Merle arrives in Candlebrow, whose university is hosting a conference on Time, at which Vectorists and Quaternionists dispute time's linearity. The university is frequented by ‘undisputably "always the same tornado"’ named Thorvald, who is apparently sentient. Bounce Roswell arrives, via the "Inconvenience". He is an inventor known for taking on Scarsdale Vibe in court over intellectual property. Roswell is heading to California in pursuit of ‘the future of light… in particular the moving pictures’. Roswell laments film's indebtedness to linear time, referring to feature films as ‘clock movies’; he and Merle fall into partnership. German mathematician Hermann Minkowski visits the university. Bounce and Merle do not understand his lecture, delivered in German, but speculate that Minkowski's workings confirm their respective theses on light and time. Frank, ‘or the spur line of his destiny’, gravitates toward Nochecita, where Linnet Dawes directs him to Fickle Creek, on the outskirts of which she informs him Stray is living with Jesse. He finds Stray living above the town's ‘pancake emporium’ with ‘regionally famous… motor outlaw’ Vang Feeley, but she does not recognise Frank. Returning to Denver, Frank is informed by Reverend Moss Gatlin that Mayva is living in Cripple Creek. He visits her, and she expresses contentment at Frank's murder of Sloat, and discourages him from ‘[feeling] like that you need to give me no happy endings here’ in hunting down Deuce, and, with him, Lake. Deuce and Lake move to Wall o’ Death, Missouri, Deuce having been made the town's Deputy in error. While on duty, he receives official report of Sloat's death and sets out for revenge. He returns a week later, despondent, and is haunted by Sloat's ghost. Though the subject is never directly confronted, it becomes ‘clear to [Deuce] that [Lake] knew, and to her that he knew she knew’ about the circumstances of Webb's death; Deuce falls into supplication and the couple try unsuccessfully for a child. When Deuce imitates Webb, Lake assaults him, but stops short of murder. At Cambridge, Cyprian Latewood, despite his reputation as ‘a sod’, has fallen in love with Yashmeen Halfcourt, who too ‘prefers, her, own, sex’.