After the incident at the cantina, the lines between the Anglos and Mexicotexans in Guálinto’s class accentuate. María Elena and Guálinto are no longer together, and his grades begin to slide due to his pining for her.

Guálinto visits the local WOW social club, an integrated billiards hall where Mexicotexan and Anglo patrons get along quite well. El Colorado, who dropped out of school years prior, is the bouncer, and they spend their afternoons together listening to the old men tell stories.

Guálinto receives news that his uncle needs him, and he walks home with his friends. He expresses doubts about continuing on to college, though his friends insist that he must and encourage him to choose a concentration soon.

Feliciano meets Guálinto at home and informs him that Judge Norris’s bank, the Jonesville National, which managed most of the money and mortgage for El Danubio Azul, has collapsed. A crooked clerk named E.C. Carlton had been embezzling funds from the bank and playing the stock Fmarket, losing everything in the crash. As a result, Feliciano has lost El Danubio Azul.

He asks Guálinto to help him empty the store of its goods, as he still owns them and might be able to sell them separately.