Editor's Choice
In which chapter of Beka Lamb does Toycie die, and how?
Quick answer:
Toycie dies in Chapter 24 when she is struck by a mango tree uprooted by a hurricane, which breaks her skull. This tragic news is conveyed in a letter from Miss Eila to Beka's father, Daddy Bill. During the storm, Beka and her family take refuge in their house, and after the storm, they begin clearing debris. Beka's grief is profound when she learns of Toycie's death, but she is eventually brought back to her senses by Miss Boysie's surprising scolding.
Mindlessly wandering through the mangoes during the hurricane, Toycie is struck on the head by a mango tree that is uprooted by the storm and falls directly on Toycie, breaking her skull. The letter from Miss Eila telling of her death, addressed to Daddy Bill, Beka's father, arrives and is brought home to Beka in Chapter 24.
Beka, Granny Ivy, her mother and father, Lilla and Bill, along with twenty-five other people weather the storm in their house, with its safe (they hope) concrete foundation. Lilla awakens Beka, who fell asleep with her head in her mother's lap, to tell her the storm is over. Light-headed from the lamps' kerosene oil smell, she's stunned to see that so many people were safe from the storm and are now milling about in their home.
The work of clearing the debris of fallen trees and up-torn belongings begins. The work of trying...
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to obtain clean drinking water and washing water from the hurricane muck carries on alongside the chores of cleaning the house up again, and the report comes in that Toycie's Sibun area was hit hard by the hurricane.
A muddy stench lingered in the air, and no matter how the Lambs cleaned and scrubbed and polished, it would not go away. All drinking water had to be boiled, and to get enough clean water to wash clothes was a problem. ... [The] storm was known to have devastated the Sibun area, and there was a sense of waiting in the house.
Days into the clean-up, the schools are still closed, and Daddy Bill comes home one day unexpectedly, hissing through his teeth the way he does when he has bad news to bear. The letter he has tells them all that Toycie is dead. Beka, her heart already "thudding in her chest" with a kind of foreknowledge, gives in to the "tidal wave" that crashed in "her brain" and screams and screams inconsolably. Miss Eila's short letter tells how a mango tree in the hurricane ended Toycie's life.
'Dear Mr Bill, just these few lines to let you know that Toycie died the night of the heavy storm. She was buried this day instant. My Toy wandered away in the confusion of preparation and mango tree fall to break her skull. ... Ever your Miss Eila.'
Daddy Bill holds Beka tight to try to stay her hysteria. Granny comforts her and shocks her in turns to bring her back to her senses. But nothing changes Beka's screaming until Miss Boysie appears at the back door roundly scolding Beka for the mess that the bougainvillea stump has gotten into. This surprise, completely irrelevant scolding recalls Beka to herself.