Living at the Cutters', Ántonia has more time to spend with Lena, Tiny, and Norwegian Anna. One afternoon, the girls tease Jim about his grandmother's hope that he become a Baptist preacher when he grows up. Because Jim shows no interest in Black Hawk's young girls and prefers the older, hired girls' company, the townspeople begin to whisper among themselves that there must be something strange about him.
Jim discovers that he can't go to the Harlings' in the evenings; Mrs. Harling is cool to him because he is still associating with Ántonia. In desperation, he searches for something interesting to do, but every place he goes is dull, and everyone he talks to seems to be scheming for ways to get out of this small town because they too are bored. For a while, Jim goes to Anton Jelinek's saloon to listen to the talk, but Anton knows that Grandfather Burden doesn't approve, so he asks Jim not to come in any more.
Jim prefers the dances at the Firemen's Hall, where the hired girls go, rather than the dances at the Masonic Hall, where the so-called respectable young townspeople socialize. He knows his grandparents would disapprove, so he has to sneak out in order to attend. One night Jim walks Ántonia home. When he tries to kiss her passionately, she scolds him. Defensively, he tells her that Lena has let him kiss her like that. She warns him not to make a fool of himself like the other Black Hawk boys because he's going away to school to make something of himself. That night Jim dreams of Lena coming to him — sensuously, reaping hook in hand — across a harvested field. On waking, he wishes he could have the same dream about Ántonia.
