Summary

James brings Masson a cup of tea, and Masson insists that they speak in Irish. He tells James he has heard that James will be moving to the mainland. Masson returns to his work and reflects on the impact Lloyd’s presence has had on James and Mairéad; it reminds him of his own conduct as a child, refusing to speak his mother’s Arabic. He thinks of his father’s insistence that his mother harmed their prospects as a family by refusing to conform to French customs, and how he would insult Algeria. Masson was made to keep his Arabic instruction a secret.

Mairéad brings clothes to Lloyd’s cottage and looks through a book of Gauguin paintings, moved by them. She takes the book to Lloyd’s hut the next morning and they look through it together. As the...