Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary

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Cecilia Tallis has come home from school for the summer, and the weeks since finals ended have been filled with inactivity. Generally she is “bored and comfortable,” but today she is desperate for a cigarette and for something to happen. As she passes through the grounds, she sees Robbie Turner assiduously working on the landscaping. Robbie is a childhood friend, someone she has known since she was seven and a fellow university student, but she avoids passing too near to him. Though she could participate in Briony’s play, she does not, knowing it will end tragically because no one can live up to her sister's great expectations. She also rejects visiting her mother, as her mother is not interested in speaking with her.

Cecilia contemplates visiting her brother Leon in London or joining one of her university friends and working for the summer, but none of it moves her from her lassitude. Besides, she must clear the awkwardness between she and Robbie before she can do anything else.

She decides to arrange some wildflowers in a family heirloom vase before her brother’s arrival later in the day. The vase is likely the most valuable item in the Tallis home, but her father wants it to be used rather than kept behind glass somewhere. After arranging the wildflowers in artful disarray, Cecilia walks to the outside fountain to fill the vase with water. There, she spots Robbie enjoying a cigarette, and asks him to roll her one as she is feeling too lazy to walk up two flights of stairs to get her own. The two smoke and engage in inane and awkward small talk punctuated by long bouts of silence. There is “something between them,” and Cecilia feels it acutely. They grew apart while at Cambridge because it was “too difficult to do anything else.”

Robbie studied literature and is now planning to attend medical school. He is the son of the family’s cleaning lady, and Cecilia’s father has always assumed the expenses of the boy’s education. As they talk about medical school, Robbie becomes defensive and tells Cecilia he has made arrangements to pay her father back. She does not intend to antagonize him with her casual comments about his going to be a doctor, but he becomes angry and insulted. He seems to be in the habit of “wrong-footing” her whenever he gets the chance—that is, making a show of being nothing but her servant’s son. It appears he is either mocking her or punishing her, and though she is not sure which, she knows she does not like his behavior.

Their conversation is a series of traps and barbs, both of them equally uneasy. Robbie watches Cecilia perch the vase on the fountain, wishing he could take back his remarks. Cecilia blames him for changing, since he still has the comfort and freedom he has always had while she, of course, has not changed at all. She is sure Robbie is the one creating a distance between them and decides to make him suffer for it. Because she knows he will refuse—and also because she wants him to be aware of her displeasure—she does not invite him to join the family for supper that evening.

As Cecilia leans over and prepares to fill the heavy, flower-filled vase, Robbie insists (rather than offers) on helping. In a small power struggle, the lip of the vase, the family’s most prized heirloom, breaks, and two broken pieces settle at the bottom of the fountain. She glares at Robbie, while he covers his mouth with his hand, implying full responsibility for the damage. A...

(This entire section contains 707 words.)

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moment later, he takes his shirt off, prepared to retrieve the broken bits from the water. Cecilia glares at him and rather than accepting his help, furiously strips down to her underwear, daring him with her eyes to challenge her. Robbie is dumbstruck and watches as she braves the frigid water and gathers the pieces before partially dressing and walking away in a soggy but dignified manner. In those movements, and her silent but obvious refusal to let him help her right his wrong, Robbie has been both banished and punished.

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