Chapter 15 Summary

The next morning finds Sophie and Stingo on a train to Washington, D.C. on their way to Virginia. The train stops for a few minutes due to a power failure, and Stingo takes that time to plan his future with Sophie. He has already called both Nathan's brother and his own father from the train station, and intends to take Sophie down to the farm and marry her. After all, Virginian society would not permit them to live together otherwise. He hugs Sophie and thinks about his nearly completed book - he has only the suicide left to write. He imagines a wonderful life as a writer and thinks of the children he and Sophie will have while he tenderly watches her sleep. She wakes when the train passes through New Jersey and, to Stingo's dismay, starts drinking. She asks him if...