Stamp Paid, upon learning that Paul D left 124 Bluestone Road on the day that he saw the newspaper clipping, scolds himself for violating Sethe’s family's privacy. He thinks over the sequence of events that Baby Suggs's family endured after the "Misery" of Beloved’s murder and after the death of Baby Suggs shortly before the end of the Civil War. He recalls that after Baby Suggs’s death, neighbors distanced themselves from Sethe, who avoided Beloved's funeral service and stood stonily at the graveside. For six days after Paul D leaves, Stamp Paid tries to knock on Sethe's door but cannot find the courage to do so.
On the other side of the door at 124, Sethe tries to rid herself of anger. She decides to take Denver and Beloved ice skating, but before they go, her thoughts return to jail, the loss of her earrings, and small parcels of food that Baby Suggs handed her through the bars. Sethe remembers that during her leave of absence to attend the baby's funeral, Howard and Buglar refused to come near her. Within three months of being jailed, Sethe gained her freedom. She bartered sex for a gravestone and had the carver inscribe one of the words that she heard Reverend Pike say during the funeral service invocation, "Dearly Beloved." Weighed down by these memories, Sethe trudges to work late for the first time in 16 years.
Stamp Paid, pondering the source of his name and wondering if he owed a debt to Denver and Baby Suggs, discusses Sethe's strange household with Ella, who was one of many black neighbors to snub Sethe after Beloved's murder. Ella suggests that Stamp Paid may find answers to his questions from Paul D, who has been sleeping at the church. Stamp Paid chides Ella for not opening her own home to Paul D in a time of need. He rejects Ella’s criticisms of Sethe and acknowledges that his own meddling caused Paul D to leave 124.
As Sethe ends her day's work for Sawyer, she recalls how trusting she was at Sweet Home before Mr. Garner's death, when things changed and slaves had to steal, lie, and deceive in order to endure life. She recalls her humiliation at hearing schoolteacher instruct his nephews to catalogue her human traits and her animal traits. The realization that Buglar and Howard would soon be large enough for schoolteacher to sell disturbed her sleep. Sethe congratulates herself for managing to save her children from slavery.
