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Chapter 20
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Mary Barton, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Employers vs. Workers
Sexuality and Danger
Christianity
Poverty and Morality
Empathy vs. Ignorance
Summary
Analysis
The morning after the murder, Esther—having heard about Harry’s death—is curious enough to investigate the crime scene, where she finds a paper ball: wadding for the shot that killed Harry. Smoothing the paper, she sees Mary’s name and address on it; the handwriting looks like Jem’s, who used to write letters for Esther because she was ashamed of her ugly script. Esther assumes that Jem killed Harry—and that it’s her fault: because she is sinful, even her attempts to do good end in evil. Esther spies on Jem’s workplace and sees him arrested. Remembering how he wanted to help her, Esther wholly sympathizes with him.
At first, the wadding with Mary’s name on it in Jem’s handwriting seems to confirm the idea that Jem killed Harry over Mary, thus suggesting that Mary’s divided loyalties between her working-class origins and her social-climbing aspiration to marry Harry indirectly caused the murder. Meanwhile, Esther blames herself for the murder because she asked Jem to protect Mary; the narrator makes clear that she blames herself solely because, as a sex worker, she sees herself as irredeemably tainted despite her good intentions. Thus Esther, like Mary, blames herself for men’s violent actions due to her internalized misogyny.
Themes
Esther, wondering how Mary has taken the news, lurks in Mary’s neighborhood eavesdropping but only learns that John has left town. Eventually, she comes up with a plan. She pawns her “finery,” borrows some plain, respectable clothes, and goes to visit Mary—which is when Mary, disoriented, mistakes her aunt for her mother. Esther, pretending to be married to a working man, claims coldly that she hasn’t visited for a long time because she lives a busy life far away. Mary, weakly, asks whether she is “Aunt Hetty.” Esther agrees and says that she’s come because she heard a friend of Mary’s was in trouble.
Esther’s continued attempts to help her niece despite her own self-hatred and despair strengthen even further the novel’s portrayal of working-class characters like Esther as community-oriented, helpful, and moral in a pragmatic way. (“Hetty” is an old-fashioned nickname for Esther.)
Themes
Mary doesn’t want to talk about the trouble with the oddly cold Esther. Instead, she apologizes that she has no food to offer. Esther, who’s been eating barely enough to live, claims that her husband is well-employed and that she has more than enough food—a lie that further turns Mary against her, as Mary remembers Esther as “loving and unselfish” and can’t understand why she would fail to visit and bring aid to the half-starving Bartons. Esther longs to tell Mary the truth but doesn’t want to face her disgust.
Esther assumes that the truth—that she is an impoverished, starving sex worker—would revolt Mary, so she lies and claims to be a well-off wife. Yet the lie backfires: without an understanding of Esther’s real situation, Mary can’t understand why a “loving and unselfish” person would fail to visit relatives or to help them during lean times. Thus, it’s not Esther’s sex work but her dishonesty that alienates Mary from her.
Themes
Esther, swallowing sobs, says she heard about Harry’s murder, went to the crime scene, and found wadding with Mary’s name on it. Mary abruptly changes her attitude toward Esther, feeling it’s kind of Esther to save Mary from the police summons and questioning that the wadding would have occasioned. Esther identifies the handwriting on the wadding as Jem’s and gives the paper to Mary. Mary takes it, examines it, and looks utterly horrified. She makes Esther promise never to tell anyone about it. Esther promises.
Neither Esther nor Mary seems to have any qualms about hiding material evidence in a murder investigation from police, which hints that while employers like Mr. Carson have the police at their beck and call, the working class sees the criminal legal system as a nuisance or even an adversary from which they must protect other working-class people. Meanwhile, Mary’s horror when she sees the wadding seems to imply that she recognizes it and wants to hide it out of loyalty to the murderer.
Themes
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Esther suddenly notices a likeness between her dead daughter and Mary. When she announces that Mary looks like her daughter, Mary has no idea of the heartbreak Esther is alluding to: she is too absorbed in thoughts about the wadding to even ask about Esther’s children. Esther, feeling unwelcome, says she has to go and makes Mary promise to destroy the wadding. Mary promises. Then she asks for Esther’s married name and address. Esther claims her name is now “Fergusson” and gives Mary an address. Mary tries to kiss her in parting, but Esther wards her off, saying Mary must never kiss her, and flees.
Presumably if Mary knew that Esther’s daughter had died young, she would express interest and sympathy when Esther mentions her child. Yet without the relevant facts about Esther’s life, Mary remains unempathetically focused on her own immediate problems. Thus, the novel suggests that to be appropriately empathetic toward another person, one needs the relevant facts about that person’s life.
Themes
