The Blind Assassin

In the present day, a tornado approaches Port Ticonderoga, and Iris remembers the advice Reenie used to give about never speaking on the phone or having a bath during a thunderstorm. After it passes, Iris gets up in the middle of the night, unable to sleep again. She goes outside, feeling bold for doing so. She thinks about Myra’s warnings about muggers who come from Toronto and target old ladies. She hears footsteps behind her and turns to see a young woman, who for a second she thinks is Sabrina. However, just as Iris feels overcome with happiness, she realizes it is not Sabrina after all.  

Returning to Avilion, Iris describes Liliana’s sealskin coat that she and Laura would play with after their mother’s death. Eventually, someone gives the coat to charity. After Lilian dies, Laura asks questions about the stillborn baby and she won’t accept the answers Reenie gives her. Liliana’s funeral shook Laura’s faith in God and she suddenly needs to know “God’s exact location.” She feels conscious of being constantly watched by God and worried that He will do something terrible like in the Old Testament of the Bible. Sometimes, at night, Laura wakes Iris up by snoring, and Iris sneaks off to the garden by herself. Like most children, Iris believes that she’s to blame for everything bad that happened—yet also that a “happy ending” is sure to come.

Iris helps Laura get dressed in the morning, and the girls spend a lot of time alone together exploring Avilion. Winter comes and the Louveteau freezes; the sound of children playing in the snow can be heard all around. In the spring, a woman jumps off the Jubilee Bridge and her body is torn apart in the defrosted river. Mrs. Hillcoate mentions another woman who’d killed herself jumping off the bridge because she’d gotten pregnant from an extramarital affair. In June, Iris turns 10. One day, Iris overhears Reenie saying that Liliana had been a “saint on earth” and that she’s concerned that Laura will be forced to grow up too quickly by spending so much time around Iris.

Back in the present, Iris walks to the bank early in the morning. She feels like everyone there hates her for the fact that she was once wealthy but no longer is (even though, as she points out, this wealth never technically belonged to her but instead to her father and husband). On the way home from the bank, she passes the Town Hall, which is adorned with two statues. One of them was commissioned by Adelia to memorialize the American colonel who named Port Ticonderoga, and the other was a “mythic figure” called the Weary Soldier commissioned by Norval. Controversially, he recruited a young female sculptor named Callista Fitzsimmons to make it.

When young Iris meets Callista, who goes by Callie, the sculptor is 28 and striking. Before long, Callie comes to visit every weekend. Norval seems happier, drinks less, and occasionally throws small parties attended by Callie’s bohemian friends from Toronto. He and Callie also go on dates, sometimes staying away for days at a time. Iris is “in awe” of Callie due to her beauty, creativity, and power, but Reenie dismisses her as “one of the floozies.” She and Mrs. Hillcoate disapprovingly discuss a rumor that Callie has gone skinny-dipping, and Reenie calls her a “gold-digger.”

The Weary Soldier is also met with objections for being too depressing, rather than victorious. Yet Norval refuses to change the figure’s expression or to emblazon it with a triumphant phrase, instead opting for, “Les We Forget.” The sculpture is finished and unveiled on November 11, 1928. During the ceremony, there are prayers and sermons, and Norval is given the role of lying the first wreath. After, Iris watches him and notices that he’s shaking with emotion. Once the ceremony is over, Laura asks Reenie and Mrs. Hillcoate many questions about the idea of sacrificing oneself in the war. Reenie assures Laura that she’ll understand when she’s older.

A week later, Laura slips into the Louveteau while she and Iris are walking beside it. After Iris manages to get Laura out, she accuses her of jumping in on purpose. Bawling, Laura says she did it “So God would let Mother be alive again.” Iris knows the only way to counter this logic is to argue that God wants Laura to be alive, which is why He allowed Iris to save her. That night, Iris is kept awake by thoughts of how easily she could have let her sister go.

