Summary

In chapter 18 readers are brought back to the present time with Joan weeping on the curb in Rome. In a panic, she sends Arthur a postcard telling him that she is alive and sorry and to come to her. She feels better after she mails the postcard and decides that this is a turning point for her new self. Back at the flat she continues to work on her novel. In the scene that she is working on, her main character, Charlotte, grows increasingly paranoid and thinks that she heard a sound outside of her window. Joan, too, while she is lost in her plotline, thinks that she hears footsteps crunching down the gravel path. But no one is there.

Analysis

Joan’s character, Charlotte, continues to have emotions that mimic Joan’s, almost as if Joan is living vicariously through her characters. Joan’s paranoia...