Now that Jarndyce and Orval have arrived at the penitentiary, the conservatives have won the vote, and the ambassador will stay there as long as there's no investigation into the killing of Jarndy and Hortense. The narrator tells us that the penitentiary is "a dangerous place" because it's a supporter of the "starmen" . He tells the narrator to head toward the "slider" , where they'll all be chained together, eat together, sleep together, and nobody will care who is guilty or not. He says that the captain wants to see him, and that the guards have told him that fighting with them can earn them time with trucules, carnivorous insects. But the captain knows that Hortense is his girlfriend, so he's going to have to earn his bread tomorrow.