Iris and Laura don’t go to school but instead have tutors, whom they treat with hostility. Craving independence, they sneak into town whenever they can, heedless of Reenie’s warnings about the dangers that lurk there. One of Reenie’s brothers is involved with smuggling magazines in from across the American border. Iris and Laura delight in reading the science-fiction volumes he supplies, precisely because they are, in Reenie’s words, “like nothing on earth.” They feel both “grateful” and left out due to not attending the local public school. One of their tutors, Miss Violet Goreham, is a 41-year-old woman whom Iris secretly nicknames Miss Violence. Reenie mentions that Miss Violence is an “old maid,” explaining that this means that she doesn’t have a husband. Reenie adds that it’s obvious no man has ever shown interest in her.

Miss Violence gives the girls more freedom than the other tutors—for example, by letting Iris pick the books she wants to read herself. She often speaks about the themes of “boundless love” and “hopeless melancholy” in the literature they read. Miss Violence sighs when moved by what they read, and Iris feels that the woman belongs in Avilion with its outdated, fading grandeur and its sense of wistfulness and regret. Miss Violence likes reading romantic novels that she borrows from the library and looking through Adelia’s scrapbooks. Iris and Laura grow to like her. When she leaves, she cries, but the girls don’t.

After Iris turns 13, Norval begins intervening in the way she dresses, speaks, and carries herself. He feels that she’s been given too much freedom and that now she needs to be restrained. At the time, Iris doesn’t understand why she’s suddenly being subjected to this extra discipline, as she’s done nothing wrong. When Iris gets her first period, she tells Callie, convinced she’s dying. Callie explains that it isn’t serious and suggests that Iris call it “my friend” or “a visitor,” but Reenie refers to it as “the curse.” When Laura sees a bloodstain on Iris’s bed, she weeps, thinking that Iris is going to die like Liliana. In a photograph taken during this time, both girls are smiling, but it is obvious that they are doing so because otherwise they would get in trouble.

After Miss Violence’s departure, Norval laments that there are gaps in the girls’ education, particularly on more challenging subjects. He employs a new tutor, Mr. Erskine, who previously taught at a boy’s school in England. Mr. Erskine is much stricter than Miss Violence and regularly resorts to corporal punishment. He’s merciless and sarcastic, which confuses Laura. Reenie is horrified about Mr. Erskine’s behavior when the girls tell her about it, but he dismisses her when she tries to speak to him. The girls do end up gaining knowledge from his lessons, albeit in a painful way. One day, Laura placidly tells Iris that Mr. Erskine often puts his hands down her shirt or into her panties. Iris is stunned, and Laura immediately observes that Iris doesn’t believe her.

Reenie, however, immediately believes Laura, and she ensures Mr. Erskine is fired by claiming to have found pornographic material in his room. Watching Reenie denounce Mr. Erskine for his lustful nature makes one of the workers at the button factory, Ron Hincks, fall in love with her. Laura feels that God answered her prayers to be saved from Mr. Erskine. She briefly considers becoming a nun, although Reenie persuades her out of it. Meanwhile, the Great Depression has a negative (although not devastating) impact on Chase Industries, and austerity arrives at Avilion. Iris turns 16 and her formal schooling ends. Reenie reads Mayfair magazine, dreaming of Avilion’s former genteel glory. Iris knows that if Adelia were still alive, she would have a host of helpful advice for her.

In the present day, Labour Day has passed and milder weather has arrived, making it easier to walk. Still, Iris accepts a lift from Myra when she drives up and offers to bring her to the Camp Grounds. The park is dirty and strewn with drug paraphernalia, condoms, and other litter. Yet in the past, it was well tended, a place where religious meetings took place as well as the Chase and Sons Labour Day Celebration. On this day, there would be games, music, food, and general “hijinks.” During the Depression, the once lively atmosphere of the celebration dims a little. On this day, Norval’s speech encourages attendees to remain hopeful about the future. Iris and Laura are there, in outfits carefully chosen by Reenie to be neither too fancy nor too informal.

For the first time in the history of the Labour Day picnic, Norval “stumbled” while delivering his speech. Afterward, Iris helps Reenie with the bake sale. Iris asks Laura to come too, but when Laura says no Iris didn’t insist, even though she’s supposed to be taking care of her. Iris is tired of always having to look out for Laura and she fantasizes about going off on travels and adventures herself. She worries that if she stays in Port Ticonderoga, she’ll become an “old maid” like Miss Violence.

