With Linda's whisper, "Popé," however, John realizes that they are still apart, separated by soma and sexual dreaming. To the end, Linda remains the well-conditioned Fordian rather than John's mother. Indeed, her last words are not "my son," or "I love you," but the broken-off hypnopaedic suggestion for recreational sex: "Every one belongs to every . . . ."
Note Linda's last look, described in Huxley's phrase as "charged with terror" — the sudden realization of her mortality. To John, the look seems to reproach him; in fact, he believes that he has killed her. John's guilt about his mother's death will re-emerge in later chapters, finally driving him to violence and isolation — an end that Huxley hints at in the conclusion of this chapter, when John pushes away a curious child roughly enough to force him to the floor.
