Chapter IX Summary

Cloudstreet is quiet with shock for a while after the wedding. On the last day of the 1950s, Rose and Quick find a flat behind a house in the Perth suburb of Mosman Park. Rose wants her own house, and they make plans to save money and buy a place. Quick was never paid for his fishing work for the family, so he decides to become a policeman, just as Lester used to be. On the day that Quick is sworn in as a constable, Rose tells him during the party afterwards at Cloudstreet that she is pregnant, and Quick is delighted. As a policeman, Quick is assigned to walking the streets, which he finds is relatively eventless. One winter morning, Sam awakens to discover his stump tingling and the smell of his dead father, signaling the arrival of the shifty...