An upper-class, highly educated woman who possesses a rich inner intellectual life. She sits in her home and allows her mind to free-associate rather than immediately inspecting a blemish on her wall. She feels ill at ease with the domestic expectations placed upon her by a male-dominated society and deeply values her intellectual freedom.

An austere woman with a profile resembling a policeman. Though the narrator claims to know her in real life, she appears in the story as a menacing mental projection who points out dirty places in the home. She symbolizes the restrictive domestic expectations placed upon women by patriarchal society.

A man concerned with the concrete, physical world around him, including the ongoing war and the daily news. He functions as a physical presence representing the conventional society from which his wife mentally escapes. His grounded observations sharply contrast with her expansive internal life.