Blue Duck almost breaks her spirit, but mercifully, Gus rescues her. On these nights, Lorena 'looked for the moon' (49.71), but nature no longer provides solace. It's terrible, and terribly hard to read. She's starved, not given water, forced to pee herself, and raped.

She's kidnapped by an evil dude named Blue Duck. Being outside felt good-she had spent too much time in hot little rooms, looking at ceilings.' (34.4)īut Lorena's involved in the book's most harrowing, brutal chapters. 'Looking up at the sky, her spirits rose even more. Duck HuntĪt first, Lorena likes the trip across the country. She dreams of San Francisco, but she would probably settle anywhere she can have from freedom. He treats her like an object, thinking he can take her wherever he wants, even though, as Gus says, 'women don't like to go backwards' (18.45). Sadly for Lorena, he gambles with her life. Unfortunately, it was a gambler who got Lorena into the whole mess she's in, and Jake Spoon is just as much of a gambler. Nevertheless, Jake Spoon's the one Lorena lets open the door all the way: she even lets Jake take her from Lonesome Dove. He helps her do business as a sporting woman (this doesn't mean playing tennis) and 'it seemed to her he had got rid of something other men hadn't got rid of-some meanness or some need' (3.21). Gus is the one who opens the door to Lorena's freedom a crack. John Tinkersley took her away from a man named Mosby, who sold her to his friends, beat her in San Antonio, and left her in Lonesome Dove after telling everyone she was a murderer. She may never have lived anywhere cool, but she has lived under the threatening shadow of some abusive men.

This woman is stifling in the heat of her small room in the Dry Bean, the bar of Lonesome Dove.

'Lorena had never lived in a place where it was cool-it was her one aim.' (3.1) Here's our first introduction to this beautiful whore with a heart of gold:

Lonesome dove novel