The Dream House Summary

Patricia Wiley, an elderly white South African woman, has sold the farm where she lives with her husband Richard (who suffers from dementia) to developers. The day before they’re supposed to move, Patricia asks her Black servant Beauty to inform her driver, Bheki, that Patricia wants to visit John Ford. Bheki drives Patricia to John’s in her car, an ancient Mercedes. While chatting with John, a retired headmaster, Patricia recalls how she first met and began an affair him when she brought a Black boy from the farm, Looksmart, for a school interview. John gives Patricia a letter and asks her not to read it until she leaves town. Back home, Patricia sees Richard headed outside with a spade and worries he’ll dig up Rachel’s grave.

Looksmart, now an adult, works for the developers who have bought the Wileys’ farm. Driving to visit the farm, he wonders whether he’s going there to see the Wileys or Grace and whether he has enough hatred left for the encounter he’s planning with Patricia.

In the evening, Patricia hears the house’s back door open. Looksmart enters and is surprised to see that the Wileys still have the dog. Patricia, not recognizing him, asks which dog. When he says Chloe, Patricia tells him Chloe’s dead—their current dog is no relation. Looksmart replies “it’s still the same dog” and tells Patricia who he is. She cries out in happiness. Later, Beauty enters. After Looksmart begins talking to her, she admits she recognizes him—but she thinks that he, like the memory of her sister Grace, sickens her. She thinks if either he or Patricia would really look at her, they might see secret knowledge in her eyes—but they don’t look. Beauty leaves to find Richard.

Looksmart says he knows the Wileys are moving and asks whether Richard is sad. Patricia tells Looksmart that Richard is losing his mind. Looksmart points out that though Patricia makes the Wileys’ situation sound gloomy, they must have made money from the farm. Patricia says they’re in debt—Richard was a bad farmer—and asks why Looksmart cares anymore. Looksmart asks whether Patricia thinks the past matters and. Then, noting how angry he is that Beauty still works for the Wileys after what happened, he asks whether Patricia remembers Grace. Patricia says Grace was a girl who died on the farm. Looksmart says Grace was murdered. The day she died, she was planning to ask the Wileys for time off work so she could get married. That afternoon, on the veranda, Looksmart and Patricia heard a scream and saw Richard’s dog Chloe chasing Grace.

When Patricia asks Looksmart whether he was the person Grace planned to marry, he runs outside and vomits. Bheki approaches, asking whether Looksmart is okay. Looksmart—who feels secret contempt for Bheki’s position as Patricia’s servant—chats with him. When Bheki explains he’s moving with the Wileys because he can’t find help for his disabled son near the farm, Looksmart reveals he works for the developers who bought the farm and offers to help Bheki’s son if Bheki takes a job with his company.

Looksmart sees Patricia has come out onto the veranda in a wheelchair. After wheeling her back inside, he says he can’t forgive her because she didn’t want Grace’s blood getting on her Mercedes, which delayed getting Grace to the hospital. He reveals that as Grace was dying, she told him Richard set the dog on her after raping her in the dairy. Beauty witnessed it. Patricia denies she was worried about her car. When Looksmart insists Patricia’s behavior toward Grace proves she never valued Looksmart, Patricia admits she doesn’t remember what she was thinking the day Grace died.

When Beauty reenters the house, Patricia demands the whole truth about Grace’s death. Haltingly, Beauty explains that she saw Richard and Grace on the dairy floor, Grace running away, and Richard unchaining the dog. Looksmart asks leading questions and adds his own embellishments to Beauty’s story. Once she finishes, Patricia promises her she won’t have to talk about Grace’s death again.

In the kitchen of the Wileys’ house, Beauty opens the door to find Richard standing there. She leads him away and hides him.

In the sitting room, Patricia asks Looksmart what he wants now. He says he wants her to remember Grace’s death and not just retire happily. Patricia says she may understand Looksmart’s grief. She married Richard because he’d impregnated her; she wasn’t happy during her marriage until she started seeing to Looksmart’s education and he began spending time around the farm. When Looksmart demands to know what happened to Patricia’s son, Patricia—taken aback—says she had a daughter, Rachel, who was born dead. Patricia never had living children, yet Looksmart was like her son. She invites him to come visit her during her seaside retirement. Somewhat sadly, he says their odd, quasi-parent-child relationship shouldn’t exist in the new South Africa.

Richard, remembering his goal of digging up Rachel, flees Beauty. He tries to unearth Rachel but can’t find her. Later, he walks into the Wileys’ house, finds Patricia and Looksmart, and tells a disturbing joke about his uncle raping his daughter. When Looksmart says he’s glad never to meet this uncle, Richard says, once upon a time, he could have had Looksmart whipped. Rather than retaliate, Looksmart says goodbye to Patricia. She asks whether he’ll visit her in retirement; he lies and says he will. Then he leaves. Patricia, furious, demands Richard say Rachel’s and Grace’s names and confess what he did to Grace. Richard says “she” lied and “it” didn’t have a name. When Patricia tries to determine what he means, he calls her a slur. She yells at him to go.

The next morning, Patricia asks Beauty and Bheki to dig up Rachel’s coffin and pack it so she can reinter it at a church. Bheki, disgusted at the task, is glad he’s decided to take Looksmart up on his offer to get Bheki a new job. The same morning, Patricia receives a phone call asking her to go to John’s—he killed himself and mentioned her in his note. At John’s, Patricia talks to a policewoman, views the body, and leaves.

In his letter to Patricia, John wrote he regrets many things in his life, but not their affair, which seemed to him a truthful experience. Pondering the letter at home while Bheki loads the car, Patricia gets angry: her affair with John was not truthful, and he chose to be insincere in his final letter. When Beauty comes out onto the veranda, Patricia begs her to tell the whole truth. Beauty admits Grace never loved Looksmart and repeatedly had sex with Richard for money; Richard murdered her because he’d impregnated her and she wouldn’t abort. Patricia asks why she should believe Beauty’s version of events and not Looksmart’s. Beauty replies that Patricia will have to decide for herself.

As Bheki drives Patricia, Richard, and Beauty away from the farm, they pass Looksmart’s car in the driveway. The cars stop and roll down their windows. Patricia gives the house keys to Bheki, who tosses them to Looksmart; then the cars drive their separate ways.