The Monster · Chapter
III explained
Leilah Verplank, after fleeing from Coronado, suffers a breakdown and recuperates in Salt Lake City.
What happens
Leilah Verplank, after fleeing from Coronado, suffers a breakdown and recuperates in Salt Lake City. She then travels to Carson, Nevada, where she secures a divorce from Verplank through questionable legal means. Meanwhile, Verplank mistakenly pursues her to Samoa and the austral seas. Leilah later stays with the Silverstairs in Paris, where she meets Count Kasimiérz Barouffski after he saves her from a fire at a dinner party. Barouffski begins to court her, and Violet Silverstairs warns Leilah about his intentions.
Themes in this chapter
Love and Marriage
The chapter explores the dissolution of Leilah's marriage to Verplank through a Nevada divorce and her subsequent courtship by Barouffski.
Fate and Karma
Leilah comes to believe in karma and fate, viewing her meeting with Barouffski as destined after her spiritual readings.
Desire and Self-Destruction
Verplank's obsessive pursuit of Leilah and his hatred for Barouffski drive him to destructive actions, while Leilah's flight and illness reflect her own turmoil.
Characters to notice
- Leilah Verplank
Flees from Coronado, suffers brain fever in Salt Lake City, obtains a divorce in Nevada, and later meets Barouffski in Paris after a fire incident.
- Violet Silverstairs
Hosts Leilah in Paris, forces her to socialize, and warns her about Barouffski's motives.
- Barouffski
Hates Verplank without having met him; saves Leilah from a fire at a dinner party and begins courting her.
- M. Verplank
Pursues Leilah to San Francisco and then to Samoa and the austral seas, unaware of the divorce proceedings in Nevada.
- Lord Silverstairs
Violet's husband, who dismisses Leilah's interest in spiritual books as 'gammon'.
Key passages
“It was not because of errors of his that she had gone, but for turpitudes of her own.”
Verplank convinced himself that Leilah left him not due to his own mistakes but because of her own immoral actions.
Highlights Verplank's self-justification and blame-shifting.
“Forget, some considerate and subliminal self admonished. Forget.”
A part of Leilah's mind urged her to forget the past, but she struggled to do so.
Illustrates Leilah's internal conflict and desire to escape her memories.
“It was a mere matter of money, he explained, and, what he did not explain, a mere matter of perjury as well, the perjury of local oafs ready to swear to whatever they were paid for.”
The lawyer implied that the divorce could be arranged quickly with money and false testimony from locals.
Reveals the corrupt legal practices in Nevada at the time.