Playing Beatie Bow: Chapter 3 Summary & Analysis

Though the little furry girl tries to lose Abigail as she winds through the streets and alleyways, Abigail pursues her—sometimes, when the little girl turns around to see if Abigail is still on her tail, her face is “distorted with panic.” The houses on the streets are closely cramped together, and as the night sky darkens above, Abigail’s path is lit only by dim lights from within the residences.

Abigail finally catches up with the furry girl, but stops when she encounters a beggar with a wooden stump for a leg and becomes frightened. She presses on, and soon she is on Argyle Street—though it is a street she has walked a thousand times, she does not recognize it. Abigail runs through the slums, and as she does, people stare at her.

Abigail pursues the furry girl to the doorway of a corner shop, and a familiar smell of burnt sugar stops her in her tracks. She hears chaotic noises coming from within, and then a tall figure—a man—bounds out of the doorway, screaming nonsense about “heathen devils” and knocking Abigail over as he runs into the street. Abigail hits her head hard on the edge of the doorstep. Other people burst from the doorway to come to her aid, but Abigail promptly faints.

Abigail awakens, but keeps her eyes shut, sensing that she is somewhere strange and foreign. She can smell a fire going in the room, and is aware that someone is holding her hand. She hears a woman’s voice, speaking in the same Scottish accent as the little furry girl, urge another person named Dovey to change Abigail’s bandage so that they can see how bad her head is.

As hands move over her head, Abigail stays still and keeps her eyes shut. She feels confused and sick, and has a terrible pain in her ankle. She does not believe she is dreaming, but wonders briefly if she has gone out of her mind. Abigail listens as the women agree that her wound is clean, and discuss checking up on someone called Uncle Samuel, to see if he is “himself again.” The two women muse aloud that Abigail must be a lady, due to her soft hands and clean nails. Abigail’s ankle throbs, and she lets out a series of yelps and cries. At last, she opens her eyes and looks around the room. Above her is “one of the sweetest faces she ha[s] ever seen”—that of a young girl with a soft complexion.

The sweet-faced girl offers Abigail a sip of posset—a drink made of hot milk curdled with alcohol—promising that it will be good for her pain. Abigail drinks from the goblet of posset and is almost instantly lulled back into a drowsy, warm slumber. When she awakes again, she believes she is alone—her clothes have been replaced with a long, thick, uncomfortable nightdress. There is a warm compress against her ankle, and the furry girl is sitting on a stool beside her, so close that Abigail can see her freckles and her “excited” eyes. She sees that the little girl has a fierce, resolute face, and hands covered in scars and burns. Abigail struggles to maintain a calm exterior, and not let on that she is as confused, disoriented, and frightened as she really is.

Abigail asks if a man with a sword really knocked her over in the street, and the little girl replies sadly that the man was her own father, who has “spells” of madness. Abigail asks the little girl her name, and she replies that it is Beatie Bow. Abigail tells the girl to stop joking—Beatie Bow is the name of a children’s game—but Beatie insists that this is her name: Beatrice May Bow. She tells Abigail that she is eleven years old, but small for her age due to a childhood fever. Beatie seizes Abigail’s arm and begs her not to tell Granny where she herself comes from—Beatie does not want Granny to assume that she has the “Gift.” She does not want it, she says, and is “afeared” of what it does.

Abigail asks where they are, and Beatie tells her that she is in the best room of her father’s house, behind the confectionary shop. Abigail asks what country they are in, and Beatie, flabbergasted, replies that they are in the colony of New South Wales. Abigail sobs, unable to understand anything that is happening to her, and wishing for her mother and father.

Beatie tells Abigail that she knows she shouldn’t have gone to watch the children’s game, but couldn’t help herself when she heard the children chanting her name—Beatie insists that she “didna know it could be done.” Abigail believes Beatie is talking in riddles. Beatie again urges Abigail to promise her that she won’t tell Granny how she found herself in this world, and threatens to punch Abigail “yeller and green” if she does not comply.

An old woman and a young one enter the room—the younger girl limps, while the old woman stands tall and proud, “like a fairy godmother.” The old woman embraces Abigail and rocks her gently, and Abigail senses a profound goodness emanating from her. Abigail relaxes into Granny’s embrace, and Granny tells Beatie to go fetch Judah. A few minutes later, a tall young man enters the room and reports that his father is full of sorrow and fear over what he has done to Abigail. Judah urges Dovey to go look after him, then comes and sits next to Abigail. Granny tells Judah that she is afraid that his father will be in trouble if Abigail is truly injured, for Abigail is a lady. Abigail insists that she is not a lady, and sinks into her pillows, distraught.

Judah offers Abigail a candy, and she sits up and accepts it. She looks around the room, and recognizes many items from her mother’s vintage shop. She sees a picture of Queen Victoria on the wall, and asks why there is a portrait of her and not Queen Elizabeth hanging; when Granny remarks that Abigail is confused, and that Queen Bess died “hundreds of years ago,” Abigail realizes that she is in Queen Victoria’s time—far in the past. She urges herself to stay calm, and not give herself away.

Abigail asks to be helped over to the window, so that she can see where she is. Judah lifts her from her bed and brings her over to the shuttered window, and then instructs Beatie to open the shutters wide. As Abigail looks down at the street below, she marvels at how none of the buildings of modern-day Sydney have yet been constructed. Once again miserable and frightened, Abigail leans her face into Judah’s chest, and asks what year it is. Judah replies that it’s nearly the end of 1873, and then puts her back in the bed.

Dovey tucks Abigail back in, lamenting the fact that the poor girl seems to have lost her memory. Granny and Dovey speculate about where Abigail could have come from. Dovey believes Abigail to be an immigrant from a fine family, but Granny mutters something about Abigail being a “stranger.” As the two women continue their conversation at the door to the room, Beatie creeps closer to Abigail, staring at her with big eyes. Abigail whispers accusatorily to Beatie, telling her that she is the reason Abigail is here, but Beatie insists that it was Abigail who chose to follow her.

Judah and Granny go downstairs, and Dovey comes back over to Abigail to place a hand on her forehead. She assures her that she has no fever, and her ankle will be better in the morning. She leaves to heat up some broth for Abigail, charging Beatie to stay and keep her company. Alone in the room with Beatie, Abigail whines that she wants to return to her own “place,” but Beatie insists that she doesn’t know where that is—she has no idea what happened, and never “went there” before she had the fever. One minute, Beatie says, she was in the lane, and the next she was able to see magnificent “towers and castles,” and heard children calling her name.

As Abigail listens to Beatie speak, she realizes that Natalie’s belief that the little furry girl was unhappy was true—Abigail wonders if the reason Beatie’s hair is cropped so short is due to her fever. Before she can ask Beatie about her life, though, Beatie asks if Abigail comes from “Elfland.” Abigail insists there is no Elfland, but Beatie says she believes Elfland is where Granny’s own great-great-grandmother picked up the “Gift.” Abigail replies that Beatie and her family are all crazy.

Beatie asks Abigail how the playing children all knew her name, but Abigail insists she doesn’t know. Beatie shouts that she will find a way to make Abigail tell her, and will find a way to hear more about the “castles and palaces” and the “queer” things she saw in Abigail’s world. Abigail cruelly taunts Beatie, telling her that perhaps she has the Gift after all. Beatie goes pale. Abigail tells Beatie that if Beatie doesn’t take her back to where the two of them first met, she will tell Beatie’s Granny where she comes from, and who brought her here. Abigail then turns away from Beatie, wondering dully what the Gift even is before drifting off to sleep.