Chapter 13 Cont.

Another significant event for Delphine takes place in this chapter that is somewhat life-changing and somewhat expected. She has been wondering, as I was, for quite some time about her relationship with Fidelis. They had both left it to simmer for awhile, and now the time had come to figure out whether they were ever going to marry. Whenever Delphine becomes comfortable with the way her life is going, she is very hesitant to change it, and rightly so. Although at this point she has been using the books that she found at the courthouse to read and escape from her life. "That she kept her father drugged on his bed next to the kitchen stove, that she was childless and husbandless and poor meant less once she picked up a book. Her mistakes disappeared into it" (Erdrich 301).
It is during one of these book reading sessions that Fidelis comes a-knocking and begins a rather flirtatious and off-putting pursuit of her hand in marriage. Delphine does not know what to make of this new electric attraction that has taken hold of both of them, and spends most of the time leading up to the wedding ignoring him, but as the case seems to be with them, there were many other important things to worry about: Roy's impending death, Franz's decision to enlist in the air force in preparation for the war, Cyprian's return to town just after Delphine and Fidelis are married, and Roy' admittance to knowing a bit more about the Chavers family's deaths than he had originally let on. Eventually all of her fears get the better of her and she dreams: "You are alone, the snake child mocked, more alone than you know. Your husband's from a foreign country and you haven't got a child. your father's dying and you don't know the face of your mother..." (Erdrich 329).