The End of the Affair

Back on the day of Sarah’s funeral, Sylvia offers to accompany Bendrix the rest of the way to Golders Green for Sarah’s funeral. Even though Bendrix notes that he has “nothing to give Sylvia,” he asks her to go to the funeral with him because he “need[s] her beauty to support [him]” there. Sylvia agrees and they walk together to the crematorium. Once they get to the building, however, everyone comes out and Bendrix, with “an odd conventional stab of grief,” realizes that they missed the service.

Suddenly, a familiar voice tells Bendrix it is a “sad pleasure” to see him again. Bendrix turns around to see Parkis, who explains that he took the afternoon off to see the funeral because Sarah was “a very fine lady.” Bendrix asks where Lance is and Parkis explains that Lance is ill with “violent stomachaches” and hadn’t been able to come. Bendrix asks Parkis to name the people who are there and Parkis points out Dunstan. At the sight of him, Bendrix feels his “old hatred” return, even though he also thinks that he would be “willing to share [Sarah] with a world of men if only she could be alive again.”

Bendrix abruptly asks Sylvia to have dinner with him. In his mind, Bendrix asks Sarah if she can see how well he’s able to “get on without [her].” When Sylvia agrees, however, Bendrix realizes he has just “committed […] to go through the gestures of love” and is overcome with remorse. In his thoughts, Bendrix begs Sarah to get him out of the commitment “for [Sylvia’s] sake.” Just then, a grey-haired woman walks up and asks if he is Mr. Bendrix. When Bendrix confirms that he is, the woman introduces herself as Mrs. Bertram, Sarah’s mother. Mrs. Bertram asks if Bendrix can lend her a little money to get lunch and go home. Bendrix recognizes an opportunity to get out of dinner with Sylvia: he offers to buy Mrs. Bertram dinner and tells Sylvia he’ll have to take her another time.

Bendrix wants to avoid memories of Sarah, so he brings Mrs. Bertram to a restaurant he never went to with Sarah. However, he is reminded of her anyway because they had never been there. Over dinner, Mrs. Bertram tells Bendrix that she didn’t like the service, that Henry is “a very mean man,” and that she’s had to borrow money from Henry in the past. Mrs. Bertram repeats that she didn’t like Sarah’s service and then reveals that Sarah was a Catholic. When Bendrix tells her that that can’t be, she reveals that she had Sarah baptized as a toddler. Mrs. Bertram makes Bendrix promise not to tell anyone because the baptism was conducted in secret—not even Sarah knew. Mrs. Bertram says she always hoped the baptism would “take” the way “vaccination” did. Bendrix assures her that it didn’t.

After dinner, Bendrix gives Mrs. Bertram some money and then heads home. On the way, Bendrix thinks to himself that God and baptism didn’t “take” in Sarah (writing from the present, Bendrix notes that he “told” this to “the God I didn’t believe in”). Bendrix notes that God has “ruined even in his non-existence the only deep happiness [Bendrix] had ever experienced.” Bendrix says to himself that it is just “a horrible coincidence” that Sarah was unknowingly baptized as a Catholic as a child and then sought Catholicism out as an adult. Once again Bendrix addresses God and says he might have won in the end, but Bendrix was the one who “was with [Sarah],” not God. Even when Bendrix wakes the next morning, his first thought is that Sarah had been his, not God’s.