In Concord in October 1902, Bailey spends the day impatiently waiting for nightfall so he can return to Le Cirque des Rêves. At dinner, his mother worries about the crowds the circus will bring, and Bailey’s sister Caroline needles him about a past dare to sneak in. Bailey announces he is going anyway; his mother tells him not to be late and orders him to take Caroline, but Caroline refuses, and Bailey leaves alone at dusk.

At the field, Bailey joins the gathered crowd as the gates and tents ignite with lights, the sign sputtering to life: Le Cirque des Rêves. He buys a single ticket and enters, struck by familiar scents and a renewed, private hope of glimpsing the red-haired girl in white he once met. He buys mulled cider, relieved to find it tastes even better than he remembers.

Bailey stops to watch a contortionist performing on a platform. After bending herself into a transparent glass box, the box fills with white smoke; it then pops and collapses into broken glass, leaving the box empty and the performer completely vanished, with no visible escape.

Drawn to a sign reading Feats of Illustrious Illusion, Bailey enters a small tent with chairs arranged in a circle. Once seated, Bailey realizes the entrance has vanished, and a dark-haired woman in a black coat is suddenly sitting beside him though she had not been there a moment before. An empty chair across the circle erupts in flame, sending the audience into panic as they discover there is no door; the dark-haired woman winks at Bailey, steps into the center, and throws her coat over the fire, transforming it into black silk that extinguishes the flames and reveals white doves. The silk becomes a top hat, and the woman—now in a black, crystal-studded gown—begins an unbroken sequence of impossible effects, including transforming a pocket watch into sand and lifting the audience’s chairs off the ground.

At the act’s end, the illusionist bows and turns, vanishing mid-rotation, leaving only shimmering traces. The door reappears and the audience exits. Outside, Bailey finds a new platform displaying a nearly motionless, white-clad figure shedding slow-falling, iridescent snow; the figure’s eyes track him. A silver plaque partly hidden by the trailing gown reads in memoriam, but does not name who is being mourned.