Loving Frank

Content Warning: This section depicts murder, including child death.

Mamah arrives in Chicago for the first time in years. She meets Ed’s new wife, Elinor, and thanks her for her kindness toward her children. Lizzie arrives shortly after; however, she is disinterested in what Mamah has to say. She resents Mamah for leaving her to care for their mother and Mamah’s children. Mamah begs for forgiveness, but Elinor interrupts them. Mamah then takes John out for ice cream.

As Mamah leaves Chicago, she thinks about Lizzie’s words—how she lost her children in favor of Frank and Ellen. Frank comes to see her, and they go for a walk; Mamah berates him for making himself “into a tragic figure in [his] own mind. [He] go[es] from feeling persecuted one minute to being God’s anointed messenger the next” (299). She says he has to decide who he is and does not return to Taliesin.

Alone, Mamah contemplates how another architect once offered to send Frank to Paris for school, but he refused, confident in his style; she admired this confidence. She thinks about what she and Catherine gave up for Frank. Mamah no longer wants to marry him, especially since she does not want to share her finances with him.