Mexican Gothic: Chapter 15 Summary & Analysis

Noemí knocks repeatedly at Marta’s door, but the woman never answers. She rejoins Francis and the two walk back toward the town square. They meet Dr. Camarillo at the clinic, who introduces himself to Francis, saying that he used to play cards with Francis’s father. Dr. Camarillo invites them in, and Noemí asks to speak with him privately. Francis obliges, waiting patiently in the sitting area.

Noemí tells Dr. Camarillo about Catalina’s seizure and asks him if he has heard of Marta’s medicine ever causing someone to have a seizure. First, he explains that Marta often goes to Pachuca to see her daughter, and second, he answers that no, he’s never heard of Marta’s tonics causing such a reaction. He asks if Dr. Cummins examined Catalina, and Noemí tells him that he has—he said that an opium tincture caused the seizure, and that Marta’s a quack. Dr. Camarillo shakes his head. Marta is no quack, there are many people who go to her for recipes. Furthermore, he says that it’s impossible for Marta to have procured an opium tincture because the herbs required don’t grow here. 

Noemí can’t make heads or tails of this information. If it were true, that means the tincture isn’t what caused Catalina to be sick, and Dr. Cummins lied about it. Dr. Camarillo apologizes for not being more helpful but offers to change the bandage on Noemí’s wrist. When he removes the bandage, however, he sees that Noemí’s skin has completely healed. The doctor is quite surprised—it should have taken a week for that rash to heal. Noemí thinks about mentioning her second episode of sleepwalking, but ultimately decides against it.

An hour after returning from town, Noemí is summoned to Virgil’s bedroom. The first thing she notices upon entering is the large, imposing painting of Howard hanging in the room. Virgil is getting dressed behind a three-fold when Noemí walks in. He tells her that the rains will soon become torrential, making the roads extremely dangerous. She should check with him before she decides to go to town. He tells her to fetch him the robe hanging on his chair, and as Noemí hands it to Virgil, she sees that he has his shirt off. She blushes in shame, thinking that this is much too casual and immodest.

After putting the robe on, Virgil gestures toward a chair and tells Noemí to sit. She ignores the gesture and tells Virgil that she knows this is not the first time that Catalina drank the tincture and had a bad reaction. He tells her that Dr. Cummins already told her that Catalina was depressed, and Noemí didn’t believe him. So why would Virgil bother telling her that her cousin is suicidal? This upsets Noemí, and she tells him that if Catalina is suicidal, then it’s Virgil’s fault.

Noemí regrets her words and tries to apologize, but Virgil acquiesces: Noemí’s right, it is his fault. Catalina fell in love with him for the wrong reasons. He thinks that Catalina saw in him a tragic, romantic figure—a boy who lost his mother and whose fortune was evaporating. No doubt she pictured High Place as a rustic mansion that could be changed, rescued from its decay. But of course, Virgil explains, Howard would never allow anything to be changed. They all exist at his pleasure.

Noemí asks Virgil if he would change anything, if he could. Virgil answers that he would make changes of a certain type, but not a change so grand that he’d become something that he’s not. You can’t change the essence of a thing, he says, and that was the problem with Catalina. She wanted him to be something that he wasn’t—what she saw in him was never there, and this made her unhappy immediately after marriage. 

Noemí wonders why Catalina would not have returned home, but she quickly realizes the answer: her family. Everyone would have been appalled, and the newspapers would have been filled with slander, just as her father now fears. She asks Virgil why he married Catalina, and he explains that it was his father’s wish to see him married. Howard wanted to know that the family line would not die out. Virgil then reveals that he was married once before, to Dr. Cummins’s daughter. The marriage was arranged by Howard and was a disaster. They disliked each other, and after four miscarriages, she divorced him.

After the divorce Virgil took a few trips to Guadalajara and then to Mexico City. He met Catalina and liked her softness, her romantic notions. She wanted a fairy tale and he wanted to give her that. Then it all went wrong. Noemí remembers that Catalina loved to read fairy tales; Snow White with the magical kiss and the beauty who transforms the beast. Here was her fairy tale. It amounted to a stilted marriage coupled with sickness and mental tribulations.

Noemí suggests that Virgil could take Catalina somewhere else and make his own life, if it’s the house that Catalina so dislikes. Virgil smirks. He can’t leave High Place, and he’s not allowed to have his own life. His father needs him here. He pauses before changing the topic. He apologizes to Noemí for the way he treated her last time they met. They don’t need to be enemies. He promises that he’ll ask Dr. Cummins to see if there are any psychiatrists in Pachuca. They shake hands amicably, then Noemí excuses herself and leaves.

Noemí sees Francis avoid her and wonders if Florence scolded him for driving her to town. She seeks out Florence and finds her in the kitchen. Noemí tells her that it was her fault Francis drove her, and that she shouldn’t be angry with him. Florence explains that it’s important to maintain order in one’s house, and in one’s life. It helps to determine each person’s place in the world. Frances has duties at High Place, and Noemí makes him forget them. He acts silly with Noemí; he completely forgets the person he’s supposed to be. She dismisses Noemí and continues her work.