The Plague of Doves: 17. All Souls’ Day Summary & Analysis

On Halloween, which is Mooshum’s favorite holiday, Evelina comes home from school. As the two sit eating candy, Mooshum tells the real story of how he lost his ear. One time, when Mooshum and Shamengwa were young, Mooshum disguised himself as a bear to prank his brother. In a panic, Shamengwa shot at Mooshum, taking off a part of his ear.

Mooshum is eager to scare the trick-or-treaters who visit the house, and he realizes that if he bites into a gummy candy, his dentures will get stuck in it. Thrilled at the reaction this image gets, Mooshum ups the ante, stretching Clemence’s bread dough over his head and squirting some ketchup on his mouth to look like blood. When he smiles the “ketchup smile,” the trick-or-treaters shriek. In their fear, one throws a rock at Mooshum, and it hits him on the forehead.

Evelina and her parents take Mooshum to the hospital. At first, it seems like he might not make it, but gradually he regains consciousness and strength. Mooshum insists that he is going to die, and that in his final moments, he wants to visit with Neve Harp. Clemence just rolls her eyes. Then Father Cassidy arrives in the hospital room. Not wanting to deal with the annoying priest, Mooshum hustles out of bed. When Cassidy offers to pray for Mooshum, Mooshum refuses. “I have been told in the Indian heaven we live with the buffalo,” Mooshum announces. “Anyway, you have already spoken for me in the church.”

Before Evelina goes back to school, Corwin takes her for a ride in his car. They kiss, and it is “strange, intimate, brotherly.” Corwin wants to marry Evelina (or “Evey,” as he calls her), and he imagines going to Paris with her, having sex in the cathedrals and coffee shops. But Evelina insists she is still a lesbian.

As Corwin drives Evelina home, Mooshum stumbles up to their car. He insists that they take him to see “lovey” (Neve Harp), and Evelina agrees. As soon as they get to Neve’s house, Evelina calls Clemence, having correctly predicted that Clemence is worried about her father’s whereabouts. Evelina’s father gets on the phone, anxiously asking his daughter if she can check Neve’s mail. Evelina’s father then explains that Mooshum, unable to get a stamp from Clemence to mail his letter to Neve, took an extremely valuable stamp from the collection Evelina’s dad inherited from his uncle Octave Harp.   

Evelina finds the stamp, and her father promises that if she can return the stamp to him, he will send her to Paris. Then Evelina and Corwin leave, realizing that Mooshum wants to be alone with Neve. On the way home, Evelina kisses Corwin. Before she gets out of the car, Corwin tells Evelina that “we better start saving for our tickets.”

Mooshum returns home the next day, having spent the night with Neve (“if only Father Hop Along were here,” he laments. “At last, I have something to confess”). Evelina reflects that she was named after Louis Riel’s wife, a name Mooshum had suggested.

Evelina’s father retrieves the stamp from Neve’s house. But a few months later, while Evelina’s dad is on the way to sell his stamps in Fargo, he hits a patch of black ice and gets into a car wreck. The album is damaged, and for the first time, Evelina and Clemence realize that it really was worth millions of dollars. Though Evelina and her dad do their best to repair the stamps, they crumble in the wind. Finally, with Evelina at his side, her father blows the stamp towards the wind, watching half a million dollars vanish in the sky.