Part 1 (through page 51) Summary

The novel begins with a reunion at a midsummer ball. A group of Oxford graduates has banded together in a "Gesellschaft" or Brotherhood in order to facilitate the work of one of their friends. David Crimond, the central character of the novel, is a brilliant, charismatic but eccentric political philosopher with radical ideas about how to transform society. His friends have agreed to support him financially as he researches and writes "the Book," but as the years pass there is little evidence that such a book actually exists. When the members of the Brotherhood discover that Crimond has unexpectedly attended the ball, there is great concern about Jean, the wife of Duncan Cambus, who was seduced by him many years earlier. Their friends fear more trouble for the marriage as they consider the likely possibility that Crimond has come...