A fight breaks out, and the editor of the local newspaper, Elwood Murray, is knocked to the floor. Murray is generally considered a “fool” and a “pansy” because he’s fairly old and still unmarried. People also object to his “nosy” behavior. Norval comes over, accompanied by an elegant man Iris has never seen before. Reenie calls the man “Mr. Royal Classic,” a nickname derived from the fact that he owns Royal Classic Knitwear. His real name is Richard Griffen and he’s Norval’s rival, so it’s surprising that he’s at the picnic. Reenie is horrified to hear that Norval has invited Richard to dinner at Avilion on very short notice, giving her little time to prepare for what will have to be an impressive occasion.

Gossiping about Richard, Reenie claims that he’s “new money” and that he’s gained his fortune by “cheating the Jews.” Iris notices a slender, luxuriously-dressed woman who she believes is Richard’s wife walking with him. Reenie scolds Iris for losing Laura, although Iris quickly finds her sitting with a young man on the grass dressed in a “proletarian mode.” Laura introduces him as Alex Thomas, explaining that he is a friend of Callie’s. When Iris mentions Richard, Alex called him “the sweatshop tycoon.” Alex offers Iris a cigarette, and she accepts. Elwood Murray comes over and takes a photograph of the three of them. Reenie then comes rushing over, saying that Richard is looking for the girls. She scolds them for sitting with strangers and smoking.

Laura said that the stranger is Alex Thomas, explaining that he recently dropped out of divinity school after losing his faith. Reenie reacts with suspicion, asking “who is he,” which means she wants to know who Alex’s family is. Laura replies that he’s an orphan who was adopted from an orphanage by a minister and his wife. Reenie exclaims, “An orphan! […] He could be anybody!” To Reenie’s further horror, Laura then announces that she invited him to dinner.

The Labour Day dinner has stuck in Iris’s memory because “it was the only time all of us were ever in the same room together.” In preparation, Reenie consults a cookbook called The Boston Cooking-School Cookbook, which had once belonged to Adelia. It begins with an epigraph by John Ruskin, which characterizes women across history and geography as “loaf givers.” Grumbling about Alex, Reenie says that he looked like “some half-breed Indian, or else a gypsy.” Norval, meanwhile, warns Laura that she needs to stop extending charitable invitations to strangers. However, Callie assures Norval that Alex is “all right.”

Iris helps set the table, seating Alex next to herself. Although Laura is considered too young to attend a dinner, she had invited a guest and is was reluctantly permitted to join. Neither of the girls are allowed wine, which annoys Iris. A “dowdy” unmarred cousin of Reenie’s serves the alcohol. The woman whom Iris had assumed was Richard’s wife is actually his sister Winifred, who goes by “Mrs.” but doesn’t seem to have a husband to speak of. Because of the Depression, far fewer people have been commissioning Callie’s sculptures, and so she has resorted to making bas-reliefs for the outside of insurance companies and banks. She doesn’t like working for such “blatant capitalists,” but she at least appreciates the public-facing nature of the work they commission.

Callie’s outfit looks like an attempt at signaling resistance to the dinner, whereas Alex seems to have borrowed the clothes he was wearing. Winifred compliments the house as “well preserved,” but Iris knew she actually means “outmoded.” The elaborate dinner Reenie cooks is clearly beyond her skill-set, but Iris feels annoyed at Winifred for not eating it. Alex makes an effort to eat, although Reenie is not flattered but rather irritated by this. When Norval asks Alex about himself, Alex explains that he left divinity school and has since “lived by [his] wits,” which Winifred interprets as meaning that he’s a journalist. This angers Norval, who hates reporters. 

Alex then criticizes the Prime Minister’s relief camps, arguing that the men there have to work 10 hours a day and hardly get anything in return, to which Richard replies: “Beggars can’t be choosers.” The argument is interrupted by the arrival of dessert. After, the group has coffee and watches the fireworks being set off on the Camp Grounds. Alex comments that he finds it difficult to enjoy fireworks because he believes both his parents died in the war, although he didn’t know for certain. He was found in a burned-down house after a bombing in a small Western European country.

Iris is warming to Alex, though she isn’t sure if she believes his story. Iris comments that it must be hard for him to not know his true identity, but he replies that he has come to believe that there is value is having a sense of self that doesn’t rely on knowing his origins. Speaking from the present, Iris wonders if this moment was “the beginning,” but then admits that it is hard to know when beginnings really occur.

