It opens on Armistice Day, November 11, 1918, in Valentine Wannop’s school, and the three chapters which make up the first Part are punctuated by fireworks exploding and the celebrations taking place in the surrounding streets.
Edith Ethel is malicious, and has managed to link Valentine’s name compromisingly with Tietjens’ in an earlier part of her conversation – which she had with her headmistress.
The bombardments which take place in this novel are perhaps less bloody and desperate than in No More Parades, though Tietjens does remember at one point the terrible death of O9 Morgan.
Up to and even including the final explosive scene, with one notable exception, Tietjens’ emotional and psychological responses under fire are also subject to a greater sense of an evolving character.
Mrs Wannop, Valentine’s mother, and wife of Christopher’s father’s oldest friend, finds out, and seeks to prevent them becoming lovers.