Payment Deferred · Chapter
XII explained
Winnie returns home for Christmas, demanding money and disrupting the Marbles' tense, secretive household.
What happens
Winnie returns home for Christmas, demanding money and disrupting the Marbles' tense, secretive household. Her energetic spending and reorganization unsettle her parents, who live in mutual fear of their shared secret. After her activity subsides, she grows bored and leaves to stay with friends, leaving the Marbles alone again in their isolated, paranoid existence.
Themes in this chapter
Guilt and Paranoia
The Marbles live in constant fear of their secret being discovered; a knock at the door terrifies them into thinking it is the police.
Family and Generational Conflict
Winnie's modern, assertive ways clash with her parents' inertia and secrecy, causing disruption and resentment.
Class and Social Aspiration
Winnie's spending and desire for a grand lifestyle contrast with the Marbles' actual poverty of spirit and the neighbors' sneering.
Characters to notice
- Mr. Marble
Drinks heavily, lives in terror of the gallows, disturbed by Winnie's bustle, gives her a £100 cheque.
- Annie Marble
Shows up as 'Mrs. Marble' in this chapter; tearful, flurried by Winnie's demands, lives in silent dread of the secret.
- Winnie Medland
Returns from school as 'Winnie Marble'; beautiful, assertive, spends lavishly, reorganizes the house, then leaves for friends.
Key passages
““Father,” said Winnie, “are we dreadfully poor since you left off going to the City?” Mr. Marble rolled a maudlin eye upon her. Then pride reasserted itself—pride in his achievement all those months ago, which was still mentioned with bated breath by City clerks, but which had never received its meed of recognition in his own home. “No,” he said. “We’ve got plenty.””
Winnie asks if they are poor now that her father no longer works in the City. Marble, drunk, feels a surge of pride in his past financial success and insists they have plenty of money.
Highlights Marble's pride in his ill-gotten wealth and his continued denial of the true state of affairs.
“Indoors her father and mother were sitting together in the back room, he with a book on his knee as usual, she gazing into vacancy, following in her vague fashion all the unpleasant lines of thought that her husband had followed long ago. At the sound of Winnie’s knocks Marble rolled a frightened eye upon her. She rose in heart-fluttering panic. “Will,” she said, “it’s not—it’s not—?” Only police would knock like that at 53 Malcolm Road.”
The Marbles sit in tense silence. When Winnie knocks loudly, they both panic, fearing it is the police coming to arrest them.
Illustrates the constant paranoia and fear of discovery that dominates their lives.
“After all, Mr. Marble’s income was nearly twelve hundred a year; of that Winnie’s fees amounted to nearly three hundred, but of the remaining nine he hardly spent a quarter. A man who has five hundred a year for which he can find no use does not worry about odd hundreds, especially when he spends every waking minute in terror of being hanged.”
Marble's income is large, but he spends little; his fear of execution overshadows any concern about money.
Shows the disconnect between Marble's financial security and his psychological torment.