In the present day, it is the first week of October. Iris picks flowers from her garden and then goes to the cemetery, where she finds a young woman already sitting at Laura’s grave. The woman is wearing black and has long dark hair. For a second, Iris thinks it’s Sabrina and she’s overjoyed, but then she realizes it isn’t Sabrina. She sees that the woman is crying and thinks, “Laura touches people. I do not.”

Back in the 1930s, the usual a writeup about the button factory Labour Day picnic is printed in the local newspaper. It features the photograph that Elwood Murray took of Iris, Laura, and Alex, although it only names Alex as “an Out-of-Town Visitor.” Reenie is horrified by the picture, which she considers immodest. Laura, however, goes to see Elwood to tell him that she wants to be a photographer when she grows up, and he agrees to let her assist him in the darkroom several times a week. He plans to teach her hand-tinting, the practice of carefully adding color to black and white images. Surprisingly, Reenie doesn’t object to this arrangement; she was sure it won’t be dangerous because Elwood is a “pansy.”

Laura ends up stealing some materials from Elwood’s studio and hand-tinting the photographs of Chase family members hanging in Avilion. When Iris catches Laura doing this, she chastises her, particularly for her choice to paint the subjects’ faces unrealistic colors like blue or green. Laura also steals the negative of the photograph Elwood took of her, Iris, and Alex. As soon as she does this, she immediately ceases going to the studio, which makes Elwood suspicious.

Several days a week, Laura assists at a soup kitchen which gave free meals to the men who jump on and off trains, traveling the country trying to find work. Laura begs Reenie for leftover bones from the Avilion kitchen, which Reenie reluctantly gives her. Reenie comments on the striking similarity between Laura and Liliana. Iris, meanwhile, is learning the button business from Norval, who teaches her how to help out with the balance sheets. At the factory, Iris feels that the other workers watch her disdainfully. One day, Elwood comes to Avilion to tell Reenie and Iris that Laura has been “seen around town” with Alex. He expressed horror that Alex, an adult man, is “taking advantage” of a 14-year-old girl.

When Reenie tells Laura about Elwood’s claims, Laura nonchalantly refused to deny them. She explains that she and Alex have been talking about religion; she’s been trying to reconvert him after his turn to atheism. She’s unconcerned about his age or the idea that other people are talking about them. Iris feels that Laura is “making a fool of her” somehow, though she doesn’t fully understand why. Reenie wants Iris to talk to Laura, but Iris feels that she can no longer get through to her sister. Iris takes to walking around town by herself. She passes the movie theater but she didn’t go in because she isn’t allowed; she won’t enter a theater until after she’s married.  

In present-day October, children soon will come to Iris’s house trick-or-treating, but she will turn the lights off and pretend to not be home. She buys a doughnut and coffee again, and she sits on the park bench in the sun, convinced that people are staring at her. She tries to tell herself not to care what people think, but unlike Laura, she “always did care.”

In October 1934, rumors spread about the workers at the button factory unionizing and “outside agitators” getting involved. These agitators are thought to be highly suspect, “criminal” and “foreign.” Reenie and Elwood express fears that they will unleash violence similar to that of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia. In September, Norval laid off several workers and gave the rest shorter hours. The demand for buttons is down, and for quite a while, the factory has been selling its products for less money than it costs to make them. In December, Norval announces that the factory will be temporarily closing and he asks that the workers be patient. He then goes home and drinks himself into a stupor. Hearing him crash around, Laura said that she will pray for him.

A few days after Norval announces that the factory will close, the union holds a meeting, during which they vilify Norval and his greed, “his big house and fancy daughters.” Norval stops coming to eat in the dining room. Callie comes to see him, saying that she’s horrified by how he’s treating his workers. A vicious argument ensues, which leads to them breaking up. The next week, a general strike takes place in solidarity with the button factory workers. Laura expresses concern about Alex, who she knows is “mixed up in it somehow.” Meanwhile, Richard comes to Avilion and meets with Norval in his study. The next day, a riot begins at a rally outside the Port Ticonderoga town hall. The rioters burn effigies of Norval, Iris, and Laura. 

