59 pages 1 hour read

Dennis Lehane

Mystic River

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2001

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Part 4, Chapters 22-24 Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 4: “Gentrification”

Chapter 22 Summary: “The Hunting Fish”

Sean learns from Whitey that Dave’s car had been stolen, abandoned along a parkway, and then towed. Because the parkway is state jurisdiction, they search it and find blood in the front seat and the trunk. Whitey is eager to arrest Dave, so they drive straight to him. Before they enter, Whitey tells Sean that the gun that killed Katie was used for a robbery in 1982. Sean is perplexed by the connection, but Whitey is sure that Dave must have gotten his hands on it somehow.

Jimmy dreams of Mystic River. There, Katie kneels beside the river with Just Ray. Dave is there, too, with “his bruised hand ballooned to the size of a boxing glove” (297). Beside him are Celeste and Annabeth—Celeste with a zipper pulled closed where her mouth should be, and Annabeth smokes two cigarettes at once. Katie tells Jimmy that she dropped her dress in the river, as a fish jumps out of Just Ray’s mouth and into the river. Then, Katie and Just Ray push Jimmy into the river. He begins to drown, the fish jumping into his mouth as he’s about to scream.

Sean and Whitey interrogate Dave; he doesn’t ask for a lawyer right away and he doesn’t look scared or nervous, which is beginning to bother Whitey.