Summary

In Chapter 11, Morris Lakeman delivers “his address to the Historical Society of Western Massachusetts” into his mirror (311). After his expulsion from the Society for sexual misconduct, he was not invited back. He wrote the address hoping that he could participate in the Mitch Harwood Lecture. Morris had tried appealing to the Society without success.

Sitting alone, Morris tells himself he does not need the Society after all (314). He still resents being called an amateur historian, as his work takes skill and expertise. Morris hopes to prove his recent historical theories by finding a body.

Morris misses his wife Miriam. She left him for a man named Rudolph. Afterwards, Morris became interested in Jack Dunne’s true crime column. The bodies Jack had discovered inspired Morris’s personal detectoring endeavors (320).

From “his copies of Captivity Tales and True Crime!,” Morris had learned of the...