51 pages • 1 hour read
Stacey LeeUnder a Painted Sky
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2015A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 14-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 14 Summary
Sammy jumps from the tree into West’s arms to escape the flames. She wonders whether he noticed, when he caught her, that she is female. West is angry at Cay for putting Sammy in the tree because many stampedes are caused by storms, and on a prairie, a lone tree attracts lightning. A piglet stumbles by and Sammy picks it up and cuddles it inside her shirt. We learn that Andy’s younger brother once had a piglet named Soapy. Four men emerge from the shadow of the burning tree: a redhead, a man called Mr. MacMartin, and his sons, Ian and Angus. The Scottish brothers are ugly and aggressive. When they see the piglet, they use an ethnic slur and accuse Sammy of stealing it. Sammy throws herself between Angus’s boot and the piglet, resulting in a sharp kick to her ribs. The cowboys lasso Ian and Angus and force them to apologize to Sammy and to their father; they make themselves lifelong enemies. The redhead reveals that he is a sheriff.
Chapter 15 Summary
The sheriff brings Sammy and Andy to his wagon train, which he leads. When they arrive at the camp, they catch sight of the river, Little Blue. The sheriff introduces them to Mrs. Calloway, who is the wife of the man whose wagon they hid in when they escaped from St. Joe. They are sent to clean up at the river but are accosted by some teenage girls who are intrigued by the sight of a “Celestial”—“an irritating term for Chinese people” (131).
Chapter 16 Summary
The teenage girls soon lose interest in Sammy and Andy once the real cowboys arrive at the stream. Andy removes the last of the splinters that Sammy got in her hand while up in the tree and reveals to Sammy that she knows about her attraction to West. Sammy becomes uncomfortable watching one of the teenage girls, Rachel, flirt with West and does not seem to realize the strength of the cider that she was drinking. Sammy becomes intoxicated and drunkenly speaks of shooting her landlord before she throws up. She notices two goblins leaning over Andy’s coat.
Chapter 17 Summary
The goblins are the MacMartin brothers, Ian and Angus, who are tormenting Andy. Fortunately, the sheriff shows up before they have a chance to do any serious harm with their lasso. Mrs. Calloway knows that Samantha and Annamae are girls, and they confess everything to her. Mrs. Calloway is an abolitionist, like her husband Andy’s “Moses train” driver. Mr. MacMartin gives Samantha and Annamae a mule, so their group can now travel faster, as they no longer have to ride double. Peety mentions a mysterious woman called Esme. They start climbing the high plains that lead to the Platte River. Cay, West, and Peety offer to teach Sammy and Andy how to become cowboys.
Chapter 18 Summary
Cowboy training begins with lessons of hunting, riding, and roping in exchange for language lessons and musical recitals. Cay wants to learn French to impress women. West reveals his artistic talents. Sammy encourages West’s artistic pursuits, explaining that, in the past, artists were both wealthy and revered, bringing up Michelangelo and the Tudor courts. They bond over their love of art and music. West also reveals his difficult childhood at the hands of his abusive father, who never accepted West for who he was.
Chapter 19 Summary
Soldiers appear in their camp. The men are looking for whiskey and trouble and start bullying Sammy when they find her alone in the camp. She pretends to be an angry Chinese boy, screaming at them in her “harshest Cantonese” (171) because she remembers that her father told her that people fear what they do not understand. Sammy’s act works, and by the time Andy returns to camp, the men are leaving. Andy explains that she has lived her whole life in fear of being lynched. Sammy asks her about the bracelet that she wears, and Andy explains the relevance of the baubles that she has collected on it. Sammy is reminded of her mother’s jade bracelet. Sammy wants to confess the truth to the cowboys, but Andy does not want to put the cowboys in legal or spiritual trouble. If they are forced to swear on a Bible and they lie, they will go to hell, but if they tell the truth, then the cowboys will go to jail for harboring fugitives. Sammy worries that Andy will be leaving soon and realizes that her travelling companions have become her family.
