anoth­er name off his list, see­ing it as a nec­es­sary step to clean up his affairs. His abil­i­ty to view mur­der as a busi­ness trans­ac­tion, rather than an emo­tion­al or moral dilem­ma, high­lights the depth of his detach­ment from human­i­ty. In his mind, the deci­sion to kill is just anoth­er step toward solid­i­fy­ing his posi­tion in the world of crime.

As the chap­ter pro­gress­es, Loubet’s reflec­tions take on a more sin­is­ter tone. He con­sid­ers the con­se­quences of his actions not in terms of human lives lost but as moves in a game that he must win. His thoughts reveal a man who has long since aban­doned any sem­blance of guilt or remorse, replac­ing them with a chill­ing deter­mi­na­tion to stay in con­trol of the sit­u­a­tion. The chap­ter con­cludes with Loubet’s play­ful dec­la­ra­tion of “Tally-ho!”—a phrase that, in the con­text of his dark inten­tions, takes on a macabre edge. It serves as a reminder of how Loubet’s twist­ed sense of humor allows him to detach from the weight of his actions, fur­ther rein­forc­ing the com­plex­i­ty of his char­ac­ter. For Lou­bet, the pur­suit of pow­er and wealth is all-con­sum­ing, and the bod­ies left in his wake are sim­ply a nec­es­sary byprod­uct of his ambi­tion.