The first morning he is to drive the trolley, Hurstwood must stop the car because strikers have stacked rocks on the tracks. When the train stops, a mob swarms it, throwing rocks through the windows until the police break up the attack. Another mob stops the train later that same day. This time, Hurstwood is attacked. The mob pulls him from the train, “kicks and blows raining on him” (292), until the police rescue him. As Hurstwood heads back to the train, a bullet stings his shoulder. Panicking, Hurstwood abandons the car and runs home. There, he seeks the sanctuary of his rocker and reads the newspaper accounts of the strikers’ attacks. He never returns to work.

As Hurstwood struggles in his new job, Carrie finds success on stage. During a performance when a lead directs a question to Carrie, she adlibs a line that the audience finds funny. The director agrees to keep the line in and convinces the company director to move Carrie to a speaking part after one of the actors leaves the show. When another of the other actors, Lola, offers Carrie a place to stay if she is willing to split the rent, Carrie sees that Hurstwood is a problem with an answer.