Who is Jules?

Jules is the husband of Leslie Day, a white woman whose parents rejected her biracial family. Jules was educated in a fancy white school paid for by her mother’s mistress. The Latin that he learned at Harvard is sprinkled throughout as he wanders through the lush gardens of the island. Jules grows more anxious as he has a continual nagging feeling that something bad is going to happen to him. As the caterpillar infestation takes over his beloved garden, Jules becomes obsessed with eliminating the threat to his trees. He spends his nights crushing the insects, scraping them off of trees, and spraying them with poison. There are a number of times in the novel in which he argues with Leslie about the best way to protect Brooks, and he comes to realize that Leslie is hiding her real motive for being on the island.