Walter Bidlake and Marjorie Carling exist in a state of polite denial. After a major fight, Marjorie had packed to leave but realized that, being pregnant with no money or skills, she had nowhere to go. She stays, feigning ignorance of Walter’s nightly absences with Lucy Tantamount. Walter is relieved to avoid a confrontation but feels his displays of kindness toward Marjorie are hypocritical.

To ease his conscience, Walter tries to believe he is genuinely in love with Lucy. He projects tenderness onto her and idealizes their relationship, but she is merely amused by his adoration. She values her emotional freedom and has no wish to surrender her will. One night, he asks if she loves him. She dismisses the question, stating that life is too fast for emotional “luggage” (203) and she is with him only for fun. The argument ends in a physical struggle, after which her mocking questions shatter Walter’s brief sense of peace.

Denis Burlap, Walter’s editor, visits the Chelsea studio of the artist Mark Rampion. Rampion’s wife, Mary, loathes Burlap, whom she considers a “spiritual leech” (205), but Rampion finds him amusing. Rampion shows Burlap a painting that celebrates physical love as a source of life, mocking Burlap for being too sentimental to appreciate its carnality. He also shows him satirical drawings criticizing modern intellectuals for being disembodied and sterile.

Burlap asks to publish some of the tamer drawings in his literary magazine, the World. He negotiates a low price, launching into a self-pitying speech about his financial sacrifices for art. Later that evening, Burlap writes a chapter for his biography of St. Francis of Assisi, eloquently praising “Lady Poverty” (212). Immediately after, his wealthy benefactor, Beatrice Gilray, brings him supper and asks for his advice on her gramophone shares.

Spandrell is sunk in boredom and depression. He perversely justifies his idleness as a principled refusal to use work as a drug to escape reality. His life of debauchery has become a dull routine, with his only satisfaction coming from the cruel psychological corruption of young women.

Seeking a distraction, Spandrell goes to a pub and meets a drunken man named Carling. As he drinks heavily, Carling talks of saints and reveals that his wife left him for Walter Bidlake. Meanwhile, at Sbisa’s restaurant, Walter is dining with Lucy, who is planning a trip to Paris. Spandrell puts the intoxicated Carling in a taxi, then goes to Sbisa’s himself. Seeing Walter and Lucy, he approaches their table and maliciously announces that he just spent the evening with Walter’s cuckolded “victim” (226).

Philip and Elinor Quarles go ashore at Port Said. Philip, who has a lame leg, feels a surge of self-consciousness when a man asks if he was wounded in the war. A flashback reveals his mother’s theory that his childhood accident caused him to retreat into the world of ideas. Later, a street vendor tries to sell Philip pornographic postcards in seventeen languages, which amuses him greatly.

In London, Denis Burlap is horrified to discover that the romantic poet he has been corresponding with, Romola Saville, is a pseudonym for two formidable middle-aged women. His assistant, Ethel Cobbett, observes his discomfort with satisfaction; she despises Burlap for his hypocrisy and resents his relationship with his benefactor, Beatrice Gilray. That night, Beatrice expresses her protective concern for Burlap by tending to his cough. As she rubs his chest with camphorated oil, she is overcome with conflicting feelings of repulsion and tenderness, while he enjoys being cared for like a child.

Philip and Elinor arrive at their country home to a chaotic reunion with their son, Phil, his governess, Miss Fulkes, and his grandmother, Mrs. Bidlake. Elinor is unsettled to see how her son seems to be a composite of various relatives, particularly her brother, Walter. At lunch, Phil behaves atrociously, much to Miss Fulkes’s mortification.

That evening, Philip writes in his notebook, reflecting on the merits of a stable, rooted life versus his own need for freedom. During an afternoon walk in Gattenden Park, he and Elinor encounter the eccentric Lord Edward Tantamount and his brother, the Marquess, deep in a theological argument. Philip remarks that God is the only topic left for such isolated old men. Elinor retorts that, at his current rate of detachment from life, he will be just like them in 10 years.