Chapter 46 Summary

"Goodnight"

After the baby abduction and the arrest and legal actions taken against Mary Crick, Tom Crick relates her confinement to a mental hospital. Mary does not grieve for her husband's departure when he bids her good night and leaves after a visit - she grieves for the baby that she had and which she lost.

Mary was acquitted of abduction on the combined bases of extenuating circumstance (the baby's return) and diminished responsibility. Crick describes his own solitude, drunk, unable to sleep and marking history papers. They live in Greenwich, longitude 0°, the title of chapter 16.

Chapter 46 Analysis

This brief chapter reinforces the permanence of the separation of Mary and Tom. The gain and the loss of the Safeway baby mirror her gain and loss of the baby aborted in 1943.