Summary: Lizard Men of Xenor

The woman tracks down a copy of the pulp magazine where the man’s story has been published and reads it in secret. It includes some components of the story he has told her but omits the love story between the maiden and the blind assassin. Instead, Zycron is invaded by a force of Lizard Men from the planet Xenor, and the inhabitants of Sakiel-Norn ally themselves with the People of Joy. She clings to the hope of receiving a message from the man but never gets one. No other installments of the story appear in the magazine.

Summary: Mayfair, 1937

A society column notes a party given to celebrate the birth of Richard and Iris’s daughter, Aimee, who was born in the spring of 1937.

Summary: Letter from BellaVista

A letter addressed to Richard and dated May 1937 reports that Laura’s condition is not improving. She is being subjected to electro-shock therapy but continues to have “delusions” and some sort of fixation on Richard.

Summary: The tower

An unnamed woman, implied to be Iris, lives in a haze of depression and confusion after giving birth.

Summary: The Globe and Mail, 1937

A short news article describes the ongoing conflict in Spain.

Summary: Union Station

The woman imagines a fantasy in which the man returns to her and they are reunited.

Summary: The cubicle

In the present, Iris continues her roaming walks, reflecting on how she is now coming to the darkest part of her story.

Summary: The kitten

In autumn 1936, Laura returns to school but is openly defiant about her lack of interest. Richard concedes that she can stop going, and Laura throws herself into charitable work instead. Meanwhile, Winifred tries to enlist Iris in her plans to get Laura married off to a wealthy and respectable man as quickly as possible. Iris stands up to her and argues that Laura can choose to live an independent life, but Winifred refuses to listen. Iris notices changes in Laura’s behavior, but she is unsure what to do and is preoccupied with her own concerns. Iris announces her pregnancy in October, expecting to give birth in March or April. Richard is pleased, and Winifred is nervous about how a child might impact her own hold on power. Laura seems indifferent but references the miscarriage which killed their mother.

Summary: Beautiful view

In February 1937, Richard and Winifred tell Iris that Laura had some sort of mental breakdown while volunteering at the hospital. She has now been admitted to a private clinic where they reassure her that Laura will receive excellent care. They also tell Iris that Laura is claiming to be pregnant, which they consider to be one of her delusions and a sign that she is conflating her identity with that of her sister. Iris is not allowed to see her sister and gives birth to her daughter in April. When Richard and Winifred see the baby, they comment on her dark hair. Iris implies that she has a secret and is relieved that Laura is not there to see the baby.

Summary: Brightly shone the moon

Iris reflects on how the tragic deaths that took place during Aimee’s childhood must have been traumatic for her. As soon as she inherited money, Aimee took off and was soon trapped in a cycle of addiction. No one knows who Sabrina’s father is. Although Iris tried to maintain a relationship with her daughter, Aimee is now embittered. She knows that there is some sort of family secret and becomes fixated on the idea that she is actually Laura’s child. Aimee believes that Laura got pregnant as a result of the affair described in her novel and that Iris and Richard passed the baby off as their own in order to avoid a scandal. Iris tries to comfort her daughter, but, as she now regrets, Iris doesn’t tell her the full truth.

After Aimee’s death, Winifred uses her money and influence to establish herself as Sabrina’s legal guardian. Over the years, Iris often follows and spies on them. She wishes she had been assertive in trying to reclaim a relationship with her granddaughter.

Summary: Betty’s Luncheonette

After giving birth, Iris worries more and more about Laura. Iris wonders if it is possible that Laura actually could be pregnant and wonders if her sister and Alex had an affair. In the summer, Richard tells Iris that a lawyer came to BellaVista and challenged the authority of Laura being held there. Laura left the clinic, and no one knows her whereabouts. Iris tells her husband that she doesn’t know anything about her sister, but as soon as she can find the opportunity, she travels back to Port Ticonderoga. She tells Richard that Reenie is sick and that she wants to see her one last time. Reenie and Iris meet at a diner. Reenie explains that after receiving a letter from Laura, she arranged for the lawyer to go and intervene at the clinic. Laura had also been sending letters to Iris, but Iris never received any of them. Reenie won’t share what she has heard about Laura’s experiences or where she is now. She does tell Iris that Laura left her a message.

Summary: The message

On the way back to Toronto, Iris tries to figure out where her sister could have left a message. She finally goes to the photo album and finds the photos taken at her wedding. Laura has altered two of the photos, leaving a vague but sinister impression that Richard, Winifred, and Iris are somehow implicated in the message she is trying to convey.

