- We get one of our longest epigraphs yet: an excerpt from Randolph Henry Ash's epic poem Ragnarök that goes on for a nearly three-and-a-half pages. In it, Ash describes how the Norse gods Odin, Honir, and Loki created the first man and woman—Ask and Embla.
- The chapter itself gets underway with a description of the hotel where Maud and Roland will be staying during their five-day trip in North Yorkshire, along with a broad sketch of their plans.
- After eating dinner together on the night they arrive, they head to their separate rooms. Roland lies in bed reading Leonora Stern's book on Christabel LaMotte, and, as he reads, we readers look on over his shoulder at Leonora's writing.
- After reading for a little while, Roland puts the book aside and gets ready to sleep.
- In her own room, Maud has been reading Mortimer Cropper's biography of Randolph Henry Ash. As usual, we readers get to read along over her shoulder, and we learn a little bit about Randolph Henry Ash's trip to North Yorkshire in June 1859.
- The next morning, Maud and Roland set out to retrace some of Ash's—and maybe Christabel LaMotte's?—100+-year-old steps.
- Maud and Ash start by looking for tidal pools that Randolph Henry Ash is known to have visited, and as they reflect on Ash's writings on sea anemones, they riff on a whole slew of metaphors that have been linked together through decades of scholarship on Ash's and LaMotte's writings.
- Eventually, Roland and Maud decide to move on to Whitby, where they know Randolph Henry Ash purchased a jet brooch for his wife, Ellen Ash.
- We now see another one of Randolph Henry Ash's letters to his wife. In it, he describes the brooch that he purchased for her in Whitby, and he muses on the geological significance of jet.
- Roland and Maud find a little shop in Whitby that sells jet ornaments and jewelry, and they decide to go in. As they look around, the storeowner notices the mermaid brooch made of jet that Maud herself is wearing, and she asks if she can take a closer look at it.
- After looking at Maud's brooch, the storeowner feels sure that she can date the piece precisely, and even name the artist who carved it. In her opinion, it's definitely Victorian and was made earlier than 1861.
- Maud explains that the brooch is a family heirloom—one that she found in a dress-up box when she was just a child. Suddenly, she and Roland realize that Randolph Henry Ash may have purchased the brooch for Christabel at the very same time that he purchased a brooch for Ellen. Or maybe Christabel bought it for herself? They have no way of knowing for sure.
- Before they leave the shop, Maud buys a brooch that says "Friendship" on it—she plans to give it to Leonora Stern—and Roland buys some worry beads.