This description by Helga Quadflieg

Returning from Lisbon, Baines is met on the quay by a highly-strung James who is little pleased by hearing about the shortage of cargo brought back from Senor Breganza. Enquiring after Anne, Baines is informed about the separation by James, who also assures him that Anne will certainly come back.

James’ hopes seem to come true when she actually returns to the house, but he has to find that she only came to collect some “things that belong to me”. Another argument follows, James reminds Anne that their marriage started off as a business partnership and he is obviously unaware how deeply offended Anne is by this reminder. Unable or unwilling to explicitly ask her to come back, he somewhat pompously offers to take her back provided she showed more ”loyalty” in future. Anne insists on her right to act according to her own moral principles. Warned by James that - as a woman - she will not survive on her own, she vows she would only come back if he explicitly asked her to and leaves.

But Anne has to learn that she has been far too optimistic about finding a job. When her money is stolen in a doss-house, she is too proud to use the name “Onedin” to get credit. She moves in with Ellen Jessop, whom she had supported during the strike. When Elizabeth happens to find Anne in her new surroundings, Anne makes her promise not to tell anyone about her whereabouts. During her excursions into the poorer quarters of Liverpool, Anne with her naivety (which sometimes borders on self-righteousness), is confronted with housing, living and working conditions of which she had been completely unaware. She encounters forms of (sexual) violence from which she had been sheltered so far and she has to find that institutions she believes in (police, the law) are perceived differently by the lower classes.

With her innocent trust in authority, Anne even gets Ellen into serious trouble: She is arrested as a prostitute and maltreated by the police after having been slandered by a neighbour whom Anne had threatened to report to the police for trying to rape her. Ellen finally urges her to go back to James: ANNE: I didn’t know that such things could happen in England. ELLEN: Your England is a different place than mine.... You’re only causing trouble here.... For me, it’s life and death, you’re only playing games.

Back in “Anne’s England”, the relationship between Albert and Elizabeth again has grown visibly colder. Their son William is suffering from medical problems, the doctor suggests that these may run in the family - Elizabeth wants to check with William’s biological father, Albert is strictly against contacting Daniel about this. Nonetheless, Elizabeth contrives to do so and there seems to arise a new closeness between her and Daniel.

At the same time, Elizabeth is piqued by Daniel’s flirtation with Emma and relishes telling Emma about Daniel’s earlier engagement to herself.

Meanwhile James and Baines are hoping to pick up a cargo of potatoes in Jersey in exchange for a cargo of Welsh anthracite. Soon after departure from Liverpool, they discover a young stowaway who wants to travel back to Jersey. As he has no money on hand to pay for the trip, he is made to work very hard on the voyage. Soon after arrival in Jersey, James finds that the boy is the son of an influential farmer who wants to take his revenge on James for the treatment of his son. Eventually James has to accept that there won’t be any cargo for him.

Back in Liverpool, Anne has finally found a job as an accountant (for much lower wages than her male predecessor)

The episode ends with a “far-distance dialogue” of James and Anne: Returning home, James happens to find the fan he had once given to Anne just when their relationship had begun to develop into a genuine love story (see I,4 “Catch as Can”). Looking at the fan, he “tells Anne: “You’ll be back !”. Anne, counting her first wages “replies” : “Well James, I’ve still got my head above water”.