There are a few different possibilities of the way Kathy died. The first one presented in the novel is that Kathy was cruising at high speeds in a boat and she went through a rough patch of water. Kathy then got sent sailing through the air and landed in the water. She took in much water at impact which destroyed her lungs and lead to her drowning. "Maybe for a few seconds she leaned back and gave herself over to sun and speed" (116). Right after Kathy ran away from John, she wanted to forget her bad memories and just let go, be crazy or feel completely free for a few seconds. But, as she leaned back, her boat ran over whitecaps and sent her soaring through the air to her death.
Another possible theory is that Kathy incorrectly navigated the boat through the water and became helplessly lost in the wilderness. She enjoyed the time she spent alone. "She could hear her thoughts unwinding. No more politics, not ever again. All that was over. It was nothing. Less than nothing" (164). We see here again that she is relieved to be free of John's stress that he took out on her and the hard life of being a politicians wife. Now she could think and not be distracted. However, as time went on, she began running out of supplies. She kept running out until they were completely gone and she died.
One final, yet highly unreasonable theory is that John murdered her. Like I said, highly unreasonable. John loved Kathy way too much for this to ever happen and he was just at the time where he wanted to make things better in their relationship. But, O'Brien offers what proceeds next as an outcome. "Quietly then, he swung out of bed and moved down the hallway to the kitchen and ran water into an old iron teakettle and put it on the stove to boil" (271). As the water boiled, he waited alone, feeling the crush of defeat and humiliation storm through his body. This made him mad. He took the boiling teakettle filled with water back to the bedroom. "He was rocking on his heels, watching Kathy sleep. Amazing, he thought. Because he loved her. Because he couldn't stop the teakettle from tipping itself forward. Kathy's face shifted on the pillow. Her eyelids snapped open... Puffs of steam rose from the sockets of her eyes" (273). In this way, Kathy suffered to her death. The boiling water tore her skin apart and destroyed her organs.
John dragged her into the boat and pushed it into the shallow part of the river. He tied an end of a rope to her ankles and tied heavy rocks to the other end. With one easy push,Kathy's body fell overboard and sank to the bottom of the lake never to be seen again.
These are a few theories of Kathy's death. Now you decide. What really happened to Kathy in the Lake of the Woods, Minnesota.
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