67 pages • 2 hours read
Deanna RaybournKillers of a Certain Age
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Background
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
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BetaChapters 4-7Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 4 Summary
The timeline shifts to December 1978, with a young Billie in a jail cell in Texas, knowing she cannot pay bail. The narrator emphasizes she has no idea that her life is about to change.
Unexpectedly, Billie is taken to a separate room where an older man is sitting and reading the newspaper. After asking about her injuries from a recent fight, he introduces himself as Major Richard Halliday. Halliday explains he works for a “clandestine” organization she might be a fit for, and Billie, skeptical, asks, “it’s porn, isn’t it?” (39). Halliday goes into the organizational history of espionage and clandestine warfare, highlighting the role of the Special Operations Executive, which recruited civilians to do clandestine work in Nazi-occupied territory during World War II. When Halliday expresses regret that SOE dissolved, Billie guesses he was a member, which he confirms.
He explains that SOE members, along with some members of the OSS, the precursor to the CIA, remained actively concerned with the presence of Nazis on the run from justice and their possession of priceless artworks, often stolen from Jewish individuals who died in the Holocaust. In response, they formed the Museum, an espionage and assassination agency. Halliday explains that while some Nazis remain at large, the organization has expanded to fight other dictatorships. Though Billie is at first taken aback by his matter-of-fact discussion of killing, she admits that she has often thought the world would be improved by some individuals’ deaths.
Halliday goes on to explain that his organization is recruiting an all-female squad, codenamed Project Sphinx. He explains that his sister, Constance, is leading the project, as an homage to her former squadron, all of whom died in Germany. Halliday explains that he was told about Billie and her arrest and surveys her personal effects. He takes a brief interest in her root beer lip balm, and then asks why she is an avid reader of Peter O’Donnell’s works, which feature the crime boss Modesty Blaise, a female mastermind who occasionally helps the government. Billie explains that she is drawn to Modesty’s independence and self-reliance. Halliday notes that Modesty is unmarried and childless, and Billie explains that she “I don’t want those things either…I want to work, to make my own life” (46).
Halliday notes that Billie has highlighted a passage where Modesty argues that following the law can still result in injustice, and Billie replies that Nazi activity was legal. Halliday brings up more recent events, specifically Billie’s arrest for assaulting a police officer who was harming peaceful protestors. Halliday reminds her she fought the officer physically, telling her his sister would have done the same.
Billie, still suspicious, asks Halliday how his agency is funded if it is nongovernmental. He explains that some founding members became successful financiers. He explains that the Museum is accountable to a central board and carries out its work “to safeguard democracy, to thwart absolutism, and to enact justice” (48). Halliday goes on to assert that if Billie accepts his offer, her arrest and her existence as a student will be erased. Billie notices that the contract stipulates training. She asks Halliday if this will include combat, and when he agrees, she accepts the offer. Halliday assures Billie she already has what it takes to kill.
Chapter 5 Summary
In the present day, the four friends are disembarking on the tropical island of St. Kitts, where they spend the first few days relaxing. When Billie has a hot flash at brunch, Natalie suggests she visit the kitchen’s walk-in refrigerator, assuring her, “Hector won’t mind. If anyone else catches you, tell them you got lost. You’re old, they’ll believe you” (54). Billie takes some citrus but hides when she hears a crew member coming.
She realizes the man looks familiar, and when he turns to face her, she realizes, he is a colleague. Billie briefly considers greeting him but realizes, “there were a hundred reasons another field agent might not make contact with us and none of them were good” (56). Billie returns to her friends, and Helen notices Billie’s discomfiture. When she asks about it, Billie says simply, “We’ve got trouble” (57).
Chapter 6 Summary
Billie explains the situation, noting that the agent, Brad Fogerty must be working, or he would be dressed as a civilian. Helen agrees, noting that she has previously worked with Fogerty, an explosives expert. Billie decides they should search his cabin, since seeking him out directly is too risky. Billie asks Helen to go with her, noticing that her friend agrees reluctantly and consumes two Bloody Marys in fairly rapid succession. The friends spend the rest of the afternoon at the pool, careful not to separate. Natalie does reconnaissance, using her flirtation with one of the crew to determine where Billie needs to go.
