As Chona Malachi lies hospitalized, trouble flares at Ahavat Achim on Chicken Hill: new Hungarian members have joined, and a giant bullfrog is found in the mikvah. Junow Farnok, insisting on his American name “Mr. Hudson,” offers $145 toward a new mikvah, demanding it be larger and built in fine marble, a grand request for a shul with little cash.

At the monthly chevry meeting, Rabbi Karl Feldman tries to manage Hudson’s demands while the men discuss practicalities. Pressed on where mikvah water comes from, Feldman admits the shul has long had an irregular supply because the town historically would not run water lines to Chicken Hill, and Chona’s late father left no formal contract or clear documentation of the solution.

Under further questioning from Irv Skrupskelis and Hudson, Feldman explains the shul secretly tapped into the well that feeds the public spigot near Clover Dairy by burying a Y-connection in the pipe. With the dairy’s growing use and a dropping water table, the well sometimes runs dry, slowing the mikvah’s fill; Hudson keeps returning to the bullfrog as a symptom of the problem.

When Irv proposes making the hookup legitimate or rerouting water, Feldman reveals a deeper obstacle: the Plitzka family, angered by a letter Chona wrote years earlier criticizing their refusal to share well water, has political power through Gus Plitzka Jr. on city council and repeatedly blocks water-line expansions to the shul’s area. Worse, Clover Dairy has just been sold to Plitzka, making any renegotiation risky.

The meeting turns uglier as Irv connects local corruption to Doc Roberts and repeats rumors about Doc’s visit to Chona’s store, furious that Feldman has not visited Chona or spoken with Moshe. Feldman finally names the man who installed the illegal connection: Shad Davis (now dead), a Black builder, whose son—nicknamed “Fatty”—still lives on the Hill. Hudson declares the congregation must modernize and leave Feldman to “unravel” the legal and moral mess, while Irv seethes at Hudson’s fixation on the frog amid Chona’s crisis.