50 pages • 1 hour read
Isabel CañasA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Andrés and Juana attend the dinner with Rodolfo, Beatriz, and the hacendados. During dinner, Beatriz sees María Catalina sitting at the table with them, but she soon disappears. Juana gets drunk and embarrasses Rodolfo with her behavior. When the hacendados leave, Rodolfo grabs Juana and forces her out of the room. Andrés and Beatriz overhear them arguing, and they discover that Juana is Rodolfo’s illegitimate half sister. Rodolfo hits Juana and threatens to disown her if she does not behave, and then returns to Beatriz and Andrés in a bright mood. He tells Beatriz that it is time for bed, and she dreads being alone in the hacienda with her violent husband and the angry spirits.
As she and Rodolfo go upstairs to bed, Beatriz feels the presence of María Catalina grow stronger in the house. On the staircase, Beatriz sees a vision of a corpse covered in blood.
In the bedroom, Rodolfo tries to have sex with Beatriz. Even though she refuses, he does not stop until she tells him she is on her period. Surrounded by complete darkness, Beatriz has a nightmare about the night her father died. She wakes up to the sounds of doors slamming in the house and suddenly knows that she is about to die.
By Isabel Cañas