On the Sunday morning after one of the war's worst raids on London, John Colville walked from Downing Street toward Westminster Abbey and saw a city still burning. Smoke, falling charred paper, and crowds of onlookers and rescue workers showed how severe the destruction had been. At the abbey he learned there would be no service, then viewed the damaged Palace of Westminster, Big Ben, and fires along the Thames. The scale of the devastation convinced Colville that London looked more deeply wounded than after any previous raid, and he telephoned Churchill at Ditchley with the news.

That same morning, Mary Churchill and Eric Duncannon struggled to reach Ditchley because the bombing had disrupted normal travel. During the long, difficult trip, Mary's private doubts about the engagement sharpened, and Pamela's warning not to marry simply because a man wanted marriage kept returning to her. Mary told Eric about her unease, and he responded gently, but the uncertainty followed her into the house.

Back in London, Colville went to the Foreign Office and was handed a call from a man identifying himself as the Duke of Hamilton. The caller insisted that only Churchill could hear the news and said it concerned a German aircraft that had crashed in Scotland. Because the message sounded fantastical, Colville briefly wondered whether Hitler or Göring had somehow arrived in Britain. Churchill, irritated but intrigued, ordered Colville to make sure the caller really was the duke and to send him straight on if confirmed.

The chapter then shifts to Hitler's headquarters, where Albert Speer witnessed the reaction to Rudolf Hess's letter. In the letter, Hess explained that he had flown to England on his own initiative to try to negotiate peace and advised Hitler to disown him as mad if the effort failed. Hitler exploded in rage, summoned his top lieutenants, and had Hess's adjutants arrested, along with Albrecht Haushofer. Hitler's immediate fear was political damage if Churchill revealed the truth, though Göring's technical staff tried to reassure him that Hess would probably fail to reach Britain at all.

At Ditchley, Clementine finally confronted Mary and made clear that she wanted the engagement postponed for six months. Mary wept but admitted she could not honestly say she was certain about marrying Eric, and she gradually recognized that her mother's intervention expressed wisdom rather than cruelty. Because Churchill was preoccupied with war matters, Clementine took charge, informed Eric, and asked Averell Harriman to comfort Mary. Walking with Harriman in the garden, Mary accepted that she had acted weakly and felt relieved that the engagement was being delayed, even though she ended the day humiliated and subdued. That night, after telegrams were sent and tensions settled somewhat, the party watched a film at Ditchley with the apt title World in Flames.