Over four slow days in the island cave, James waits for news of Sadie and Lizzie and feels time stretch under fear and helplessness. He survives by fishing, sleeping, thinking, and writing, but his mind keeps returning to the rape of Katie. James is tormented by guilt for not intervening, hatred for Hopkins, and dread that the same violence has been and will be inflicted on the women he loves.

One morning, James sees a group of white men leave their usual beach on a skiff while a canoe and the drunken overseer Hopkins remain behind. Realizing no one knows he is on the island, James recognizes an opportunity. Memories of racial terror and of Hopkins mocking the killing of a young enslaved boy sharpen James's anger into a decision to act.

James approaches Hopkins quietly, takes the pistol lying beside him, and builds up the fire until Hopkins wakes. At first James speaks in the submissive dialect Hopkins expects, then shifts into more direct, articulate speech, unsettling him and making clear that he is in control. When Hopkins recognizes him as Jim, James orders him not to move and circles behind him.

James locks Hopkins in a chokehold and forces him to confront, if only in James's words, the women he has raped, especially Katie. As Hopkins struggles, curses, and panics, James tightens his grip and continues speaking, making his hatred and indifference plain. Hopkins dies in James's arms, and James feels no remorse for killing him.

Afterward, James drags Hopkins's body to the canoe. He smashes a hole in the hull with a jagged rock, puts the body inside, briefly considers returning the pistol to the boat, then thinks of what such a weapon has done before and keeps it from Hopkins. James pushes the damaged canoe into the river and watches it sink into the current, erasing the body as best he can.