PEACE: One Devil

Dave Tallman · 23 Apr 2008, 04:46 · from 2008-April.txt.gz

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From: davetallman at msn.com (Dave Tallman)
Date: Tue, 22 Apr 2008 22:46:53 -0600
Subject: (urth)  PEACE: One Devil
Message-ID: <480EBF3D.2060202 at gmail.com>

I'm still looking for out-of-place memories for my "one devil" theory, 
and I found
another glaring example: the ladies' Indian Club meeting on Den's fifth 
birthday.
It's described in vivid detail even though Den wasn't present. He was 
inside the
house, looking at Joes' s picture and then fighting Bobbie Black.

Where could this memory have come from? Conceivably, Weer's ghost could 
flit around
his own vicinity when he went back in time. However, all other memories 
are from
his point-of-view. If he had that power he wouldn't need to make a hole 
to peep at
Sherry Gold (p. 11).

Could this be a story told to him by his mother or Aunt Olivia, fleshed 
out with details
by his imagination? It doesn't have story form, and it is real enough to 
interfere
with his doctor visit. "Ladies, this was not what I wanted." (p. 13).

It could be a vision from Hannah -- she seems to have a ghostly link to 
him. He calls her
an occult source (p. 5), and he appears to her and to Kate at the end of 
the banshee
story (p. 34). But Hannah wasn't present for the whole meeting (p. 9).

So what about the "one devil" possibility? If he killed someone who was 
at the party he
may be linking to their memory. He didn't kill Aunt Olivia; we know 
Peacock did. He isn't
likely to have killed his mother since her death came as a surprise (p. 
28). There no
real motive to murder Mrs. Black, Mrs. Green, or Mrs. Singer that I can see.

But the "one devil" theory could work the other way around. Suppose 
someone murdered
Weer? There's one person at that meeting who we know lived after he did: 
Eleanor Bold.
She was rumored to have lovers when Weer was five, so she must be at 
least ten years
older. It's very odd that she visited Weer, a healthy man in his fifties 
(when she
was in her sixties) and asked if she could plant a tree on his grave.  
How could she
know he would die before she did, unless she had something to do with 
his death?

Eleanor appears quite often in the novel, at critical points in the 
plot. She was at the fatal
five-year birthday party (p. 5), she secured an invitation for Olivia to 
see the china egg (p. 72),
she heard the story of Tilly (p. 118), and she planted the elm tree on 
Weer's grave (p. 1).
She's not a minor character; one could say she has observed Weer's whole 
life. Her married
name is Porter, "one who keeps a gate." The gate of death?

What would be her motive? Probably not the death of her young nephew 
Bobbie Black; that
was ancient history. But look at the first sentence: she's "the judge's 
daughter." Not just
"one of the judge's daughters" (she had a sister). Wolfe doesn't write 
throw-away descriptions,
especially in the opening sentence. I think Wolfe is hinting that she 
sees herself as acting for
God (the Judge), as Nemesis. Her visit when he began to run the plant 
might be taken as a
warning to mend his ways or die. The reporter's interview in the last 
chapter shows the plant
is a place of horror and a blight on the community. Weer's tenure as 
President has improved
nothing. It is time for Nemesis to act.

In Clue, the murder victim is the owner of the mansion. Perhaps we were 
asking the wrong
question. Not "Who did Alden Weer kill?" but "Who killed Alden Weer?" 
The answer may be
right there in the first sentence of PEACE.

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