A Handful of Dust

Tony Last, a country gentleman, lives at Hetton Abbey with his wife Brenda and their eight-year-old son John Andrew. Tony's contentment masks Brenda's growing boredom with country life. Her attraction to John Beaver begins, setting a secret affair in motion.

Brenda spends weeks in London, renting a flat from Mrs. Beaver while the affair continues unseen by Tony. She moves in social circles where duplicity risks exposure, and friends scheme to fix Tony up with a mistress, but these efforts fail.

Brenda's affair becomes common knowledge within their London social circle, yet Tony remains blissfully unaware of the truth. He continues his life at Hetton and trusts Brenda to keep their secrets.

Brenda is in London when their eight-year-old son John Andrew is killed in a riding accident. On hearing that a John is dead, Brenda initially suspects Beaver has died, but learns the victim is her own son. At the funeral, she experiences a complex mix of grief and relief, muttering 'Thank God!'

After the funeral, Brenda asks Tony for a divorce so she can marry Beaver. Tony agrees to protect Brenda's social reputation, offering to fund the divorce with £500 a year.

Tony spends an awkward weekend in Brighton with Milly, a woman hired to gather divorce evidence. He then learns from Brenda's brother that Brenda, encouraged by Beaver, now demands £2,000 a year, a sum that would force Tony to sell Hetton. He withdraws from the divorce talks and plans to travel for six months.

Tony meets explorer Dr Messinger and joins him on an expedition to the Amazon in search of a lost city. On the outward voyage he begins a romance with Therese de Vitré, a young woman whose Catholic faith complicates things when he admits he is married.

In Brazil, Messinger proves an incompetent organizer; native guides desert them and they are stranded. Tony grows ill and cannot walk, while Messinger leaves in a canoe to fetch help and is swept over a waterfall and killed.

Tony is rescued by Mr. Todd, a British Guianan who runs a jungle settlement. Todd nurses Tony back to health and asks him to read Dickens; Tony, able to read, agrees to read to him, and the relationship grows tense and uneasy.

Readings become a ritual that holds Tony in the jungle; the atmosphere grows menacing as he realises he may never be allowed to leave. The longer he stays, the more the sense of entrapment deepens.

When a search party approaches, Todd sedates Tony, hides him, and gives the search party Tony's wristwatch to take back to England as proof of his fate. The plan ensures Tony cannot be rescued without exposing Todd.

Back in England, Tony's death is accepted by his social circle, and his cousins inherit Hetton Abbey. A memorial is erected in his memory, marking the end of Tony's dramatic struggle and the public memory of the family.

Brenda remarries a friend of Tony's, signaling a new chapter away from the shadow of the affair. The remarriage underscores the social upheaval and the compromises made to preserve reputation.

The narrative closes with the lingering memory of Tony's fate and the way it ripples through Hetton, Brenda, and their circle. The family moves on, marked by loss, reputation, and the unresolved questions of what might have been.