Previous Next

Summary

Valerian is in great pain and sits in his greenhouse thinking about the time he found Michael hiding under the sink. He used to believe that Margaret had a drinking problem, and he is very upset now to realize that he was wrong and that her long history of erratic behavior resulted from guilt about abusing Michael, not from alcoholism. After the Christmas dinner, Margaret tried to explain her behavior to Valerian, but she sickened him when she told him that she abused Michael because it felt delicious. Valerian wanted to hurt her during her explanation but could not.

At two in the morning on Christmas night, Sydney comes into the dining room to see Valerian. Sydney and Ondine lack financial security, and their financial future depends on Valerian. Sydney asks Valerian if he plans to fire them, and Valerian says he does not know because all he can think about is the image of Michael under the sink. Valerian tries to achieve an emotional release by crying and wants to cry tears of blood, but he cannot cry. Finally, around dawn, he goes to bed.

The morning after Christmas, Margaret wakes up very early and feels relieved that her secret was revealed. She washes her hair very vigorously and feels hopeful about the future, but the rest of the people at L’Arbe de la Croix are full of sorrow or anxiety. Sydney and Ondine remain worried about being fired, and Valerian is still in a state of shock. Margaret insists on trying to tell Valerian more details of her abuse of Michael, and she insists that she had not really hurt him, still trying to explain her actions.

A few nights after Christmas, Margaret announces to Valerian that she has called Michael and told him to uninvite B. J. Bridges for New Year’s. Valerian is horrified and incredulous that she has had the nerve to contact Michael, but she insists that Michael is not damaged. Valerian notices that she actually looks prettier and also stronger. He asks her why Michael did not confide in him, and she speculates that he may have been ashamed. Now Valerian finally begins to cry because he cannot understand why Michael still loves her. She begs Valerian to hit her, but he will not. He tells her that perhaps he will hit her tomorrow, but when the next day comes she asks him again and he again says tomorrow. Frustrated, Margaret cannot think of a way to lift either of their moods.

New Year’s Day arrives and Margaret asks Ondine why she kept Michael’s abuse quiet. Margaret thinks Ondine wanted to feel superior to her. Ondine admits she kept it quiet was because she was afraid Valerian would fire her, and maybe Sydney, too. Margaret says Ondine should have stopped her and mentions that she was only nineteen, while Ondine was thirty or thirty-five. Ondine corrects her and says that she was only twenty-three. After Margaret suggests that maybe they can be friends now, Ondine smiles but is not receptive. After New Year’s, Valerian retreats to his greenhouse and spends most of his time there, letting the plants go wild. In his guilty haze, he has lost any sense of the value of order there. A dead plant is as good as a live one. Giving up, he lets the ants invade.

Analysis

The new fast-paced, manic life of Jadine and Son in the city contrasts with the other characters’ lives on the island. On Isle des Chevaliers, time moves extremely slowly, and pages pass before a single day does. The sense of physical confinement is also powerful. Valerian sits still as a stone contemplating his failed life first at the dinner table and then in the greenhouse, where the air is described as being filled with pain. Because Valerian did not control what happened to Michael so many years ago, he does not try to gain control of anything else in his life, which is why he lets the ants invade the greenhouse. Margaret tries to slip reassuring words to him as they pass each other on the stairs, which implies that in this home, contact is inevitable, no matter how he might try to avoid it. Even when Margaret tells him that she phoned Michael about uninviting B. J. Bridges, Valerian does not scold Margaret as harshly as he could. Valerian knows that no matter how hard he tries to understand what went wrong with Michael, he knows Margaret destroyed their relationship with Michael

As Jadine and Son retreat further and further into an almost childlike state in the city, those on the island find themselves suddenly in a state of terrible maturity. With knowledge comes the loss of innocence, just as in the biblical story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. That Valerian’s downfall also came about through seeking the truth emphasizes the parallel with the story and the pain that knowledge brings. Similarly, Margaret parallels the Eve character because she delights in something she should not—in this case, the harming of her child. In opposition to the biblical tale, Valerian retreats into his garden, the greenhouse, rather than being expelled from it. But the space has been ruined for him by the knowledge. Like Adam and Eve, he is now aware of what he did not know before, and he cannot return to the state of innocence.

Valerian’s acceptance of entropy into the greenhouse, as he ceases to protect against the soldier ants and to carefully nurture his plants, is a sign of how he has yielded his position to the unstoppable force of nature. This yielding displays Valerian’s downfall, but the narrator describes Valerian’s downfall with empathy. Valerian could easily have been written as a caricature: a foolish old man who neglects his son and cannot see the horrors committed in his own house. Instead the narrator presents his decline as something beautiful and noble, even tragic. In comparison, the narrator never turns on Margaret by denouncing her or making her look cruel. Margaret’s point of view is faithfully represented throughout the chapter, and the sense of renewal that she gains through her confession is presented with deep empathy and psychological accuracy. The chapter portrays each character as acting from a specific history and set of reasons. None of the characters are dismissed out of hand or considered lost.

The empathy Margaret, Sydney, and Ondine feel for Valerian emphasizes the internal conflicts within each character. When Margaret goes into the kitchen to apologize to Ondine, she feels bad about abusing Michael but is convinced he has not been affected by it. However, Ondine’s refusal to absolve Margaret is completely understandable and utterly revealing. Her unwillingness to tell Margaret’s secret about the abuse displays her loyalty toward her family because she does not think Sydney could bear being separated from her if Valerian only fired her. Margaret’s theory of why Ondine never told anyone about the abuse and Ondine’s real reason displays a disconnection between the two characters. For Margaret, a self-involved and pampered woman filled with insecurity, Ondine’s silence was naturally about her. But Ondine’s silence came from a much simpler desire to keep her job. The reasons for their actions are intimately tied to their specific experiences and histories. The narrator makes both of those perspectives strong and believable without attempting to reconcile Margaret and Ondine.


Previous section Chapter Seven Next section Chapter Nine

Popular pages: Tar Baby

Take a Study Break