Benevolence

Benevolence in The Power of the Dog is made legible through small, consequential gestures rather than grand declarations. It can be hesitant, as when Phil Burbank reaches toward Peter Gordon and withdraws his hand, or startlingly direct, as when he later puts an arm around the boy. After Phil’s death, care takes another form: The Old Lady Burbank and The Old Gentleman Burbank comfort one another, and flowers from the funeral are carried into hospital rooms. Across these moments, kindness is both an action between particular people and a way of answering grief, vulnerability, and uncertainty.

A Gesture That Changes

When Peter tells Phil that his father hanged himself, Phil’s response begins with restraint. He starts to touch the boy, draws back, and lowers his voice before saying, “You poor kid,” followed by the assurance, “Things will work out for you yet.” Peter answers with a faint smile. The scene makes compassion physical before it makes it confident: Phil’s hand does not complete its first movement, but his lowered voice and words still offer comfort. Peter’s reply, slight as it is, registers that the offer has reached him.

Later, Phil’s restraint gives way to contact. He calls Peter’s offer “damned kind,” slides an arm around his shoulders, and promises that “Everything’s going to be clear sailing for you from now on in.” He also tells Peter that he will finish the rawhide rope that night and invites him to watch. The promise and the rope belong to the same exchange: Phil turns gratitude into a shared activity, and the boy stays to watch him work. Phil finishes despite a freshly wounded hand, a concrete sign that the promised craft matters enough to continue through pain.

The meaning of this change is sharpened by Phil’s own account of what Peter’s gesture means to him. He interprets the boy’s wish to braid as a desire to emulate him, and the touch of Peter’s hand as something his heart had long needed. The narrator connects this intensity to Phil’s earlier loss and his enduring memory of Bronco Henry. Benevolence here is not effortless generosity: it is bound up with Phil’s loneliness, his wish for closeness, and the risk involved in reaching for it. For Peter, too, the shoulder-grip becomes an inwardly significant moment. He feels that his mother has taken his plan out of his hands, yet the contact leaves him with a sense that he is as special as he believed himself to be. The scene gives kindness force without making either character’s motives simple.

Care After Bereavement

At Phil’s funeral, those who are not Episcopalians lament the absence of a eulogy and recall qualities that might have been spoken aloud: his intelligence, friendliness, unpretentious manner, banjo playing, whistle, and skilled hands. Mrs Lewis sheds a tear over a darning ball Phil had once surprised her with. These recollections present benevolence through particular acts and remembered capacities. The darning ball, in particular, preserves a personal kindness in an ordinary object, while the flowers gathered for the funeral acquire a life beyond the service: there are enough to brighten rooms at Herndon Hospital, including its charity wards.

The Old Lady Burbank and The Old Gentleman Burbank leave the grave for the railroad depot, knowing there is nothing to say to anyone. Their exchange redirects attention from public explanations to mutual care. She tells him that he had “nothing, precisely nothing, to do with it,” and he softly asks whether he may remind her of the same. Their words do not solve the death or explain it; they protect one another from assuming blame. The repeated reassurance makes kindness reciprocal: neither is merely the comforter, and neither is asked to carry grief alone.

Kindness as an Answer

The Old Lady Burbank’s recollection of Rose Gordon Burbank and George Burbank offers another image of care. She remembers watching Rose get down from the machine, give her hand to George, and suddenly look at him; she describes them as good together. She then recalls going to Rose and saying, “Here …” The passage withholds the rest of the gesture’s words, but preserves its direction: The Old Lady Burbank approaches Rose after witnessing the couple’s tenderness. Kindness appears as attention to a moment between other people and as a response made directly to one of them.

On the train back to Salt Lake City, The Old Lady Burbank admits that she had always known something strange would happen. She remembers being told that she was braced, patient, and kind; then, kneading her trembling bare hands, she cries, “Kindness! What else in God’s name is there?” The Old Gentleman Burbank answers, “Nothing, really.” Her physical trembling keeps the exchange from reading as an abstract maxim: kindness is spoken amid distress, not from a place untouched by it. The reply is brief, but it joins her question rather than dismissing it.

Their plans for Christmas with Rose and George, at Rose’s specific request, give that exchange a modest continuation. The Old Lady Burbank says she used to feel old; The Old Gentleman Burbank answers that she never looked it. This closing exchange does not undo death or grief. Instead, it locates benevolence in renewed company, remembered patience, and the effort to steady another person. The novel’s episodes distinguish kindness from a guarantee that events will turn out well: it cannot command fate, but it can offer comfort, companionship, and a way through what cannot be changed.