The Heat of the Day

Stella thinks about the fact that she mustn’t call Robert, who has returned to his family home. Mrs. Kelway has received an offer on the house, which has been for sale for years. The family discuss the relevant issues: Whether they want to sell, how much they should accept as an offer, and where Mrs. Kelway, Ernestine, and Amabelle’s children would go if they did sell. Anne, one of the children, comes downstairs, though she should be in bed. They do not come to any decisions during the chapter.

Robert asks Stella, “And if I am?” (300), as the chapter begins in the midst of a conversation in which he admits that he is indeed selling information to the enemy. They are in bed together at her flat. When she questions his loyalty, he tells her that “there are no more countries left” (301), and that the country “sold itself out already” (302). He tells Stella that he thought, at various points in their relationship, that she already knew what he was doing. She leaves the room and looks at the photographs on the mantle, struggling with her hatred of Robert’s actions but love for him.

He comes into the room.