ATDTDA (17): No longer pursued by Furies, 485-486

[Paul Nightingale]

Waiting for something to happen, and not realising the waiting is the
something, "Deuce was relentlessly being delivered into his own life". Time
is passing ("the seasons repeated") with little respect for agency; there
has been little in this chapter in the way of (simple) plot development,
Lake's relationship with Deuce juxtaposed to the one that emerges with Tace.
It seems "their [her/his] local reputation" is based on childlessness, so
again Lake shifts from Deuce to Tace, whose children are now named: perhaps
this indicates Lake's growing awareness of, and familiarity with, them. Tace
confesses she "wanted to rob trains when [she] was a girl" (486):
information to go alongside her tales of abuse on 480, with Phoebe Sloper
introduced as Lake's child counterpart.

Tace begins by explaining that Lake shouldn't assume there is anything wrong
in being childless; there are "other chores down here" (486). Yet her story
suggests that marrying Eugene, who rescued her from an abusive family
situation, was itself the "other [chore]", a come-down from her youthful
ambitions: "What do you think happened?"