Billie and Helen leave dinner early, with Helen pickpocketing the needed keycard from a staff member. They arrive at the cabin, and Billie tries to reassure Helen that there are likely no security cameras, wondering if her friend has lost her professional detachment. She pockets Helen’s necklace, concerned it makes noise. They search the room, and Helen finds a “sleek leather attaché case,” which the two women quickly realize contains a bomb (64). Billie recognizes it and knows the password to open it is always set to the date of the explosion. It opens when she enters that day’s date, and Billie knows there is no way to disarm it without another code.
Fogerty arrives and attacks Helen. Billie, highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat, succeeds in strangling him to death with Helen’s necklace. Helen explains that the necklace is piano wire: “I used it on the head of the Finnish national bank” (68). The glow of success quickly fades once Helen reminds Billie that only the dead man had the means to disarm the bomb.
Chapter 7 Summary
In the aftermath of the struggle, Billie is tired and reflects that while she exercises intensively and takes care of her health, “once in awhile some little shit like Brad Fogerty crossed my path and I felt every damned year” (70). They hide the body in the cabin wardrobe and return to dinner.
Helen and Billie commiserate because the cruise director, Heather Fanning, has been “talking to us like we’re toddlers” (72). Helen laments the indignity of aging and grief, and Mary Alice and Natalie arrive with dessert and survey the ticking bomb. Helen defends Billie when the others are upset that she killed Fogerty before she could get the override code.
To save the passengers, the friends plan to start a fire on the ship so it will be evacuated. To fake their own deaths, they will have to steal a small rubber launch and make their way to a nearby island in secret. To guarantee their safety, they must destroy their identity documents without the usual aliases the Museum would provide. Mary Alice is dismayed her wife will be among those who think she is dead, and Billie prepares for departure, taking rare coins and an object she does not name inside the plastic case of her e-reader. It will later be revealed as a passport and credit card under an alias, ensuring that the women will be able to access some funds. As they prepare to set the fire and depart, Billie reflects, “I’d known them for two-thirds of my life, those impossible old bitches. And I would save them or die trying” (79).
Chapters 4-7 Analysis
In these chapters, Raybourn establishes the action plot and central mystery. The four women are targets for assassination, but they do not know who is targeting them or why. The increased conflict reveals important aspects of relationships and character. Billie is clearly the leader, taking it upon herself to give Helen a mission and purpose amid her grief. But even a less alert Helen is unperturbed by Billie’s execution of Fogerty. The other women’s main concern is that his death prevents their easiest escape route—diffusing the bomb. Billie and Helen each take advantage of conventional stereotypes about older women to accomplish their work. Billie’s hot flashes are not merely a sign of age and weakness but are how she discovers the plot against them; without her trip to the walk-in refrigerator, she would not have noticed Fogerty. Helen uses her elderly appearance to further conceal her pickpocketing skills. And while her necklace appears to be unsuitable for the mission, it is a hidden weapon.
Raybourn uses these details to underline that all four women have hidden strengths despite the world’s tendency to undervalue them. Like the four women, the tropical setting of the Amphitrite is not what it appears: Instead of providing respite and relaxation, the peaceful surroundings contain harbingers of death and peril. The ship’s name is a reference to the goddess of the sea, one of the first of many efforts to connect the women to the Greek pantheon, an ancient association with power and mystery.
The flashback to Billie’s youth helps explain aspects of her character in the present. She has always been interested in honing her physical combat skills and is never tolerant of men’s tendency to abuse their power to stifle dissent. The Hallidays, unlike the police officer Billie attacks, see women as powerful and able to wield violence to accomplish loftier goals. On a related note, Halliday and the existence of the Museum underline the limits of law and government. Halliday’s tale emphasizes that the former Allied Powers are more interested in the new status quo than righting the moral wrongs of the post-World War II era. This connects Billie’s past to her present: Unlike Mary Alice or Helen, Billie is still focused only on the mission and not on those who might mourn her death or on past regrets. Her greatest loyalty is to her friends and colleagues, and her drive to preserve these bonds on her own terms will shape the remainder of the narrative.
