Gloria arrives very late to work at Anne Powell’s house because Robert has just been taken to the Reformatory. Anne begins to scold Gloria, but Gloria briefly explains what happened and buries herself in kitchen work instead of talking. As Gloria cooks and cleans, fear for Robert grows into a private conviction that he is already being beaten, and Gloria wrestles with anger at her absent father, then forces herself to reject blaming him completely.

At lunch, Gloria endures comments from Anne’s brother Fred, Fred’s wife Nell, and Anne’s elderly great-grandmother, Old Lady Powell. Upstairs, while serving Old Lady Powell, Gloria sees the family telephone and uses a distraction with the radio serial The Guiding Light to call Tallahassee. Gloria reaches a secretary for the social worker Loehmann and leaves an urgent message asking whether he has spoken to Judge Morris, but the call produces no immediate help.

Before Gloria leaves the room, Old Lady Powell unexpectedly becomes clearheaded and reacts to the word “Reformatory.” Old Lady Powell recalls a 1920 fire there that killed boys and says the place should have been shut down, giving Gloria a frightening new sense of the institution’s history. When Gloria tries to learn more, Old Lady Powell turns hostile again, and Gloria leaves to find Anne waiting outside.

Anne confronts Gloria about secretly making a long-distance call, and Gloria assumes she is about to be fired. Instead, Anne takes Gloria into her late father’s office for privacy and insists on hearing the full story. Gloria tells Anne about Lyle McCormack’s harassment, Robert’s reaction, and the sentence. Anne is outraged by the unfair punishment, especially compared with Fred’s own past fights, and admits that Black children and poor white children are treated differently.

Anne immediately offers money, first thinking Robert might be bailed out, then realizing he has already been sentenced. Gloria asks about other options, such as a lawyer or a letter to Judge Morris, but Anne admits her own influence is limited and that local lawyers may fear the McCormacks and the stigma attached to Gloria’s father. Even so, Anne promises to consult her friend Channing Holt, a woman law student who may know what to do. The chapter ends with Gloria holding onto real hope for the first time since Robert was taken away.