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Summary: The Globe and Mail, 1938

A newspaper article quotes Richard applauding the Munich Accord, believing that it would strengthen capitalism and business interests. The article also mentions that Richard is likely to pursue a political career as a member of the Conservative party.

Summary: Mayfair, 1939

A society article describes a fancy party given as part of a visit from the King and Queen of Britain and at which Iris and Richard are present.

Summary: The Be rage Room

The man and woman reunite. He is exhausted and seems to be in poor health. One war has ended, but he believes another one is going to start soon. She is happy to see him, and tells him she read the story about Zycron but was confused about why no other installments followed. He claims he did not have time to write them.

Summary: Yellow curtains

The outbreak of World War II takes the woman by surprise. She is increasingly committed to leaving her husband and fantasizes about creating an independent life where she can wait for her lover to return from war.

Summary: The telegram

The woman receives a telegram announcing a death. Snippets of the conversation relay her pretending to not even know the man whose death announcement she receives.

Summary: The destruction of Sakiel-Norn

The woman is haunted by dreams of her dead lover.

Summary: Gloves

Spring has come again in the present-day narrative. Iris has been writing down her memories for nearly a year. Her condition worsens.

Summary: Home fires

Iris returns to her narrative of the past. By the time World War II breaks out, she has suffered several miscarriages, and Richard is openly unfaithful to her. They maintain a façade for social appearances. The war is initially a tricky situation for Richard since he has spoken out in favor of the Germans, but he shifts his alliances and maintains his hold on money and power.

Summary: Diana Sweets

In May 1945, just after the end of European hostilities in World War II, Iris receives a phone call from Laura. Laura is in Toronto and wants to meet with her. They meet at a restaurant. Laura explains that after leaving the clinic, she first hid at Avilion with Reenie’s help and eventually moved to Halifax. She had access to her inheritance from her father and spent most of her time on charity work. She tried to contact Iris but was never able to get through. Laura urges Iris to leave Richard, but Iris is evasive, claiming she needs the money and fears losing her child.

Laura asks Iris what she knows about the circumstances under which Laura was admitted to the clinic. Iris says she was told that Laura was suffering delusions, including one that she was pregnant. Laura explains that she was in fact pregnant, and Richard and Winifred had her admitted in order to prevent a scandal. Laura underwent an abortion without her consent. Iris asks about the father, and Laura seems astonished that Iris doesn’t know. Iris takes this as confirmation that Alex Thomas was the father of Laura’s baby. However, Iris is confused when Laura begins to refer to some sort of bargain that she had to participate in in order to keep Alex safe and his whereabouts hidden. Laura explains that now that the war is over, she is waiting for Alex to come back and look for her.

Iris bluntly breaks the truth to her sister: Alex died in Holland six months prior. Iris and Alex were lovers, and because he listed her as his next of kin, she received the telegram announcing his death. Laura seems stunned and leaves the restaurant without saying anything to her sister.

Summary: Escarpment

The next day, Iris worries about Laura. Returning from a luncheon, she learns that Laura stopped by the house looking for her, but only hours later, she receives news of Laura’s death in a car accident. Iris calls Richard and they plan out how to minimize the scandal and make sure the death appears accidental. As Iris prepares to leave the house, she finds a pile of Laura’s old notebooks, which Laura must have left at the house when she stopped by in Iris’s absence. Curious, Iris opens them.

Analysis: Parts XII & XIII

The man and the woman enjoy a temporary reunion, only to be finally torn apart forever, and the fact that he returns from one military conflict only to go on to serve and die in another highlights the relentless cruelty of historical events in the mid-twentieth century. While travelling to Spain may have initially seemed like it was going to give the man greater liberty than living in hiding, he returns a broken man. Much like how Norval was traumatized by the horrors he witnessed during World War I, the man has gone from valorizing fighting for one’s principles to truly understanding the horrors of war. Nonetheless, he cannot give up on his hopes of fighting for justice and making the world a better place. Ironically, once the man goes to fight in World War II, the woman seriously considers the idea of leaving her husband, but she ends up being punished for delaying too long. In a tragic scene, the woman must pretend to be unmoved by the news of her lover’s death because she has to keep their relationship a secret. She never has the courage to be open about the true love of her life, whereas the man wants to die knowing that if he never comes home, she will at least know that she was the most important person to him.

Richard’s engagement with recent political events further reflects his unscrupulous and power-hungry behavior. The Munich Agreement was a political agreement signed by numerous European states in 1938. The agreement reflected a policy of appeasement which allowed Hitler’s power to increase, ultimately paving the way for his future atrocities. Richard is willing to back even heinous power regimes like the Nazis if they serve his business interests. The notion of appeasement as a political strategy also has interesting thematic resonances with the novel’s plot since characters like Iris and Norval essentially pursue a version of appeasement in hopes of protecting themselves. They know that Richard is untrustworthy and unprincipled, but they go along with him so that they can maintain their own claims to wealth and power.

Laura reenters the narrative of her sister’s life just as abruptly as she left it and again tries to spur Iris to action. Iris not only doesn’t try to reach out to her sister while Laura is institutionalized, but she does very little to track her sister down afterward. Laura gets out of the clinic in the summer of 1937, and she contacts Iris in May 1945, almost eight years later. In all that time, Iris has done little but preoccupy herself with maintaining a hollow shell of her life. Even by 1945, when Laura suggests that Iris leave Richard, Iris can’t bring herself to do so. Now that her relationship with Alex is over, Iris has no real motivation to do anything except try to wait out her days. Iris is also still so consumed with her own jealousy of the relationship she believes Laura had with Alex that she cannot see the real information Laura is trying to convey to her. There is really no evidence to suggest that Alex would have been the father of Laura’s baby, but Iris is so consumed with guilt and shame because of her own secret that she transposes this secret onto Laura herself.

Even though Iris is offered a second chance to rebuild a relationship with her sister, she squanders this opportunity in a moment of vengeful cruelty. Iris is convinced that Alex was having an affair with Laura at the same time that he was sleeping with Iris herself, so Laura’s hope that Alex will return to her sends Iris into a jealous rage. Because life has been so cruel to her, Iris cannot stand to see Laura’s resilience and optimism. She is also desperate to prove that she was more special to Alex than her sister was, so she lashes out at Laura. Iris wants Laura to experience the loss, jealousy, and suffering that she grapples with herself, so she inflicts pain by cruelly revealing Alex’s death and the fact that he was her lover. This moment is ironic because under so many other circumstances, Iris has been, and will continue to be, totally unwilling to tell the truth. She could have owned her relationship with Alex and left Richard, or she could have told the truth to Aimee so that Alex’s memory could live on in her daughter. However, Iris uses the truth only as a weapon and not as a source of healing.


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