The Beast in the Jungle

The Beast in the Jungle Summary | Chapter 1 Summary

It is October, and John Marcher goes to lunch with a group of friends to Weatherend, a large, sumptuous country home where a woman of his acquaintance, May Bartram, is staying. Following lunch, there is a tour of house and grounds and the guests move about the rooms of the house, visiting in small groups. The mansion-sized house is filled with collections of unusual objects. John struggles to remember how and where he has known May, who seems to "rank in the house as a poor relation." She seems to be helping out by conducting tours and looking after the guests.

The two end up together alone in one of the many rooms in the house, not entirely accidentally. He describes her in his mind as handsome but older than he remembers.

Then he recalls where and when they had met—eight years ago in Rome. She corrects him—it was in Naples and it was ten years ago. They had sought refuge together from a storm in a cave in Pompeii. She had been 23, he 25. He struggles to find something of significance in their previous encounter—something of a "romantic or critical kind." But he struggles in vain.

And then she supplies the link—he had told her, in their ten-years-ago experience, something that had kept the memory of him alive for her. He does not remember what it was. She is hesitant to remind him because it reveals who he was, what he was like ten years ago, and she is concerned that it might be an embarrassment to him. But he wants her to tell him, so she does. She says that he had told her then that he had felt from an early age that he was destined to experience something strange and rare, a foreboding and a conviction of something that would quite overtake him.

She reveals that she has never told anyone of this, and he responds that he has never told anyone except her. She also tells him that she understands the feeling and asks whether he still has it. He tells her that it hasn't happened yet and that it's not something he will accomplish or be distinguished for; rather, it will not be cataclysmic but will alter everything, will be life changing. She asks him whether the feeling might merely be the expectation and the fear of falling in love. But he answers that he has been in love, and that wasn't the thing. He says he doesn't think it will necessarily be violent but natural and unmistakable. Then he asks her to watch for it with him. "Don't leave me now," he implores.