The Shoe-Horn Sonata: Act Two, Scene Twelve Summary & Analysis

Back in Sheila’s hotel room, the two friends talk about spending a weekend together, but decide they’d “bicker” too much. They then talk about whether or not they hate Japanese people. Bridie, for her part, admits that she becomes frightened around Japanese people, going on to tell a story about finding herself surrounded by a group of Japanese tourists while shopping. Forgetting that she was holding a package of cookies, she ran out of the store and was promptly arrested for shoplifting. Because she didn’t want “the whole nursing corps” to know this story, she decided not to explain herself, so she went to court and was fined for the theft. Seeing how upset her friend is, Sheila puts her arm around Bridie and tells her that this story isn’t so bad, but Bridie insists that to her it’s “the end of the world for,” since she loses sleep because of the “shame.”

Despite Sheila’s insistence that Bridie’s arrest is nothing to be ashamed of, Bridie says that she promised herself she’d “never tell anyone” about the incident. “I’m not just anyone, Bridie,” Sheila says. “Keeping a secret wears you down. Believe me—I know.” She then reveals her desire to tell the story of her rape on television, considering talking about it in the final interview. Hearing this, Bridie tells Sheila not to talk about the matter “beyond this room,” but Sheila ignores this, talking about the “thousands of survivors” there must be in the world, people who are—like her—still “strapped in the war” and “too ashamed to tell anyone.” “The war hasn’t ended,” Sheila tells Bridie. “Not for me. For me it goes on. And now I want peace.”

Distraught that Sheila might talk about her trauma on television, Bridie warns, “You know what they’ll call you. They’ll call you a whore.” Nevertheless, Sheila remains resolute, and so Bridie stands to leave, saying that if she’d known her friend would act like this, she would have “let [her] drown in the South China Sea.”