Analysis: Parts X & XI

Tensions within the Griffen household finally reach a critical boiling point as secrets and mysteries threaten to burst forth, and great measures are taken to conceal them. In the autumn and winter of 1936-37, Laura’s unhappiness and desperation are clearly demonstrated as she takes increasingly bold and rebellious action. Winifred and Richard are only interested in protecting Laura’s reputation and securing her social position through marriage. They let her drop out of school because they don’t see any actual value in her education and don’t want to deal with the potential scandal of her bad behavior. Laura’s immersion in charity work reflects her desire to be useful and make the world a better place, but no one around her seems interested in why these values are important to her. Iris makes a half-hearted effort to stand up for her sister when Winifred schemes a marriage plan, possibly because she knows how unhappy she has become as a result of her own unwanted marriage. However, Iris easily gives in to Winifred because she is used to being dominated and pleasing other people.

The extent of Laura’s true vulnerability is revealed when she tries to speak out and stand up for herself. Laura’s “mental breakdown episode” echoes her earlier experience when she admitted that Mr. Erskine had been abusing her. Although this information only emerges gradually, Laura takes a desperate risk and tells a doctor at the hospital where she volunteers that she is pregnant with Richard’s child. However, just like before, people either don’t believe Laura, or prioritize maintaining social appearances over her welfare. Richard and Winifred successfully convince everyone that Laura is mentally ill and suffering from delusions. The fact that they can pull off this story shows the power and influence they hold and also how much Laura’s eccentric behavior has prejudiced people against her. Ever since she was a child, Laura has acted in ways that are unconventional for a woman of her time and social position. As a result, when it comes down to her word against the word of a respected and powerful man, no one believes her. In this way, Atwood shows the victory of misogyny over female creativity.

Iris shows a strange passivity about her sister’s fate throughout this section and chooses to focus on her pregnancy. Iris is hopeful because Richard stops hurting her and demanding sex once she is pregnant, and Winifred seems to know that as the mother of Richard’s child, Iris will gain greater power within the household. Much like Norval before him, Richard is very invested in having a son and heir to continue his legacy. Iris’s self-focus is evident in that she does not even take action once she learns her sister has been institutionalized. Winifred and Richard, of course, would try to prevent Iris from contacting or seeing her sister, but Iris has been able to successfully carry on an affair for months without them knowing. If Iris truly wanted to, she could have taken action to find out the truth about Laura’s situation. However, Iris’s fears and jealousy deter her from offering any assistance. Iris does question whether Laura’s pregnancy is actually a delusion or not, but her fear is that if Laura is pregnant, Alex is the father, and this fear poisons her and prevents her from doing anything to help her sister. Because Iris has kept her own secrets so effectively, she is hyper-aware that other women might also be harboring similar secrets.

Information about both Iris’s past and her present-day reflections strongly suggest that she has concealed information about the paternity of her child. When people comment on the baby’s surprising hair color, Iris responds quickly and defensively. She admits that she was secretly relieved that Laura was absent from the birth, which implies that Iris has a secret she is afraid Laura would catch on to and that she has another motive to not try very hard to help her sister. Because Iris has a secret to keep, it actually serves her purposes to keep Laura locked up in the same way that it serves the purposes of Richard and Winifred. Iris has been corrupted into a person who needs to hide the truth and who allows other people to become casualties of the lies she creates.

The toxic consequences of these lies continue to spill over into subsequent generations. Up until this point, Iris has largely blamed Winifred’s interference for her estrangement from her daughter. Only now does Iris concede that her unwillingness to be fully honest with Aimee also affected their relationship and may have driven her daughter away. Aimee grew up with multiple generations of trauma, secrets, and abuse hanging over her. She has always known that there was something wrong with the story she has been told about her past, but she could never identify what it was. Aimee’s story shows one dangerous consequence of the truth being withheld, which is that when people don’t know what the true story is, they make up fictions to fill in the gaps. Iris had a powerful opportunity to speak the truth to her daughter, but she is so accustomed to secrecy that she cannot be honest. Iris’s moment of refusal to tell her daughter who her father really is contrasts sharply with Laura boldly naming the father of her unborn child, even though she exposes herself to extreme risk by doing so.

Reenie is the one person who unquestioningly believes Laura and stands up for her. Reenie had been the one to protect Laura from Mr. Erskine, and she protects Laura again by freeing her from the clinic. It is important that Reenie, who has little education, money, or access to resources, can successfully help Laura get free whereas Iris fails to do anything at all. This event represents a kind of victory for the working classes. Perhaps because Reenie is working class, she has always had to be independent and resourceful. As a result, she feels more confident and capable than Iris does. Reenie also knows that it is possible for Laura to earn a living and be independent once she does get out of the clinic, so Reenie is very invested in giving Laura that freedom. Iris has lived in a gilded cage for so long that she cannot even imagine how Laura would survive if she got out.