Summary

Chapter 2 begins in 1933 in the hayloft of a barn, where Mark and his childhood sweetheart Letty are enjoying a moment of post-coital intimacy. Letty is married to another man, but involved in an ongoing affair with Mark, and she is pregnant with Mark’s child. It is implied that Letty’s father was abusive (although it is not stated what form this abuse took), and that this compelled her to run away a few years ago with the much older insurance salesman who is now her husband. She is unhappy in the marriage, partly because her husband beats her.

Letty tells Mark that she has always loved him, but she ran away before because she knew that he would not intervene to save her from her father, just as he has not intervened to save her from her abusive husband. Mark ponders his regrets...