Lives of Girls and Women

Del recalls her mother’s claim that Jubilee “is rife with suicides” (265). She initially took this statement at face value, but later argues with Ada over the credibility of this statement. Del recalls only Miss Farris’s drowning and the death of Marion Sheriff by suicide, noting how the townspeople, like Fern, draw their own conclusions about the deaths.

When the library’s collection of stories no longer satisfies her, Del decides to become a writer and begins a novel based on the Sheriff family. While she changes the family name, she focuses the subject matter on the daughter, Marion, whom she reimagines as a black-haired temptress named Caroline who pursues men like “weary husbands” and “defeated salesmen” who travel through Jubilee. Del decides to keep her book a secret, carrying “the idea” of her story with her in her mind instead of writing it down out of the fear that it will not translate how she wants it to on the page.

Del outlines the details of Marion’s life that either stay the same or change in her novel, eliminating the brother who dies of alcoholism but retaining Bobby, who spends time in a psychiatric hospital, as Del believes that “three tragedies” are too unbelievable for one family. In Del’s novel, Caroline sets her sights on a nameless school photographer—“The Photographer”—whose photos cause everyone to look older than they are. After Caroline discovers his car abandoned by the Wawanash River, she dies by suicide. Caroline’s brother then discovers that the photographer’s photo of her captures her eyes as white orbs. Del notes that she still had not thought through the “implications” of her story, hoping that the reasons behind the novel’s events would “come clear” later on.

At the end of Munro’s story, Del sits down with Bobby Sheriff, who is home from the hospital, and hopes to catch a glimpse of his “madness.” After a polite but otherwise mundane conversation, Bobby wishes her luck in life as she waits to hear back on her college scholarships. Del responds “Yes,” rather than thanking him.