Stella knows that Maynard has given her the worst job in order to punish her. The Colony no longer feels safe to Stella, and she realizes that she hasn’t had a period in at least six months. Stella goes to see Nurse Crawford, but Baker intercepts her to say that she now believes Stella was telling the truth about Frances. They go to Baker’s office, and the superintendent says she will have Stella work in the budget office with Miss Perkins. Baker wants to implement a new program called “Reformed to Reformer,” and Stella will be her first enrollee. Stella feels like she is dreaming. When she brings up her concern about her period, Baker tells her that the doctor ensured that Stella cannot have children; if she ever has to return to her home, there is no way she could stop Cordell from raping her, and the doctor did not want Stella to become impregnated again. Baker tells Stella to focus on her own happiness now, but Stella feels betrayed.

Baker assures Stella that the operation gives her a new beginning, a different future. She says that she has her own awful backstory, which she promises to tell to Stella one day. Stella hopes that Baker is acting for Stella’s own good and not her own. Baker assures Stella that she will have a “reputable” future, saying that this is almost the same as being happy. Stella knows that she has been content at the Colony, so she decides to trust Baker and let her past go.

Baker has a sense of impending doom and is having trouble getting moving. She is glad that Frances is under control now that she is taking a sedative, but Baker still feels uneasy. For this reason, she is late to the office on Monday morning. When Maynard calls to tell Baker that Woodard and several other board members have arrived, Baker panics, knowing that Maynard, as her rival, won’t cover for her. When Baker finally arrives at the office, Woodall assumes control of the meeting, faulting Baker for making Maynard an adversary. He says that Baker will remain the superintendent, but she is on probation for three months, and if there is even one more complaint, she will be fired. Baker is mortified. Woodall states that Maynard is to be promoted to assistant superintendent and will be responsible for hiring a new housemother. When Baker accompanies the group on a tour of the facility, she sees Ruth reentering the main building from a spot near the woods, but she merely returns to her office, too exhausted to address this issue.

Newell tells Ruth that he talked with her mother, and Ruth explains that Baker manipulated her explanation to her mother to make it sound as though Ruth had been sent to the Colony for doing something wrong. Newell says the Colony opened in 1929 as a white women’s penal colony, but similar facilities date back to World War I. At that time, so many servicemen had contracted sexually transmitted diseases that prevented them from fighting. Now, with tensions ramping up in Europe again, the American Social Hygiene Association has joined with government agencies to round up women like Ruth, whose reputability is deemed suspect. These women are considered threats to national security because the government does not want servicemen infected by venereal diseases and unable to fight. Stella assures Newell that she’ll testify in court if necessary. They plan to meet again in two weeks.

Stella catches Ruth on her way back inside and announces that she’ll never be able to have babies because of her operation. She is excited that she can be like Baker and help others. Miss Perkins calls her back to work, and Ruth returns to the kitchen. She tells her friends that Stella can never have children. Sally says the doctors did the same thing to her, telling her that her time at the Colony would be reduced if she agreed to the procedure. Ruth remembers going to a county fair years ago and seeing a booth set up to teach people about the benefits of sterilization; the presentation claimed that this procedure reduces the “burden” on society. She went home upset at the time, and her mother told her that the government had been involved in trying to “improve humanity” for some time. Ruth realizes how futile it will be to fight this system.

Stella’s eagerness to please baffles the other women. One day, she gets ready early, eager to continue becoming the new person Baker assures her she can be. Suddenly, Maynard bursts in, yelling. Stella says she was getting ready early because she couldn’t sleep, and Maynard gives her two demerits for breaking the rules. Stella points out that the manual never says residents cannot rise before 6 a.m. Just then, Mrs. Rutherford, the new housemother, appears, confused because it is only just now time for the women to awaken. Maynard says that she saw Stella coming out of the bathroom and assumed that her watch was wrong; she says an “early start” wouldn’t hurt anyone. Frances snorts.

