Chapter 41: 39. Thomas Kennedy

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary (complete and chronological)

Bella Alvarez and Raphael arrive, and the boy’s unmistakable resemblance to Gabriel instantly quiets any suspicion of fraud. Their presence lifts Gabriel from his narcotic fog, briefly reducing his morphine needs and allowing him to stay awake for joyful hours. He tenderly examines Raphael, hugging and kissing him repeatedly. Each day Bella and Gabriel have long, private conversations while someone distracts the child; at night Bella and Raphael stay at Hannah and Josiah’s house. When Gabriel’s pain returns and he sleeps more, Bella joins the caregivers. Thomas watches the women—competent, instinctive—and feels shame for how he had once handed his own dying mother to strangers. Abiah pulls him into kitchen tasks, playfully slapping his hand with a wooden spoon when he samples her cooking. Outside, Josiah confesses to Thomas that he cannot build Gabriel’s coffin, despite having prepared the wood. Abram Glick will craft it from the oak, grumbling that pine would suffice, but Josiah insists on the heavy oak to bear the ten-foot span. Josiah also reveals Hannah’s refusal to discuss funeral details or allow Amish ministers to baptize Gabriel; Gabriel himself showed no interest. Josiah has arranged for Gabriel’s burial in the English Cemetery of Peace beside Rachel and Jasper, under oaks among the Welsh graves, where plum blossoms fall like snow on the footstones.

Key Events

Bella and Raphael arrive; Raphael’s resemblance to Gabriel dispels doubts.
Gabriel experiences a brief resurgence of joy and reduced morphine use.
Bella and Gabriel talk privately for hours while others entertain Raphael.
As morphine demand rises again, Bella joins the household’s care for Gabriel.
Thomas reflects on the women’s skillful, intuitive care for the dying and his own past failure with his mother.
Abiah instructs and teases Thomas in the kitchen.
Josiah confides to Thomas that he cannot build Gabriel’s coffin; Abram Glick will make it from quartersawn oak at Josiah’s insistence.
Josiah tells Thomas that Hannah is avoiding funeral discussions and that Gabriel declined Amish baptism.
The burial plot is confirmed: the English Cemetery of Peace, beside Rachel and Jasper.

Character Development

Thomas Kennedy: Observing the women’s ease with dying and birth, Thomas feels old shame for relegating his mother’s care to strangers. His simple kitchen tasks with Abiah ground him in the domestic rhythm, hinting at his growing humility.
Gabriel: Though physically sinking, he experiences a fleeting emotional resurrection in Bella and Raphael’s presence, showing the depth of his love and his need for familial connection before death.
Josiah: His inability to build the coffin—despite preparing the wood—lays bare a father’s helpless grief. His stubborn insistence on oak over pine reflects both love and the need to contain his giant son with something worthy.
Hannah: Her refusal to engage with funeral logistics or Amish baptism suggests a form of English-style denial, a refusal to ritualize what she cannot bear to accept.
Bella: She moves seamlessly from private partner to bedside caregiver, embodying the quiet, capable force that Thomas admires in the women of the house.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

The Mystery of Women’s Care: Thomas perceives the women’s care for the dying as a knowledge he lacks. Their hands that once pushed life into the world now soothe its exit, exposing his own detachment.
English Denial vs. Amish Acceptance: Hannah’s avoidance of funeral talk contrasts with Josiah’s grim coffin preparations and the ministers’ offered baptisms. Gabriel’s lack of interest in baptism underscores a personal slipping away from any faith framework.
The Oak Coffin as Burden of Love: Josiah’s oak, “too ornate, too beautiful, for a box,” and Abram’s concession that the span requires strength, symbolize the weight of grief and the desire to honor a giant with something lasting—even if it will be buried in the ground.
Burial and Togetherness: The Cemetery of Peace, with its Welsh roots and plum blossoms that fall “like snow,” offers a final reconciliation: Gabriel will lie with Rachel and Jasper, his family made whole in death.
Shame and Self-Reflection: Thomas’s memory of ceding his mother’s care to strangers echoes the larger theme of English withdrawal from the intimacies of dying, a sharp contrast to the Amish and Bella’s immersion.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter pivots from Gabriel’s internal struggle to the communal labor of dying. It shows the household adapting to Bella and Raphael’s presence while the practicalities of death—coffin, burial, ritual—emerge. Josiah’s vulnerability and Hannah’s denial reveal how grief fractures even a close-knit family. Thomas serves as an outsider witness, reflecting on his own deficits while the chapter quietly argues that a good death requires both physical care and the courage to plan for the end. The chosen burial plot unites the dead under the plum blossoms, offering a measure of peace.

Study Questions and Answers

Why does Thomas feel shame when he observes the women caring for Gabriel?
Thomas realizes that he had “quickly and unquestioningly” left his elderly mother’s care to institutional strangers. Seeing Abiah, Hannah, and Bella move with instinctual competence around the dying man forces him to confront his own absence and cultural distance from deathbed intimacy.
What is the significance of Josiah’s insistence on quartersawn oak for Gabriel’s coffin?
Josiah cannot will himself to build the coffin, but he channels his grief into the material choice. Oak is strong and beautiful, fitting for a giant son, yet Abram objects that pine is the plain Amish custom. The thick, planed oak becomes a metaphor for a father’s desperate attempt to contain and dignify a loss too immense for ordinary rituals.
How does Hannah’s refusal to discuss the funeral reflect her character’s arc?
Hannah, who has become “so English in her habits,” denies death’s reality by avoiding the funeral talk. Unlike Josiah’s practical woodworking and the ministers’ doctrinal certainty, her silence reveals a mother who cannot let go enough to plan the rituals. It underscores the novel’s tension between Amish acceptance of death and English secular avoidance.

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