Part II The Baths — Chapter Three

At a claustrophobic post office, Thomas Senlin purchases stationery and composes a carefully crafted lie to his cousin, Ms. Olivet Berks, claiming he and Marya are happily extending their stay at the Baths. He asks her to arrange a substitute for his school duties, vowing to return by harvest, and adds a conciliatory postscript.

Distracted by the clerk’s blacking-out of a chapbook, Senlin impulsively buys the half-redacted book. Outside, he reads The Confidences of a Wifemonger, which outlines how predators identify, isolate, and “primp” vulnerable women for wealthy husbands. The remaining pages are censored. Senlin dismisses it as cynical fiction but pockets it uneasily.

Rationalizing his deceit to Berks, Senlin decides not to raise an alarm in Isaugh, fearing a futile, dangerous influx of townsfolk to the Market. He resolves to keep searching alone and heads toward the Le Gris Hotel to continue discreet inquiries.

Drawn by a crowd at a gazebo, Senlin expects a play but finds a grim ceremony: a customs agent reads a litany of charges against a young hotel porter, Frederick Haggard. A laundry woman whispers that the charges are fabricated retaliation after the youth rejected a rich woman’s advances.

The executioner, known as the Red Hand, injects a glowing serum from a braced cuff, his body visibly transforming. In a sudden, shocking display of strength, the Red Hand wrenches off Frederick’s head. Senlin is sickened and terrified, recognizing the Baths’ sanctioned brutality and feeling his fear of the authorities—and for Marya’s fate—intensify.