The Courage to Face Truth — The Blue Castle

Valancy must buy tea at Uncle Benjamin's store on the birthday she dreads, and he greets her with riddles about old maids who cannot decline matrimony while clerks once joked whether she was curable or incurable. She collects John Foster's Magic of Wings at the library, almost retreats to Redfern's Purple Pills to avoid Dr. Trent, but reads that fear is the original sin and stands up resolved to keep the appointment.

When he says time flies, she answers passionately that it crawls, then corrects his pronunciation of mirage and walks out despite the will she usually courts. On the street she stops pretending she does not want marriage, a home, and children, then nearly panics when Dr. Stalling passes, remembering the Sunday he called her a little boy and ordered her hat off in an empty church.

The magazine stories of heroines surrounded by men make her furious; Foster's line names the serpent that has coiled around her choices for decades. Montgomery ties public humiliation, private honesty, and a line of printed philosophy into the moment Valancy finally acts on her own behalf. Closing on Foster's line, Montgomery gives Valancy language for the fear that has kept her obedient and a reason to keep the doctor's appointment.