In this chapter, we learn that the two women have returned to Hong Kong, and Miss Jessel is suffering from scarlet fever. She has been poisoned with a mixture of serpentin and scarlet herband, and she is in a wheelchair. She asks the doctor if he can cure her, and the doctor says that he cannot, because the poison will clog up her veins and prevent her from cultivating herbs. She says that she will do anything to cure her sister, even if it means losing her