The next day, Alice goes into town on an errand for her father, passing Frincke's Business College on the way with a shudder, seeing it as a place that drags promising young ladies down to "hideous obscurity". On the walk back home, she encounters Arthur Russell, who shows an obvious interest in her. As she assumes he is all but spoken for, she doesn't know how to handle the conversation. She warns him not to believe the things girls like Mildred will say about her, and she tells a number of lies to obscure her family's humble economic status.