The denouement of Philip Winter's ill-begotten engagement to the feather-brained Rose Birkett is enacted in full view of Southbridge School's extended family during a holiday break. Evidence of Rose's empty head is plain to see when, at tea, "through sheer want of personality", she brings conversation to her own level and insists that Hamlet and Shakespeare are both names of plays, and most probably the same one. Everyone, including her own parents, is rooting for Philip's escape. What they couldn't have hoped for was that Rose, overwhelmed by the sheer dullness of being engaged, would break it off herself.