Nora Webster

Nora tells no one about her new job. When her sister, Una, claims to have heard a rumor about Nora returning to the Gibneys, Nora insists that she has yet to make up her mind. She reflects on something her mother once said: that her family, including her sisters, “preferred Maurice to her” (61). She remembers visits to the farm where her sister Catherine lived with her husband, Mark. Driving out to the farm with Maurice would bring up her memories of past family traumas. Now, she expects that these stories will “die out soon” (63) because they are not being passed along. Instead, Conor and Donal are more interested in discussing which houses are haunted. As Nora drives them once again to Catherine’s farm, she tries to reassure them that ghosts do not exist.

In the farmhouse, Catherine fusses around and never sits. The farm is large, Nora thinks, and the family is wealthy. She feels like an “object of pity” (66) who is being hosted by her wealthy sister. Catherine does not mention food, but Nora takes sly pleasure in refusing to be polite. Conor and Donal become hungry; though the hosts have already eaten, Nora is “determined” not to refuse her sister’s insincere offer to cook for them, and she takes pleasure in irritating Catherine.