Summary

Chapter 34 opens in a dark house, practically a hovel, with a grotesque old woman tending a fire. A stranger comes in the door; at first the old woman does not recognize her but soon she realizes that the stranger is her long lost daughter, Alice Marwood, though no longer young and beautiful. Alice retells her mother her story: she was bred to be bad, given both too much leeway and too much attention. Then when she inevitably did something wrong, justice was too harsh and she was tossed away without a second chance.

The mother tells Alice she has survived all these years by begging and stealing. Mrs. Brown tells her that she has been watching a mysterious man that they just call “him,” and also that she has kept an eye on Florence. Alice’s rage is immediate and intense at the...