Flight Behavior

While Dellarobia helps Hester, Valia, and Crystal dye skeins of wool, she takes notice of the butterflies, which are now drifting down from the valley and flying through the air around the house. Hester is annoyed that news about the butterflies has flooded their property with visitors. While she is okay with people from church visiting, she is irked that “everybody and his dog wants the grand tour” (103). Recently, a reporter from Cleary, the next town over, came to interview Dellarobia about the vision. Hester disapproved, but Cub was proud and enjoyed the celebrity. In particular, Hester thinks it’s blasphemous that Dellarobia is referred to in the article as “Our Lady of the Butterflies” (106).

Dellarobia examines what drove her to nearly have an affair. It was far from the first time she had fallen out of love with her husband and in love with another man; she considers the others she has developed crushes on, including one of Cub’s old friends. Ultimately, Dellarobia believes that “there [is] something wrong with her […] [s]ome insidious weakness in her heart or resolve that would let her fly off and commit to some big nothing, all of her own making” (110). She responds tartly to Hester’s criticisms of her change in character by telling Hester to charge the people who show up to see the butterflies because that’s something Hester would do.