- By the middle of October, things in Maycomb have mostly settled down.
- Mr. Ewell gets a job with the WPA, but gets fired for laziness—a feat Scout has never heard of before or since.
- Brain snack: the Works Progress Administration was created to give unemployed people jobs during the Depression, so a person would have to be a really bad worker to get fired by them.
- After that Mr. Ewell goes back to picking up his weekly welfare check while blaming Atticus for his unemployment in a really menacing way.
- Atticus isn't worried, but Judge Taylor is on his guard.
- Around the same time, Mr. Link Deas gives Helen a job, even though he doesn't have much for her to do.
- Eventually Mr. Deas finds out that Helen has to go a mile in the wrong direction to avoid the Ewells, who harass her every time she walks by their place.
- Over Helen's protestations, he walks her home one day.
- On his way back he stops at the strangely silent Ewell place, and shouts that if he hears about them causing Helen any more trouble they'll be in jail so fast they won't have time to shut the door behind them.
- The next day, Mr. Ewell follows Helen to work, and Mr. Deas chews him out again; after that the Ewells don't bother her any more.
- Otherwise, life goes on as usual for Scout.
- As the end of October approaches, Scout remembers what happened the previous Halloween: the local kids got up a prank on two deaf old ladies, taking all the furniture out of their house and hiding it in their cellar.
- Talk about trick or treat.
- The ladies insist on bloodhounds to track down their stolen property, and Mr. Tate obliges, though he has to travel ten miles to get them.
- After three failed tries to get the bloodhounds to find a trail leading away from the house, Mr. Tate finally realized what had happened.
- This year, the Maycomb ladies are determined to keep the kids out of trouble, so they've planned a carnival in the high school auditorium.
- Ugh, adults, right? But Scout decides to go, anyway.
- Scout soon finds herself pressed into service to play a ham in Mrs. Grace Merriweather's tribute to Maycomb agriculture.
- Gee, this party sounds awesome.
- Mrs. Crenshaw makes Scout a ham costume out of wire and cloth, which is convincing if constricting.
- Neither Atticus nor Aunt Alexandra has the energy to attend the parade of meats, so Scout gives them a preview in the living room and gets Jem to take her over to the high school.