Chapter 20 Summary
The cowboys have a change of heart and now want to become Argonauts and pan for gold in California. They ask Sammy and Andy to join them. Wanting to stay together longer, the girls agree and give the money and rings they took from Yorkshire’s body to the boys to help pay for supplies for their journey. They start planning the supplies that they will buy when they reach Fort Laramie next month. Sammy strums her violin and sings a song about loving the “West.” Overcome by the double meaning of the lyrics, she goes down to the water for a cry. When she returns to camp, she finds that West’s old coat has been placed across her bedroll.
Chapter 21 Summary
Peety gives his horse, Princesa, to Andy, so she now can make her journey to find her brother on her own. At first, Sammy wants Andy to come with her to find Mr. Trask. However, Andy is escaping from enslavement, as is her brother, so it is dangerous for Sammy to be with them and help them. Peety engages them in conversations of marriage and explains how people in Mexico are not against racially mixed marriages. He suggests that Sammy find himself a wife there. Cay thinks that Sammy should find himself a Chinese wife. West remains silent. Sammy explains how her parents met through a matchmaker. The fort comes into sight, but Sammy and Andy are afraid that they will be recognized so decide to meet the cowboys a few miles down the road on the other side of it. Andy reveals that she finds Peety attractive. Sammy continues to use the Chinese zodiac in her relationship considerations. They find the corpse of a Black man in the brush, marked by a cross carved into a tree.
Chapter 22 Summary
They decide not to tell anyone about finding the body. The group now must cross a river. The horses make it across, but Sammy and her mule, Paloma, hesitate. Out of nowhere, Ian and Angus appear, and Sammy urges her mule into the river. Paloma loses her footing and Sammy’s precious violin gets wet. Sammy, too, finds herself in the water, and almost laughs that she has finally managed to drown herself.
Chapters 14-22 Analysis
This central section of the novel focuses on the character development of Sammy and Andy, who are trained in how to be cowboys. This education results from the dangers experienced during the animal stampede, when both Sammy’s and Andy’s lives were put in danger. This training requires that the cowboys spend more time with Sammy and Andy, often alone. Lee uses this training as both humorous light relief and a device that allows for character and relationship development. For example, in Chapter 18, the reader is told of West’s artistic talents and his abuse as a child. Being rescued by West and spending time alone with him during her cowboy training deepens Sammy’s romantic feelings for him and drives the romantic subplot.
Lee also explores Samantha’s Chinese heritage in order to enrich her character development. Samantha uses Chinese astrology and culture as the lens through which she understands her life and interprets the actions of others. She refers to herself and her friends as their zodiac animals and understands Cay’s fearless yet sometimes reckless personality as belonging to Tigers (153). This motif of the Chinese zodiac and fate throughout the novel allows Samantha to interpret other characters on a textual level, and hence allows Lee to relate elements of characterization to the reader and foreshadow plot developments.
The constant question of Sammy and Andy’s disguise develops Lee’s exploration of the theme of Negotiating Gender Roles in the 19th-Century American West. As the girls grow closer to the cowboys, they begin to worry if their disguise will be discovered and if it is ethical to keep such a big secret from their friends. While Sammy wants to confess, Andy is concerned that this will compromise the cowboys legally, as they would then knowingly be harboring fugitives from the law. In this section, Lee withholds something from the reader, however: It turns out that their cover has already been blown; physical intimacy during their rescue, as well as other clues, made it clear to the cowboys that Sammy and Andy were actually young women impersonating younger boys. Lee subverts the conventions of dramatic irony here: While the reader believes that they know something that the cowboys do not know, the cowboys actually know something that the reader doesn’t know. This subversion allows Lee to further destabilize the idea of gender roles: their performative aspects and the 19th-century conventions relating to how men and women are supposed to interact. This allows for the tension of the budding romance between Samantha and West to continue, as well as the uncertainty of whether he is resisting her because he believes she is male or because she is Chinese.
This section contains some dark elements that counterbalance the lighter relief. It introduces the MacMartin brothers and the beginning of the conflict in the plot revolving around their animosity toward Sammy and Andy. It also concludes with Sammy believing herself to be drowning in the river—an image that recurs in the novel—which ends Chapter 22 on another cliffhanger.
