In September, Quoyle takes Bunny to her first day of school. He is relieved when she emerges happy, having proudly written her name for the first time. Agnis suggests they go berry picking and invites Wavey and Herry to join them. As they pick berries, Agnis sends Quoyle back for a forgotten lunch basket, and he persuades Wavey to accompany him.

While walking along the shore, Quoyle and Wavey witness a massive iceberg collapse into the sea. Overcome by a sudden impulse, Quoyle grabs Wavey’s ankles. She freezes, and he presses his face against her legs before pulling back and asking her to step down from the rock she is on. Sensing his romantic intentions, a distraught Wavey recounts the story of her husband’s death: Herold Prowse died on January 29, 1981, when the Sevenseas Hector oil rig capsized due to design flaws, improper ballast adjustment, and failed safety systems. Her grief shatters the tension. Moments later, however, she and Quoyle fall into the berry bushes, kissing passionately. The sound of the sea reminds Wavey of Herold, and she pushes Quoyle away, running back to the others.

At a local diner, Tert Card tells Quoyle and Billy Pretty that the newly discovered McGonigle oil field will bring prosperity to Newfoundland. Billy argues that the wealth will be exploited by outsiders, leaving only crime and pollution for the outports. The debate escalates, with Billy lamenting the destruction of the traditional fishing life and Card defending the benefits of modernization.

Back at the Gammy Bird office, Quoyle submits his “Shipping News” column, which contrasts the beauty of old sailing schooners with modern oil tankers and details a recent, destructive oil spill. Enraged by the anti-oil sentiment, Card rewrites the piece into crude industry propaganda. When Quoyle sees the published version, he furiously confronts Card, who claims his editorial authority allows him to change any content. Jack Buggit then calls the office; Card hands the phone to Quoyle, and Jack tells him to write his column his way. Jack then speaks at length to a humiliated Card. Afterward, Card relays the new policy and separately passes along Jack’s idea to expand the wreck feature by including boat wrecks alongside car wrecks.

At the end of September, Quoyle is spending his first weekend alone at the green house while Agnis is away for the weekend buying buttons and muslin, and his daughters are staying with Dennis and Beety for Marty’s birthday. As he leaves the house for a walk, a knotted piece of twine falls from the door latch, and he pockets it. He walks to the end of the point, where he discovers a dead body in a yellow survival suit being washed in and out of a sea cave.

Unable to reach the body, Quoyle rushes back to his boat, deciding it will be faster to cross the bay than to drive. The water is extremely rough, and a large wave capsizes his boat, which quickly sinks. Thrown into the freezing water over a mile from shore, Quoyle clings to a floating plastic cooler. As hypothermia sets in, he grows delirious, believing the cooler is filled with hot coals keeping him warm, and is on the verge of rolling over to sleep in the waves when Jack Buggit hauls him onto a boat. After a six-hour ordeal, he is brought to the Buggits’ house, where Mrs. Buggit expertly warms the shivering Quoyle. He tells Jack about the body he found, and Jack calls the Coast Guard.

Two days after his rescue, Quoyle learns from Billy Pretty that the body has been recovered. It was decapitated and dismembered, and authorities believe it belongs to Mr. Melville, the yacht owner whose head was found in the suitcase. At the office, Nutbeem complains about the constant stream of depressing local stories about sexual abuse, listing several recent cases involving priests and family members. Tert Card remarks that such sordid news is what sells the paper.

Meanwhile, Quoyle’s relationship with Wavey deepens as they fall into a comfortable routine. He drives her and the children to and from school and work, and their budding romance becomes a subject of gossip. Quoyle visits Wavey’s small, colorful house, where she paints wooden crafts her father makes to sell to tourists. During a quiet moment at Skipper Will’s restaurant, Nutbeem tells Quoyle that Jack Buggit assigns beats that force his reporters to confront their personal traumas: Quoyle, whose wife died in a car crash, covers wrecks; Billy, who has never married, covers home and women’s interest news; and Nutbeem, a survivor of abuse, covers sex crimes.

Feeling overwhelmed, Agnis goes for a walk and comes across a pond that triggers a painful memory of being cornered on the ice by a man when she was a young girl. The memory reminds her how that life hardened her and forced her to become self-reliant. Back at the house, as the first snow of the season begins to fall, she admits to Quoyle that she is afraid of being isolated at the point during the winter.

Quoyle outlines several options, pointing out that plowing the road is too expensive, and that taking a boat will be impossible once the bay freezes. He tentatively suggests they move into town for the winter; he and the girls could live in Nutbeem’s soon-to-be-vacant trailer, and she could find a room. Agnis is stunned by the suddenness of the idea and asks to sleep on it, agreeing the next morning. Later, at her upholstery shop, she receives a package from Macau containing a large sum of American cash tied with a thin strip of pale blue leather, which she passes to Mavis Bangs with a significant look, suggesting both women recognize it.

While temporarily staying at Beety Buggit’s chaotic house, Quoyle gets a call from Billy Pretty, who insists he order a new boat from Alvin Yark. Billy mentions that Yark is Wavey’s uncle. Quoyle agrees and arranges to visit Yark’s workshop with Wavey and all the children the following Saturday.

They drive through dense fog to Nunny Bag Cove, a town of new houses that was rebuilt with insurance money after a fire. At the Yark house, they meet Alvin’s wife, Evvie. Afterward, Quoyle follows Alvin Yark, a small man with a paper-like face, to his shop. Yark agrees to build Quoyle a 16-foot boat. He explains that he cannot start right away, as he first needs to go into the woods to find the right trees. He tells Quoyle he only builds with green wood, never dried timber, because he believes it makes a stronger, more water-resistant boat.

In December, Quoyle and his daughters have dinner with Agnis at the inn where she is staying. She announces she has landed a major upholstery contract to refit the fire-damaged cargo ship Rome in St. John’s. She, Mavis Bangs, and Dawn will be moving there for the winter, staying in a company apartment. Agnis assures Quoyle they will all move back to the green house in the spring. Quoyle confirms he has no plans to return to New York, reflecting on how much Newfoundland has changed his perspective.

Bunny then performs a cat’s cradle string trick called “The Sun Clouded Over.” Quoyle examines the string; it has seven tiny hard knots and one clumsy overhand knot that Bunny identifies as one that she made. She says she found the string that morning on the back of his car seat, revealing it is another of the mysterious knotted strings that have been appearing all over the property.

At the Gammy Bird, Tert Card complains about the cold and dreams of Florida. Billy Pretty recounts a string of bizarre local crimes, including two separate incidents of men tearing off all their clothes in court and a case where a fisherman was apparently eaten by his own guard dogs. B. Beaufield Nutbeem, the foreign correspondent, shares that it is his last week at the paper before he sails his boat to the Caribbean.

Card taunts Nutbeem, predicting his boat will sink in the ice. Billy remarks that people are always leaving Newfoundland in the fall and that Quoyle is the only person he has ever seen move to the area to settle. Quoyle confirms he is staying for good, noting that Alvin Yark is building him a boat and his daughters are happy. Billy Pretty doubts a man can raise two girls on his own, but Quoyle ignores him.