“Ask a child who gets a gold star in their workbook,” said Myrna. “The sticker is useless, but the act is priceless. Symbols are powerful, especially for kids. Why do you think they want trophies and badges? Not because they can play with them, or buy things with them, but because of what they mean.”

“Approval,” agreed Reine-Marie.

“Right,” said Myrna. “And Uncle Peter sending Bean the paintings made Bean feel special. I think Peter identifies with Bean, sympathizes with the child, and wanted to let Bean know it’s okay to be different.”

Myrna looked at Clara, waiting for her approval. Waiting for the gold star.

“That could be the reason,” said Clara. “But I actually think it’s far simpler than that.”

“Like what?” asked Beauvoir.

“I think Peter knew that Bean could keep a secret.”

Bean had kept the secret of his or her own sex. The pressure to tell must have been enormous, but Bean had told no one. Not family. Not schoolmates. Not teachers. No one.

“Peter knew the paintings would be safe with Bean,” said Reine-Marie.

“But if they’re secret, why didn’t he keep them himself?” Jean-Guy asked. “Wouldn’t they be safest with him?”

“Maybe he believed he wasn’t safe,” said Gamache. “That’s what you’re thinking, isn’t it?”

Clara nodded. That was the feeling in the pit of her stomach. Peter needed to keep these paintings secret.

She looked toward her house.

But what was hidden in those odd paintings? What did they reveal?

Chapter 18

EIGHTEEN

“A poem begins as a lump in the throat,” said Armand Gamache as he took a seat on one of Ruth’s white preformed chairs.

“You make it sound like a fur ball,” said Ruth. She slopped Scotch into a glass, not offering him any. “Something horked up. My poems are finely honed, each fucking word carefully chosen.”

Rosa was asleep in her nest of blankets beside Ruth’s chair, though Gamache thought he noticed the duck’s eyes open a slit. Watching him.

It would have been unnerving if he didn’t keep reminding himself it was just a duck. Just a duck. An unnerving duck.

“Well, you’re the one who said it.” Gamache tore his eyes from the watch duck.

“Did I?”

“You did.”