Tilda reports that the hospitals at Étaples were bombed. Peggy helps Miss Garnell reshelve books and notes that the Somerville copy of The Anatomy of Melancholy is missing the frontispiece. Miss Garnell is interested in hearing how the books are bound, and Peggy notes that the men’s side and women’s side of the bindery are still separate worlds, even though some women have been asked to work the machines. Miss Garnell wonders if the shift in the normal order due to the war will prove a silver lining. Peggy jokes that reading bits of Melancholy as she folds it has told her, “[t]hat too much learning will make me lonely, send me mad and keep me poor” (345).

Gwen pulls Peggy away from studying Greek grammar to go boating. Peggy feels desperate that she can’t remember what she’s learned, and Miss Garnell lets her take the grammar book. Peggy goes to Somerville to hear Principal Penrose give her address and runs into a girl she saw at the exam. The girl says she is preparing to make a good marriage. Peggy is impressed by Principal Penrose and thinks that, though she is unmarried, she is not an embarrassment. Principal Penrose encourages the girls but says if they don’t pass Responsions, they should consider answering the call of the War Office. Maude prompts Peggy to put on lipstick for the exams. Peggy struggles with Ancient Greek and is convinced she failed.

When she gets the letter with her exam results, Peggy delays opening it. She is distracted at work, and Mrs. Hogg scolds her for folding pages wrong. Mrs. Stoddard offers to hold the envelope for Peggy until the end of the day. Maude walks home, and Peggy goes to the cemetery to visit her mother’s grave. She wonders, “Why did we have to wait until we were dead to have our names inscribed on something?” (359).

Peggy recalls how Ma wanted her to stay in school, but Peggy feared she would be left out and pushed aside if Ma and Maude worked together at the bindery; she thinks, “I’d felt like a copy, an echo. Too fragile to be alone. I’d anticipated the loneliness of it and fought Ma until she gave in” (359). She reads the letter that tells her she failed Responsions. She goes to see Bastiaan, and they make love.

Iso Rae writes the girls to tell them Tilda has learned that her brother, Bill, has been killed, and Tilda is distraught.

Mrs. Hogg gloats that Peggy has failed to be accepted into Somerville, and Peggy feels that many of the bindery girls are smirking at her. They hear news of the Battle of Amiens, and people are getting sick with the flu. The girls are asked to work overtime.

The Red Cross asks for volunteers, and Peggy recalls what Principal Penrose said about helping the war effort if she didn’t pass the exam. Peggy, Lotte, and Maude sign up as Red Cross volunteers. Bastiaan comes with them to help. They mostly visit homes to help people. On Saturday nights, Peggy spends time with Bastiaan. They make no plans for the future.

Three volunteers die, and Peggy realizes that is why the Red Cross asked for single women or married women without children. She looks for reports of the deaths in the papers, but there is no roll of honor for the women.

One night, Maude puts the books away on Calliope, and Peggy realizes, watching her, “I’d thought it would be me the war would change, but I was beginning to realise it was Maude” (369). Peggy recalls how Ma always said the books would expand her world, but thinks now, “if I hadn’t read them, I wouldn’t know how small my world was” (369). Maude spots the Greek grammar and tells Peggy to return it.

Bastiaan comes with Peggy to the Somerville library, and Miss Garnell guesses he was the one who wanted Rudyard Kipling. She encourages Peggy not to shy away from the uphill battle, but Peggy insists on returning the book. She brings Miss Garnell a frontispiece for The Anatomy of Melancholy. Tilda writes that she is grieving Bill, and all the boys she tends remind her of him. She is weary and heartbroken.

Mrs. Stoddard offers Peggy a position as junior reader, and Peggy hesitates because of Maude. Mrs. Stoddard suggests that Maude might like a little more independence. Peggy is angry with Mrs. Stoddard for encouraging her, but Mrs. Stoddard knew Peggy would regret not trying to get into Somerville. Peggy takes up her new position as a reader but continues to check in on Maude, who doesn’t appear to miss Peggy as much.

