The House of the Spirits: Chapter 11 Summary & Analysis

At age 18, Alba becomes a woman. She goes to her room, mixes some red paint with some white paint, and paints a big pint heart on her wall. Alba is in love with Miguel, a leftist leader in his last year of law school with a serious passion for justice. Alba is in her first year at university, studying philosophy and music to annoy Esteban. Her grandfather says that marriage is usually a good thing for women, but for girls like Alba, marriage only hurts them. She knows he will never understand her feelings for Miguel.

The first time Alba meets Miguel, she notices the tiny insignia of a raised fist on his sleeve. He talks of revolution and of answering the violence of their oppressive system with more violence. He is inspiring, and after a night with Miguel, Alba is convinced she would give her life for a noble cause. But when the students at the university seize a building in solidarity with striking workers, Alba joins the protest out of love for Miguel, not ideological conviction. 

To Alba, the protest feels like a game. The students barricade themselves in the building, along with Sebastián Gómez, a disabled professor. Miguel, however, is the unofficial leader of the operation. He drains the toilets, reserving the water, and organizes a makeshift kitchen that provides them with cookies and instant coffee. Sebastián is hopeful that other students and unions will join their protest and that they can bring down the government, but Miguel thinks it unlikely.

After a day barricaded in the building, Alba calls home. She tells Blanca that she will be staying “until victory or death,” which feels ridiculous coming out of her mouth, and Esteban grabs the phone. He tells her to come home immediately, or he will send the police in to get her. Alba has no business being with “all those communists,” Esteban says, and Alba hangs up the phone. Sebastián doesn’t think the police will come in to get them. The public won’t stand for it. “It’s not a dictatorship and it never will be,” he says.

That night, Alba begins to feel terrible stomach cramps, which only seem to grow worse. It is cold, too, and the students are looking tired. The only one who seems unaffected is Sebastián Gómez, who is rumored to have taken machinegun fire to the legs while in Bolivia. Suddenly, Alba feels warm fluid leak between her legs. She is mortified, so she curls up in the corner in misery. Ana Díaz, one of the student protestors, comments that Alba’s pains are evidence of her class status—“proletarian women” don’t even complain during childbirth, Ana says.

Sebastián approaches and, finding Alba curled up in the corner, is instantly irritated. “That’s what happens when you let women get involved in men’s affairs!” he says. No, Ana corrects, this is what happens when you let the bourgeoisie get involved. Sebastián tells Alba that she must go home, and Alba is secretly relieved. Miguel helps her to the door, and despite her recent criticism, Ana helps, too. They escort Alba to the front door, where the police are waiting to meet them. A gun is pointed directly at Alba’s face, and she finds herself looking into the eyes of Esteban García.

Esteban García laughs. “I see it’s Senator Trueba’s granddaughter!” he says. He asks Alba what is wrong with her and says it looks as if she has just had an abortion. Alba tells him it is none of his business and demands to be taken home. He hesitates. Esteban García isn’t used to people talking to him like that, but he orders another officer to take Alba home. When she arrives, Blanca begins to scream, and she doesn’t calm down until Jaime assures her that Alba is fine. 

Alba stays in bed for two days, and the student protest is resolved peacefully. She thinks about Esteban García. She remembers the incident with him in the library, but her most vivid memory of Esteban García is from her 14th birthday. Alba was in the garden waiting for Jaime, who was taking her shopping for a present, and she could see Esteban García talking to Esteban Trueba through the window of his library. She recognized Esteban García immediately in his police uniform, and when he left, she ran into him in the garden on his way out. He asked her if she remembered him, and she lied and said no. 

Alba told Esteban García that it was her 14th birthday, and he said he had a present for her. He smiled, and even though she tried to look away, he grabbed her firmly by the face and kissed her. He smelled of tobacco and violence, and when he let go, he grabbed her by the throat. He tightened his grip before releasing her and began to laugh. Esteban García left the garden, laughing all the while, and Alba sat and cried. She felt “dirty and humiliated,” and she immediately ran into the house and washed her mouth out with soap. While Alba doesn’t know it, her thoughts about Esteban García are “a premonition.”

Miguel’s anger at Alba for not telling him she is Esteban Trueba’s granddaughter doesn’t last long, and their relationship heats up. They sneak around together, but Alba soon discovers that the safest place for them to have sex is the big house on the corner. If the servants hear anything, Alba says, they will just think it is the ghosts. They have sex in each of the empty rooms, and then they move to the basement. Alba constructs a bed out of old mattresses and sheets from damask curtains, and they spend hours together in the dark. For the first time, Alba wants to be beautiful; looking at herself through Miguel’s eyes, she believes that she is. One day, Miguel tells Alba that he will be joining the guerrillas, and that it is too dangerous for her to come along.

Jaime believes that after so many years of struggle, the Socialist Party is finally going to win an election. Alba laughs at his optimism. She repeats Miguel’s beliefs and informs Jaime that the Socialist Party will never win without a revolution. Violent oppression can only be resolved with violence she says, but Jaime disagrees. He believes in a peaceful approach to progress. Later that night, Jaime says again that the Socialist Party will win the election, but since he rarely speaks, no one pays attention to him.

Jaime, however, knows for a fact that the Socialist Party will win. He knows this because of his close friendship with the Candidate, who has been vying for the presidency for the last 18 years. Jaime met the Candidate years ago on a routine medical call, and they struck up a friendship. The Candidate’s experience with losing tells him that this time he is going to win, but he asked Jaime to keep it quiet. Jaime said no one would believe it if he did talk about it, so to prove it, he tells Esteban. 

Jaime is not involved at all in politics and talk of a violent revolution makes him uncomfortable. Esteban, however, takes every chance he gets to warn Jaime of the dangers of communism and the evil they are headed for if the left wins the election. When Jaime discovers Esteban is organizing a terror campaign, he decides it is all too much and goes to live at the hospital. During this time, political tensions begin to escalate, and posters of the candidates are hung all over town. Jaime worries excessively about Alba and her relationship with Miguel, a known revolutionary.   

One day, Alba comes to Jaime and begs him to talk to Miguel. His sister is sick, and she hopes that Miguel will open up to Jaime and tell him what is wrong. Jaime agrees, and when he sees Miguel, a young kid obviously worried about his sister, Jaime begins to soften. He tells Miguel to take him to his sister, and he leads Jaime to a small apartment in the bohemian quarter. Inside, Jaime finds Amanda. She is 20 years older and skin and bones, but she is the woman Jaime remembers. Miguel is surprised that they know each other, and Jaime is struck with a feeling of profound loss. He understands that years of poverty and frustration have brought Amanda here, and he tells Miguel they must get her to a hospital. “Only a detoxification program can save her now,” Jaime says.