A month into her infiltration, the narrator joins another swimming excursion with the Moulinards. Walking with Aurélie, Sophie, and Paul, she notices the latter two whispering suspiciously, suggesting some commune members still distrust her despite her growing friendship with Aurélie.

Sitting on a rock by the river, Aurélie apologizes for the others' behavior, attributing it to xenophobic snobbery. To reassure the narrator, Aurélie reveals the commune's plan: they intend to protest at the upcoming agricultural fair in mid-September by blocking its entrance, demonstrating against the Tayssac reservoir and the diversion of the Guyenne's water. The narrator notes she has been seeing posters for the fair everywhere, including in Vantôme's bar where she went to observe Naïs, and recalls that the fair will be held at the local lake she shares with René, a lake potentially threatened by the megabasin.

At the river, the narrator spots Franck, the thirteen-year-old local boy from Vantôme who fathered a child with his teacher, on the opposite bank. Unlike the swaggering ringleader she previously observed, Franck appears innocent and sweet, playing devotedly with his two-year-old son, bringing pebbles and doing handstands to make the toddler laugh. The hippie parents raising the child look on. The narrator feels an unexpected envy at the purity of Franck's love for his son. Aurélie, watching her watch Franck, dismisses him bluntly as "a complete asshole."