Short Fiction · Chapter
The Return explained
A fisherman's wife, Madame Martin-Lévesque, becomes alarmed when a strange, ragged man begins loitering near her home.
What happens
A fisherman's wife, Madame Martin-Lévesque, becomes alarmed when a strange, ragged man begins loitering near her home. The man is revealed to be her first husband, Martin, long believed lost at sea. His return throws the household into emotional turmoil as he, his wife, and her second husband Lévesque must decide how to proceed.
Themes in this chapter
Marriage and Domesticity
The return of the first husband disrupts the established domestic life of the Martin-Lévesque household, forcing a renegotiation of family roles and relationships.
Cruelty and Suffering
The characters endure emotional and physical hardship: Martin's twelve-year captivity, the family's poverty, and the painful confrontation of his return.
Characters to notice
- Madame Lefèvre
The wife of Lévesque and former wife of Martin; she is the central figure in the domestic crisis caused by her first husband's return.
- Maître Chicot
The barman at the Café du Commerce who serves Martin and Lévesque a drink after Martin's return.
Key passages
“I'm taking the air... Am I doing you any harm?”
The vagabond claims he is merely sitting by the roadside and means no harm.
Martin's initial, evasive response to Madame Martin's confrontation.
“Is it you, husband?”
Madame Martin recognizes the tramp as her long-lost first husband.
The moment of recognition that triggers the story's central conflict.
“I'll do as you wish. I don't want to wrong you. But it's annoying when I think of the house. I've two children, you've three; let's each keep our own.”
Martin proposes a practical, if unemotional, division of the family and property.
Martin's pragmatic approach to the impossible situation.