Beloved Part 3, Chapter 26 - 28
House 124 grows silent, as Sethe and Beloved become intertwined in their obsession. Sethe is now convinced that Beloved is her daughter since she finds a scar on her chin, one that mirrors the wound that she had inflicted on her child. Sethe and Beloved grow so enmeshed that Sethe stops leaving the home altogether. Their bond alienates Denver, who begins to understand that she needs to go out and seek help for her mother, whose physical condition has begun to deteriorate. Denver finds it very difficult to leave the house, but she manages it. Denver goes to a neighbor called Lady Jones in search of some work so that she can take food for her mother. The woman recognizes her and tells her that the church committee would be more than willing to help Denver. Denver is reluctant to take help from strangers but she finds a package of food outside her house the following day. The community members continue to send packages of food to 124, and Denver often goes out to thank the people that do.
Beloved dominates Sethe, and throws angry fits when Sethe tries to be assertive. Eventually, Sethe regresses to a child-like state, while her body grows too weak to move.
Denver visits the Bodwins to look for some work, and there she tells their maid, Janey, about the terrible conditions at home. Denver leaves the Bodwins with the hope of securing work soon and notices a slave figurine in their home. Janey tells Ella about Beloved and the terrible conditions that Denver had described. Ella organizes all the women to go out to 124 and exorcise it. Denver sees a large group of women approaching the house as she is waiting for Mr. Bodwin to pick her up and put her to work. The women begin to sing as they approach the house, and this brings the weak Sethe out of the house. Sethe is reminded of Baby Suggs and the sermons that she used to deliver in the clearing. Beloved accompanies Sethe to the porch of the house, and the women notice that Beloved has now taken the shape of a pregnant woman.
Sethe sees Mr. Bodwin and mistakes him for Schoolteacher. She charges at him to attack him but is restrained by the group of women. Denver follows her mother’s example and runs into the crowd of women leaving Beloved alone. Beloved thinks that Sethe and Denver have abandoned her.
Stamp Paid talks to Paul D and tells him about the day the women went to 124 to exorcise Beloved. Stamp Paid believes that 124 is no longer haunted, and is simply another weathered house. Paul D is worried that Sethe has lost her mind, and this fear is confirmed when they run into Denver. Paul D asks her about Sethe, and Denver tells him that she has lost her mother. Denver is now working for the Bodwins, and Miss Bodwin has taken charge of her education with the hope of sending her to college soon. He asks her if Beloved had been her sister, and Denver replies in the affirmative. Although she is certain that Beloved had been something else in addition to being her sister. They discuss an account of a boy who had seen a naked woman running through the forest, he had claimed that she had fish instead of hair. Once Denver leaves, Paul D begins to reminisce about the several escapes he had attempted during his time as a slave. At the end of the civil war, he had mistakenly believed that his life would get easier. He remembers the seven years before coming to 124, he had wandered north from Alabama and seen black people surviving in the most obscene conditions.
Paul D decides to go to 124, and he immediately realizes that Beloved is gone when he enters the house. He finds Sethe humming to herself, and she is visibly unhinged. He promises to take care of her from then on, while Sethe only says that her daughter has left her. Paul D tells Sethe that they have more yesterdays than anyone else, but what they need to focus on is tomorrow.
The novel ends with the author describing the loneliness that comes over 124 after Beloved's departure. The townspeople soon begin to forget about Beloved, and it becomes so that even those that had spoken to her cannot recall her. The author concludes that Beloved’s story was not one to be passed on.
Analysis
The theme of community returns in this final section of the novel, as the women of the surrounding region gather to exorcise the ghost of Beloved. The community members also aid Denver when she turns to them for help. We begin to understand that Sethe had withdrawn herself from the community, but her neighbors were ready to lend a helping hand at the first sign of a request.
In part three of the novel, the readers see how Beloved begins to morph into something beyond the ghost of Sethe’s murdered daughter. There are several hints, littered throughout the plot, that seem to indicate something beyond a simple ghost. The foremost among these hints is Beloved’s description of the circumstances of her origin. Beloved’s stories are reminiscent of the account of the middle passage, the horrific journey that slaves had to undergo when they were being taken from Africa to America. Furthermore, Stamp Paid overhears noises from 124 that he takes to resemble the suffering of slaves. Lastly, Beloved appears to be pregnant in the exorcism sequence, which happens to be conducted by all the women of the community. These details seem to indicate that Beloved represented the angst that slavery imposed on mothers. Beloved is more than just the ghost of a dead baby, she is the embodiment of all the pain and suffering that slaves experienced in pursuit of motherhood.
