A Rule Against Murder

Clara leaves the breakfast table, enraged by Irene’s insult of Gamache’s father. Meanwhile, Gamache is in the car with Beauvoir, who is also angry. He heard Irene say “coward” after Honoré’s name. Gamache, however, isn’t angry, because he knows the truth about his father.

When Peter comes after Clara, she asks if he defended Gamache. Bert had tried to stop Irene from telling the story, but she told the family that Honoré Gamache had spoken out against Canada joining World War II. The furor he caused had delayed Canada’s entry into the war by one week, resulting in more lives lost and a prolonged war. He then convinced others to become conscientious objectors and had been labeled a coward. When Bert protests that Honoré had gone to war, Irene dismisses it, because he was in the ambulance corps.

Gamache and Beauvoir visit the sculptor who created the Charles Morrow statue. He tells them that when he met the family, he almost rejected the commission because they were so false and defensive that he couldn’t get an idea of Charles Morrow. Bert Finney, however, had talked to him for a long time and had finally given him what he needed for the statue. When he was ready to begin, he decided to use fossilized wood.

Gamache asks if he carved the bird into the statue. He tells them that, in the information Bert gave him, he found a drawing of the bird and copied it onto the statue. They discuss how impossible it would have been for even the entire family to push the statue over—petrified wood is even heavier than marble. He is also very surprised when Gamache says that the pedestal was unmarked and comments that it would have been scratched even as the statue was being installed. As they are leaving, he finds the bird drawing, which he had pinned to the wall. The drawing is signed by Peter Morrow.

Marianna tells Peter that Sandra had told them all about his conversation with Gamache. She wants to ally herself with Peter because she doesn’t believe that he is the killer. She mentions a note that their father had put in her suitcase when she left home, but Peter doesn’t want to share his note with her and so distracts her by asking Bean’s sex. After he leaves, she reflects on her note, which read: “You can’t get milk from a hardware store” (210). She wanted to connect with Peter by sharing this private bit of information, but he has rejected her.

While walking along the lakeshore, Lacoste sees Clara and asks Clara about what Julia had said before she died. Clara says that Julia may have meant everything she said but that didn’t mean it was true. Peter had said that she was just raving about her father’s secret, and it didn’t mean anything.

Beauvoir calls Julia’s husband, David, in prison. He tells the story of Julia leaving home from a different perspective and honestly seems to be grieving her. He talks about the family and tells Beauvoir that Peter had turned down his inheritance. Although he doesn’t have any insight into who might have killed Julia, he believes that Peter had written the message on the bathroom wall.

Like Marianna, Thomas tries to ally himself with Peter. They both believe that Bert killed Julia, but Thomas insults both Clara and Gamache during their conversation. When Marianna appears, neither she nor Thomas seem to care about Julia’s death, except for how they will inherit more money as a result. They turn on Peter and tell him that his nickname, which he had always thought was because he had paint spots on his hands, was because he followed their father like a puppy. Peter loses his temper, and leaves.

It has been two days since the murder, and Gamache has no motive or suspect. Colleen, the gardener who found the body, joins him at the crime scene. He realizes that she was gardening in the rain when she found the body and asks why. She tells him that she feels like an outsider, and the man in whom she is interested is interested in someone else.

After she leaves, he sees Peter down on the dock, throwing something into the lake. He is visibly upset, and so Gamache approaches him, but then Thomas storms out of the lodge, yelling. He chases Peter across the lawn until Gamache and Beauvoir manage to restrain him, accusing Peter of stealing his cufflinks. Irene asks if it is true and, when it is clear that it is, she leaves, disgusted, with Thomas.

When Gamache asks why he did it, Peter says that it is because the cufflinks were Thomas’s protection. Gamache shows Peter the drawing, which makes him happy. He drew it when he was eight for his father’s birthday. He had gotten his father’s approval that day, and it had become linked with art in his mind forever. When he asks why it has no feet, however, Peter is evasive.

Gamache’s team runs through the list of suspects, trying to find a motive. Gamache tells them about the insurance pyramid scheme that David Martin had gone to jail for. When Sandra interrupts them, attempting to use the library, Gamache refuses her, and she becomes angry and leaves. They realize, as they work, that everyone is still a suspect, and they still don’t know how the murderer shifted the statue. Gamache also tells his team David’s theory that Peter wrote the bathroom message.

After the meeting, Gamache asks Madame Dubois why she had put the statue in that particular place. She admits that she had liked Charles Morrow and liked Bert Finney, too. As they walk the garden, they see Pierre arguing with Elliot. When they see Veronique going to the beehives, Madame Dubois admits that she knows that Veronique loves Pierre, and that everyone except Pierre knows it.

Marianna sits at the piano, regretting naming her child Bean. She calls Bean over and asks why they never jump. She begins planning to change Bean’s name to something that will offend her mother even more.

Beauvoir spends a great deal of time analyzing the handwriting of the two notes found in Julia’s fireplace. Although he wants the author to be Pierre, of whom he is jealous, he finally figures out who the writer actually is.

Bert tries to convince Irene to tell her children the truth, but she will not. She remembers, after Julia was born, the pain that she felt, only diagnosed much later as neuralgia. The condition made even the slightest touch extremely painful: the reason she was so distant from her children.

Lacoste informs Gamache and Beauvoir that Marianna, an architect, is actually the most successful of the children. Instead of becoming clearer, things are muddier because the Morrows are so good at hiding themselves. Gamache admits that he had always thought that Peter might be capable of murder. Beauvoir reveals that the notes in Julia’s fireplace were written by Elliot and that he has also discovered that Elliot’s parents live near Julia in Vancouver.