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Chapter 17: Clara
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Five Little Indians, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Resilience and Redemption
Cruelty and Trauma
Family
Finding Home
Summary
Analysis
After giving his testimony, Howie goes home and settles in for the winter, with some help from Maggie. Months later, a letter arrives from the lawyers, telling him how much compensation he will receive. It takes him four days to even be willing to open the envelope.
For the first time in his life, Howie has a safe place to go after he gives his harrowing testimony. He sinks into his house through the winter, letting the quiet and peace there work on healing him. It’s good that he has found this peace, too, because although the monetary compensation is a bonus, it can’t truly redress the harm he suffered.
Active
Themes
In the spring, Howie thoroughly cleans and spruces up the house before Clara’s arrival. She approves of the hard work he put in finishing the corral. And she likes the two horses he keeps there—one for him and one for her. That night, after he’s fallen asleep, Clara sits at the kitchen table thinking about Maisie’s death, Lucy’s obsessiveness, and Kenny’s compulsive need to run away. When she thinks of Lily, she now sees the happy girl from her dream. She digs into her bag to retrieve the three glass bottles Mariah gave her at the end of their first winter together, so many years earlier. She carries them to the three poplar trees which stand next to the house and suspends them from the branches with their hide ties. Then she slips back into Howie’s bed and falls asleep as the bottles’ tinkling sound welcomes her home.
Active
Themes
