The Cruelest Month

While Clara is hiding the wooden eggs, she finds a duck’s nest of real eggs and shows it to Madeleine Favreau and Monsieur Béliveau. They discuss the séance that night, arranged by Gabri. Madame Isadore Blavatsky, a psychic who is staying at the bed-and-breakfast, has agreed to hold a séance. Hazel, Madeleine’s roommate, has decided not to go. After they leave, Clara reflects on Favreau and Béliveau’s new relationship, happy for them, as Monsieur Béliveau lost his wife two years ago and Madeleine is in remission from cancer.

Soon after, Clara hears Gilles Sandon and Odile Montmagny arguing about going to the séance. He thinks it will be fun, while she sees it as sacrilegious. Odile reminds Gilles that Monsieur Béliveau will be there, and he promises not to kill him. Clara is shocked, wondering what Gilles has against the man. Suddenly, she is dreading the séance, to which she had been looking forward.

That night at the séance, Madame Isadore Blavatsky reveals her real name: Jeanne Chauvet. Gabri invented the Madame Blavatsky persona for fun, and when Clara confronts him, he admits that Jeanne did not know about his plans for that evening. She protests that she only reads cards but admits that she contacts the dead sometimes, so they ask her to try.

While the others are at the séance, Hazel Smyth is at home. Her daughter, Sophie, is coming home from university the next day. As she cleans the living room, she remembers when Madeleine, who had been her best friend in high school, came to visit. She forgot, in the years they were apart, how Madeleine makes her feel alive and is glad Madeleine decided to move in with her after her cancer diagnosis. Hazel is worried about the séance.

Like Hazel, Peter Morrow has stayed home. He and his wife, Clara, are both painters, and while he has had commercial success, she has not. She has been working on a piece, but he has not seen it, and he goes into her studio. Recently, a gallery owner in Montreal contacted Clara about her paintings and is coming to see her work. Peter does not understand her paintings and is surprised the man contacted Clara. When Peter sees Clara’s current work, he is overcome with jealousy and knows that her career is about to take off.

At the bistro, Jeanne reads everyone’s runes, but they are disturbing, and so they decide to hold the séance. They use candles for their only light, and when Jeanne says the spirits are coming, they are all frightened. They hear footsteps and a voice, and they think it is a spirit, but it is only Ruth Zardo, another villager.

After Ruth’s interruption, the séance breaks up, but several people stay in the bistro, and Peter joins them. Ruth interrupts the séance because she touched the duck eggs that Clara had found, and the mother would not sit on the nest. She has put them in a low heat oven to incubate until they hatch. Jeanne tells them the séance would not have worked anyway because Three Pines is too happy. Monsieur Béliveau disagrees, pointing out the window to the Hadley house, sitting ominously on a hill above Three Pines.

Together, the villagers tell her about the Hadley house, host to murder and kidnapping in the past, and which they all see as inherently evil. Jeanne suggests that the house balances the village, because if they direct their negative emotions at the house, they can let go of them. Monsieur Béliveau suggests that they hold another séance, this time at the Hadley house. Everyone looks to Clara for the final decision, and she decides they should do it because it might help them gain closure with the house.

After the decision, the villagers all return home. Monsieur Béliveau offers to drive Madeleine, but she declines. Walking home, he feels happier than he has since before his wife’s death. Myrna Landers goes home and finds a good book to read but is distracted by thoughts of the house. Gilles Sandon goes to bed, and his partner, Odile, stays up drinking wine and imagines receiving the Nobel Prize for her poetry. When Madeleine gets home, she tells Hazel about the séance planned for Easter Sunday night. Upon her arrival home, Clara discovers that Peter has been in her studio and asks for his opinion. He tells her the painting is incredible but asks about her color choices. After he leaves, she begins to doubt her decisions.

On Easter Sunday morning, rain holds off until after the egg hunt. While the children hunt, the adults picnic. Ruth warns Myrna not to go to the séance that night. She believes that they should leave the house alone. That night, Ruth, Gilles, Odile, Myrna, Jeanne, Hazel, Madeleine, Sophie, and Monsieur Béliveau go to Clara and Peter’s house for their annual Easter Sunday dinner. Afterward, everyone except Peter, Ruth, and Olivier walk to the Hadley house for the séance. The closer they get, the more scared and exhilarated Clara feels. She overhears Odile and Madeleine arguing but cannot decipher the subject.

The Hadley house is abandoned and decrepit. They are all reluctant to enter, but Clara leads the way. They hear a trapped bird and decide that they should let it out, following the sound upstairs. The bird is behind a closed door, and when they open it, they realize it is the former owner’s bedroom. They cannot find the bird, but after some discussion decide to go ahead with the séance. They set chairs and candles in a sacred circle, and Jeanne begins the ritual. She announces, “They’re coming,” and sharply claps her hands (47). Clara hears footsteps in the hallway, and then, inside the room, two people scream, followed by a thud.