 Soon after his arrival in Sydney, Mordecai takes a metalworking job at Brighta Bicycle Lamps in Barranugli.He recognises that his employer Harry Rosetree is also a German Jew, but his overtures are sternly rebuffed by the factory owner, whose family are shown to be doing their best to assimilate to middle-class Australian society.Mrs Flack begins to spread malicious and unfounded gossip about Mordecai which she relays to Blue, another worker at the factory who she introduces to Mrs Jolley as her nephew.