To Kill a Mockingbird Chapter 11 Summary

Now that Scout’s a grown-up second-grader, tormenting Boo Radley seems like little kid stuff, and she’s setting her sights beyond the neighborhood to the metropolis of downtown Maycomb.
Getting downtown, however, requires getting past the house of Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose, which is no walk in the park.
Jem and Scout both hate the old woman, who hurls insults at them every time they pass her house, no matter how nice they are to her.
Since Jem has made it a point of pride to get past Mrs. Dubose on the way to meeting Atticus when he gets off of work in the evenings, Atticus often finds them upset at her rantings.
Atticus always stops and makes polite conversation with Mrs. Dubose, which makes Scout think he’s incredibly brave.
The day after Jem turns twelve he’s got a load of birthday cash to spend, so they head down to town for him to lighten his pockets.
On the list of purchases: a toy steam engine for Jem and a baton for Scout.
As they pass Mrs. Dubose, she accuses them of playing hooky, even though it’s Saturday.
Jem and Scout hold firm while Mrs. Dubose abuses them, but when she attacks their father for defending Tom Robinson, Jem almost loses it and has to be dragged away by Scout.
They make their purchases and head home, passing by Mrs. Dubose’s house again.
She’s not on the front porch, and Jem suddenly snaps, grabs Scout’s new baton, and uses it to destroy Mrs. Dubose’s camellias, finally breaking the baton over his knee.
They don’t go to meet their father that evening, and Scout tries to cheer Jem up, but it’s no use.
Atticus comes home and asks Jem about what he did.
He tells his son that no matter what she said, wreaking havoc upon an old lady’s garden is not justifiable, and he should go over and talk to her – right now.
Atticus stops Scout from joining her brother, so she sits there wondering why Atticus doesn’t seem as worried as she is that the gun-toting Mrs. Dubose will make Jem pay for her camellias in blood.
Scout finally climbs up on her father’s lap and speaks her mind, and her father says that it’s not fair, but they need to keep their heads, for things are only going to get worse as the Tom Robinson case gets closer.
Atticus tells Scout that he hopes that when they’re older they’ll understand better why he’s doing what he’s doing.
Scout tells Atticus he must be wrong, because most of the townspeople think he is.
Atticus says that they’re entitled to their opinions, but personal conscience isn’t a democracy.
Jem returns, saying that he cleaned up Mrs. Dubose’s yard and apologized, even though he didn’t mean it.
Atticus says that there’s no point in apologizing unless it’s sincere, and that as a sick old lady Mrs. Dubose can’t be held responsible for her actions.
Jem says that Mrs. Dubose wants him to come over every day except Sunday to read to her, and Atticus says he has to do it.
Jem says that “it’s all dark and creepy” (11.67) inside the house, and Atticus says he should just pretend he’s in the Radley Place.
On Monday Jem heads over to Mrs. Dubose’s house for his first round of reading, and Scout goes with him.
They find her in bed, and she gets in a few sharp words before Jem starts reading.
Scout finds her face disgusting – wrinkled, spotty, toothless, and drooling – and tries to find something else to look at.
After Jem has been reading for a while, the kids notice that Mrs. Dubose’s frequent corrections of his mistakes had dropped off, and she doesn’t even notice when he stops mid-sentence.
They look at her and, thinking she is in some sort of fit, ask if she’s all right, but she doesn’t answer.
Then an alarm clock goes off, and Mrs. Dubose’s servant Jessie shoos them out of the house, saying it’s time for Mrs. Dubose’s medicine.
They get home at 3:45 and play in the backyard for the rest of the afternoon.
Atticus comes home bearing gifts, and asks them about their first day at Mrs. Dubose’s.
The days go on for Jem and Scout, and reading to Mrs. Dubose becomes part of their daily schedule.
One evening Scout asks Atticus what exactly a “nigger-lover” (11.100) is, since that’s what Mrs. Dubose frequently calls him, and it’s also what Francis said.
Atticus asks if that’s the reason she jumped Francis, and Scout says yes.
Atticus asks why she’s asking if she understood it well enough to make it the reason for a fight, and Scout says that it was the way Francis said it that got on her nerves.
Atticus tells her that the term doesn’t mean anything, but it’s something “ignorant, trashy people use […] when they think somebody’s favoring Negroes over and above themselves” (11.107) and that even higher-class people use it sometimes when they want to put someone down.
When Scout asks, Atticus says that he really is a nigger-lover, because he tries to love everyone. He tells her it’s not an insult to the person it’s directed at, but instead shows you how “poor” (11.109) the person using it is.
One afternoon while Jem is plugging away at reading aloud to Mrs. Dubose, Atticus surprises them by coming in.
It turns out he’s just left work – Mrs. Dubose has been setting the alarm clock later and later each day, so Jem and Scout have been staying longer and longer without realizing it.
Mrs. Dubose says that Jem has to come for a week longer, even though the original month is up, and Atticus says he has to do it.
During the final week of reading, there’s no more alarm clock, but Mrs. Dubose tells them when they can go – and it’s usually pretty late when she says so.
She no longer has fits, but when the book gets boring she amuses herself by picking on the kids – fortunately, Jem’s gotten better at not rising to her bait.
Finally the last day of reading is over, and Jem and Scout are both ecstatic to be free.
As spring goes on, Jem develops a mastery of what’s going on in college football.
One evening Atticus gets a phone call, and says he’s going over to Mrs. Dubose’s.
He comes back with a box, and says that Mrs. Dubose is dead.
He explains to the kids what’s really been going on: Mrs. Dubose was a morphine addict, and she decided she wanted to kick the habit before she died as a matter of personal pride.
The fits the kids saw her have were caused by withdrawal, and the reading was to keep her mind off the cravings till the alarm clock went off and she could have a dose (which also explains why the reading periods got longer and longer).
By the end of the reading afternoons, she was free of the drug habit.
The box Atticus brought home is for Jem, and when he opens it he finds a camellia.
Jem is angry at this needling from beyond the grave, but Atticus tells him that he thinks it’s a message that everything’s all right.
Atticus says that even if Jem hadn’t gone on an anti-camellia rampage, Atticus might have made his son go read to Mrs. Dubose anyway, in order “to see what real courage is” (11.153) – not using a gun but fighting for a cause you believe in even if you know you probably won’t win.

Chapter 12

Chapter 10