After the Mansion House ball, Carrie sharply criticizes Pooter’s friendliness with Farmerson. Pooter is disappointed to find their names missing from a newspaper account of the ball; when he asks them to correct the omission, the paper names them “Mr. and Mrs. C. Porter” (46). After another letter, the paper says that “Mr. and Mrs. Charles Pewter” has twice asked them to announce the “important fact” that they attended the ball.

When Carrie laughs at his pun about frayed shirts, the two amend their previous disagreement. The two laugh extensively, and Pooter then repeats the joke to a bus driver, the office staff, and the tailor.

For a change, the Pooters sit with the Cummings, Gowing, and Mr. Stillbrook. Mrs. Cummings and Carrie sing a duet, and Gowing sings a comic song that Pooter mostly enjoys but finds somewhat distasteful.

Pooter meets a friend named Mr. Franching, whom he describes as a “swell,” and invites him home for a potluck. When Carrie doesn’t answer the front door, Pooter goes around to the side, where the grocer’s boy is picking off the blistering paint. The men instead enter through the kitchen window.