The Heart of the Matter

Standing on the veranda of the District Commissioner’s bungalow, Scobie waits for the group of survivors at Pende. Realizing that one of the victims could easily have been Louise, Scobie remarks to Wilson that Louise arrived in South Africa safely. Wilson interrogates Scobie about how Tallit got caught smuggling illegal diamonds. Scobie says he received a tip about the parrot, but Tallit’s cousin claims the parrots were switched.

The next morning, Scobie watches the stretchers pass by carrying the victims and struggles to reconcile these deathly images with the love of God. He also cannot believe in a “God who was not human enough to love what he had created” (108). One of the survivors, Scobie learns, is a 19-year-old widow who is grasping a stamp-album. Scobie reflects on how she was carried into his life on a stretcher. The doctor informs Scobie that he is unsure of her fate.

The wife of a local missionary named Mrs. Bowles asks Scobie to stay at the rest-house with the patients while she runs to the dispensary. Full of pity, Scobie prays for a young girl who, in Scobie’s imagination, appears to have a white communion veil over her head. Suddenly, the sickly girl awakens and calls him “Father” (112).