Summary

Hanny and the narrator brought the rifle and several stuffed rats to the beach. Nothing had changed since the narrator’s last visit to the ocean, apart from the addition of a spray-painted swastika on the side of a pillbox. Dead seagulls, tree stumps, driftwood, trash, and seaweed coated the beach’s surface.

Hanny indicated that his headache was gone and he felt much better. The narrator repeated Father Bernard’s opinion that Mummer was well-intentioned but afraid. The narrator and Hanny crawled into the pillbox. It was intended for protection against bombing, but was never used, as the Loney was not an important martial territory and the Third Reich never approached the Irish Sea.

Hanny and the narrator removed the sand from the floor and arranged the stuffed rats and toy soldiers on the ground. The narrator positioned the gun in a slit...