Students return for the fall term, and Peggy tries not to feel melancholy. Maude looks into Peggy’s eyes to soothe her, and Peggy thinks Maude’s expression reminds her of her mother. She realizes Maude has never confused herself with Peggy, and she, Peggy, has been using Maude as an excuse to hold herself back. Maude tells Peggy, “As good as any of them” (380). Ma had always said that to Maude, and Peggy realizes that while Maude had believed this, she, Peggy, never had.

Maude comes to get Peggy and Bastiaan. One of their patients, Mrs. Hillbrook’s boy, is sick with the flu. Lotte is holding him and talking to him, but she won’t let the others near. Bastiaan soothes Lotte. She finally releases the boy, who is dead.

Mrs. Hillbrook recovers. Maude begins folding stars again and says they are for Lotte. Lotte comes for dinner and says that Mrs. Hillbrook is gone. Lotte says that, in French, it was not possible for her to live. The girls invite Lotte to stay the night, as it is dark.

Maude wants to talk, and Peggy asks what happened with Mrs. Hillbrook. Maude says Lotte insisted the woman could not live, and then, Maude says, Lotte did something “not right” (390). Lotte falls ill with the flu and does not recover. Peggy sees, again, how her sister can “sit with death” (392).

Peggy visits Bastiaan, who is recovering from the flu. He knew Lotte did not intend to return to Belgium.

Tilda writes the girls, warning them not to expect Jack, who is back home, to be the same Jack they knew in 1914. Peggy wonders, “How could any of us return to who we were then?” (394).

At the armistice celebrations, a man tells Bastiaan they fought his war, and now he should go home. Peggy invites Bastiaan to spend the night on Calliope. She realizes she will have to make a decision about him. She and Maude have tea the next morning, and Peggy admits she doesn’t know what to do, but it’s not because of Maude; she tells her sister, “You don’t need me to hold your hand” (400). Peggy keeps dreaming of Somerville, but she also wishes Bastiaan could stay.

Peggy proofreads the Oxford Dictionary and thinks about loss. She feels she’s lost part of herself in giving up on Somerville. Peggy leaves Maude with Jack for lunch. Maude’s calmness seems to soothe him.

Peggy meets Gwen, who takes her to lunch at the Clarendon Hotel. Gwen talks about how the war has made women prove themselves, and it is time to press for more equality. She notes that women’s sacrifices were not “glorious or noble […] It was women’s work and it was just expected” (408).

Peggy is angry because she feels she’s been locked out of everything: Somerville, having the vote, a future. She resents that Gwen still has all her privileges and choices, and Peggy leaves the restaurant. She thinks, “I wanted so much more and I felt like I’d been swindled” (410). Later, she goes back to the hotel, but Gwen is already gone.

That night, Peggy and Maude join the Rowntrees and eat victory buns. Peggy saves one for Gwen. Gwen visits the next day, bringing Peggy a scone and butter. Peggy is still sad about Somerville, but Gwen reveals that she failed the entrance exam twice.

For Christmas, Peggy gives Bastiaan a muffler she’s knitted. He gives her a copy of The Odyssey in Ancient Greek.

Bastiaan reports on the outcome of the Peace Games, which he attended. He has passed his exams to become an architect and will be working on rebuilding the library at Louvain. He hopes the library will give Peggy a reason to come to Belgium.

Peggy waits in her room at Somerville College. She passed her exams and won a scholarship. Maude approaches with Jack, and Peggy thinks they make a handsome couple. Rosie and Tilda are with them. Peggy puts on her gown and joins them as they walk to the Sheldonian Theatre. Gwen announces that she has decided to go into politics.

Peggy surveys the other women waiting to receive their degrees and thinks, “They are the survivors […] of war and influenza. And now they have triumphed over tradition. They are smiling, excited for a future they have earned, and know they deserve” (423).