The rioters set fire to the factory and smash the windows of businesses that refused to join the strike. They break into the offices of the local newspaper, beat up Elwood, and break the machines. Iris feels scared but also excited. At dinner that night, Laura refuses to eat. The next day, the military arrives to subdue the rioters, followed by the Mounted Police. The police come to Avilion and ask to speak with Iris and Laura about Alex. They ask Laura if she knows that he’s a “known subversive and radical” who has been “stirring up trouble” in the relief camps. When Laura claims ignorance of Alex’s subversive activities, they put increasing pressure on her, but Laura maintains that she wouldn’t tell them even if she knew something. 

As soon as the police leaves, Iris tells Laura that she knows Laura is hiding Alex in the house, and Laura admitted that he’s in the cellar. Iris cries out in exasperation, but they both laugh at the idea of Reenie finding him by accident. Iris suggests they hide him in the attic. After waiting until Reenie goes to bed, Iris creeps down to the cellar and finds Alex, telling him, “You should be ashamed of yourself.” They speak flirtatiously: Alex hints at the scandal that would ensue if people thought he and Laura were having an affair, but he assures Iris that Laura is too young for him. He explains that Laura is hiding him out of a sense of Christian duty to care for the vulnerable. Iris asks Alex if he started the fire, and he insists that he didn’t.

Iris and Laura discuss the plan for how they will keep Alex alive without revealing to anyone else that he’s in the attic. They never discuss what they’ll do if someone does find out. They smuggle their leftovers for him, being careful to avoid even bringing him a plate, because Reenie would have noticed it was missing. Presently, Iris reflects that Reenie probably was suspicious, yet perhaps tried to preserve her own ignorance so that he could honestly tell the authorities she didn’t know anything if they were caught. Alex asks for cigarettes, and they bring some for him, asking him to limit himself to one a day, which he doesn’t do.

Iris and Laura also bring Alex water to wash with, and they then dump it out in secret. While Iris is waiting for him to finish washing, she finds the idea of him naked on the other side of the door inexplicably “painful.” The newspapers accuse Alex of being “an arsonist and a murderer” whose education has led him to become an extremist and commit evil acts. Wanted posters featuring the picture of Alex that Elwood took are hung up around town. Meanwhile, Alex asks the girls to bring him writing materials. Taking care of Alex brings the sisters closer together. In the evenings, they talk to Alex; after they leave him, Iris thinks about him while she’s going to sleep.

One day, Iris goes up to the attic without Laura for the first time. She finds Alex smoking, and when he notices she’s there, he jumps and drops his cigarette. They both kneel down to try and put out the sparks, and in one swift moment, Alex kissed Iris. Iris isn’t sure if she was expecting this or how she felt about it at the time. Alex tries to take her clothes off, but she pushes him off her and runs away, feeling that he’s laughing at her behind her back. Iris knows that if it were to happen again, she would be in trouble. She tells Laura that they needed to find a way to sneak Alex out of Port Ticonderoga.

Alex, meanwhile, complains about developing cabin fever. By the time the new year comes, Iris and Laura decide that the time was right for him to escape. They steal one of Norval’s old coats, make Alex a packed lunch, and hug him goodbye. After he leaves, the girls both cry. In the attic, they find a notebook in which he’d written a long list of strange-sounding words, such as “quartzephyr,” “jocynth,” and “zycron.” The girls are suspicious of the list, and Laura says she’ll burn it in the fire.

A week later, Laura gives Iris a print she made of the photograph Elwood took of them and Alex. Laura had cut it so that only Iris’s hand is visible, and she tells Iris that she knows this is how Iris will want to remember it. Laura admits that she made a corresponding version for herself with Iris cut out. Iris reflects that “This was the closest [Laura] ever came, in my hearing, to a confession of love for Alex Thomas.” After that day, the sisters don’t speak of Alex again.

In the present day, Iris dreams that she is covered in thick hair. She thinks that she wakes up but she actually doesn’t, and she dreams that Richard is there. When Iris actually does wake up, her heart is beating fast and she thinks about how nightmares can kill people. She returns to the story she’s been telling. In early 1935, Laura is spending more and more time helping the church’s relief efforts, and Iris rarely sees her. The company that insured the button factory refuses to pay for it to be rebuilt after the fire, which means that it remained closed. Norval spends increasing amounts of time in Toronto, sometimes bringing Iris with him.

