Summary

Grace is pulled out of bed by her mother, Sarah. When her mother sits her down on the "killing stump," knife in hand, Grace is convinced she is about to be killed (4). Instead, Sarah cuts off Grace's hair, and then tells her, "You are the strong one now" (5). Sarah sets off for town, and Grace seethes with rage towards her mother. She thinks about the man called Boggs, who her mother has been sleeping with, and who is the father of Grace's two younger half-siblings, Bran and Finbar. Grace hates Boggs, and thinks with disgust of the time when he asked to see her alone. Sarah had prevented anything from happening, but after Boggs left that time "the change" took over Sarah, "her eyes becoming black and unseeing" (7). Grace spends the afternoon sitting with her younger brother, Colly. That night, Sarah brings...