After breakfast, Stella goes to work, but Baker asks Miss Perkins to send Stella to the cottage. When she arrives, Baker gives her a new dress and says they are going to run an errand in Kinston: their secret. On the taxi ride, Stella tells Baker how much she enjoys her new work. In Kinston, Baker makes a few purchases, and then the two go to a soda fountain, where Baker tells the server that Stella is her niece. She tells Stella that this lie is easier than the truth. Stella sees Baker relax for the first time, and she enjoys this moment, confident that Baker has her best interests at heart. When they get back to the Colony, Baker tells Stella about the fire the residents started at Samarcand, but she asks Stella to keep this story to herself. She warns Stella that if Maynard gains control of the Colony, Stella will likely be sent home soon.

Stella wants revenge on Maynard. She tells Frances that Baker might lose her job because of the woman, and she even tells Frances about the Samarcand fire. When Stella says she doesn’t like Maynard, Frances says she doesn’t like Maynard or Baker. That night, Stella sees Frances sneak out of the dorm and return a few minutes later. The next morning, one of the dorms catches fire, and no one can locate Frances or Baker.

At her cottage, Baker reviews some of Nurse Crawford’s reports, horrified by how many times she failed to address Maynard’s reprehensible choices. When she smells something burning, she sees the black smoke and rushes toward the flames, remembering what happened when she was seven years old.

When she was a child, her parents were always telling her to leave the matches alone, but she so loved striking them and watching them burn. The disobedience made it even more exciting. She’d grab the matches and hide, lighting them one by one. Sitting in the window seat, behind the lace curtain, she saw her family outside and felt jealous of the smile her mother bestowed on her sister. The flame touched her finger, and she dropped the match. The curtain quickly caught fire, which leaped to her stockings and dress. She ran outside, and her mother put out the flames while the house burned. Her parents never yelled or chastised her; her mother simply told her to always cover her disfigured legs.

Now, Baker sees Frances holding a gas can. She trips, and Frances walks over and tells Baker to tell Stella that her wish came true. Then Frances disappears. When Baker gets up, she walks toward the fire, and Stella pulls her back. They search for Frances, but to no avail. Baker calls Woodall with the recommendation that they immediately discharge all the women, and he approves this move, enraging Maynard. Baker immediately calls an old friend, who tells her about a job opening in Alabama. Baker asks if she can bring her “niece,” whom she is training to work in reform along with her. A few hours later, her friend calls to invite Baker and her “niece” to visit the facility. Baker and Stella get on a train together the next day.

Maynard questions the residents about Baker and Stella’s disappearance, but no one knows anything. Maynard gives Ruth her discharge papers, and after nearly seven months in the Colony, Ruth gets into a taxi with her mother. An old school friend comes to visit Ruth at her mother’s house and is shocked by Ruth’s story, though she ultimately blames Stella for what happened to her. Ruth is appalled to hear her friend talk about “decorum,” which Ruth points out has nothing to do with rape.

Newell finds a few legal precedents indicating that if a lawsuit were brought against those who ran the Colony, they would not be found guilty of anything. The fact that the Colony existed at all proves that little has changed and that the government still supports the reform agenda. He shows Ruth a newspaper article about what happened at Samarcand, and it strikes Ruth as an odd coincidence. She cannot understand how women could subject other women to the “treatments” and punishments of these facilities. Newell says that these women believe they’re doing the right thing.

For the next few days, Ruth replays this conversation. She calls Josephine, who says she is being watched and cannot rent rooms out as she did before. Ruth says that meeting Josephine and the other women was the only good to come of this. Ruth is adamant that she did nothing wrong, and she decides to try to move on, as she told her friend she would. Frances is still missing. 

One day, on her way to work, Ruth sees a news headline touting Baker as the “heroine” of the Colony. Several people talked about Baker’s virtues, citing her attempt to save Frances and speculating that her work must have been successful because none of the women from the Colony have returned to a reform institution since the fire. Reading this, Ruth is irate. That night, she writes her version, rebutting the story in the paper. She leaves nothing out and mails it before she loses her nerve. The next day, the sky is cloudless, and Ruth feels renewed confidence. She sees the sheriff’s car and does not falter.