Norval is doing business with Richard Griffen. Reluctantly, he’s looking for people to buy the factory, but no one wants it. By this point, Norval is thin and his hands are always shaking. Laura has also stopped eating, seemingly because she doesn’t believe she deserves food while others are going hungry. During their trips to Toronto, Iris and Norval often have dinner with Richard. Iris is silent while the men discussed politics; Richard expresses his hatred of communism and his approval of Hitler’s economic policies. Iris is usually bored during these conversations and she only nods absently. 

One day, Iris, Norval, and Richard are supposed to have lunch together at the Royal York Hotel. Just before they’re about to go inside, though, Norval pauses and tells Iris that she and Richard will be dining alone and that Richard is going to propose to her. When Iris asks her father what she should do, he replies that the choice is hers, but that “a certain amount depends on it.” He explains that if Iris marries Richard, Laura’s future will be secure and it might be possible to save the button business. Iris says nothing, which Norval interprets as agreement. Richard arrives and takes Iris away on her own. She doesn’t have strong feelings about him, either positive or negative. Yet that night, she’s consumed by dread.

A week after Iris and Richard get engaged, Iris is invited to lunch with Winifred at the Arcadian Court, a restaurant on top of Simpsons department store. Iris wears her “best daytime outfit” but still doesn’t fit in with her fancy surroundings. Winifred is wearing green. She tells Iris to call her Freddie, adding, “I want us to be great chums.” She looks at Iris’s ring, explaining that she helped Richard choose it. Winifred is about 30, older than Iris but seven years younger than Richard. She explains that she and Richard are “such great pals” and that she organizes his social calendar for him. In hindsight, Iris knows Winifred must have been disappointed in how she behaved during this lunch.

Winifred indicates that she wants to shape Iris into a new kind of person. She mentions Adelia and how the Montfort women were known for their wonderful style. Winifred insists that with the right adjustments, Iris “could be charming,” but Iris feels that this is untrue. Once they finish lunch, Winifred begins describing all the tasks and events that will be part of planning the wedding. In hindsight, Iris feels that Winifred was a “pimp.” The wedding is to take place in Rosedale, the “fake-Tudor barn” where Winifred lives. Winifred brings Iris clothes and coaches her in how to behave around society people. Iris confesses that, although she hates Winifred, these lessons did prove to be helpful.  

The night before the wedding, Laura creeps into the bedroom in Rosedale where Iris is supposed to be preparing herself for the big day. Laura tells Iris that Iris too young to get married and that she doesn’t believe Iris actually wants to do it. Iris replies that the decision is a practical one and explains that it’s necessary in order to protect their father. Laura remains adamant that Iris shouldn’t marry and warns her, “But you’ll have to let him touch you.” After Laura leaves, Iris stares at her trousseau, which frightens her, although she tries to remember that it signals nothing more than traveling to a new place.

In Iris’s wedding picture, she smiles without her teeth. She feels completely dissociated from the version of herself displayed in this photograph. Richard, meanwhile, is still somewhat young and handsome. Laura somehow spoils each one of the group photographs by either frowning, biting her nails, or moving in each one. Norval is exceedingly drunk on the wedding day and at a certain point disappears altogether. After the wedding, Richard takes Iris away to a room at the Royal York Hotel—the same location where the wedding reception took place—where they have sex for the first time, an experience Iris finds unsettling and painful.

The next day, the newlyweds takes a train to New York, where they have dinner with a number of Richard’s wealthy friends. These people act “fearful” and “deferential” around Richard. In hindsight, Iris realizes that Richard was probably trying to avoid spending time alone with her. His friends comment on how young Iris is. A couple of days later, Iris and Richard take a ship across the Atlantic Ocean, a journey that makes Iris terribly seasick. She’s relieved that her illness gives them an excuse not to have sex. Under pressure from Richard, Iris forces herself to leave their cabin, attending a cabaret performance. On the third day at sea, Iris goes onto the deck alone; she looks out at the ocean and throws a penny into it, but she refrains from making a wish.