There is one night in the month of Bhādrapada when many families are careful not to look at Candra, the Moon. This is the story told for that restriction.
It begins at Śiva's home on Kailāsa. Nārada arrives carrying a new fruit and gives it to Śiva. Young Gaṇeśa asks for it. Śiva turns to Brahmā and asks who should receive the fruit; Brahmā says it should go to the young boy, and Śiva gives it to Gaṇeśa.
The chapter then moves away from the fruit. Brahmā returns to his work of creation, and Gaṇeśa places an extraordinary obstacle in his way.
Gaṇeśa assumes a fierce form. Brahmā reels before him. Candra sees that form, sees Gaṇeśa's attendants, and laughs.
The text does not treat the laughter as harmless amusement. It treats it as ridicule.
Gaṇeśa becomes angry and curses Candra: he is not to be seen in the three worlds, and anyone who sees him will share in the distress attached to that curse.
Candra loses his brightness and becomes invisible. He is overcome with anxiety and begins to wonder how this happened to him.
The other gods quickly understand that this is not a private quarrel. A world without Candra has a problem. Led by Agni and Indra, they go to Gaṇeśa, praise him and ask him to show favour to Candra and to the worlds affected by the curse.
Gaṇeśa is pleased with their appeal, but there is a difficulty. He will not make his own word false.
The chapter makes him say that even if Meru shook, the sun fell, fire became cold or the ocean crossed its boundary, his spoken word would not become false.
So he does not erase the curse. He narrows it.
The wording is unusually strict: the effect applies whether Candra is seen knowingly or unknowingly. The gods accept the limited form of the curse, bow to Gaṇeśa and shower flowers before carrying his decision back to Candra.
The restriction is placed on seeing Candra on the fourth day of the bright fortnight. The gods then tell Candra more specifically: he must not be seen on that fourth day in Bhādrapada.
They also tell him what to do next: go to Gaṇeśa for refuge.
Candra does.
He goes to the southern bank of the Gaṅgā, repeats Gaṇeśa's one-syllable mantra and undertakes a severe austerity. The Purāṇa gives the enormous span of one hundred and twenty years.
At last Gaṇeśa appears before him, dressed in red, wearing red garlands and red sandal paste, with four arms and an elephant's face, his splendour filling the worlds.
Candra is frightened at first. Then he steadies himself, folds his hands and praises Gaṇeśa.
Most importantly, he does not argue that the laugh meant nothing. In his prayer he calls what he did a transgression committed through ignorance and asks to be pardoned.
Gaṇeśa accepts the prayer.
He restores Candra to his former appearance, but the Bhādrapada-fourth restriction remains. The chapter says that looking at Candra then carries the effect of the curse.
Gaṇeśa also changes the relationship between them. He gives Candra a place on his own forehead in the form of a crescent, and prescribes occasions on which Candra is to be worshipped.
Candra then erects an image of Gaṇeśa and worships it. The gods and sages honour the place, and the chapter closes with Candra restored to his previous condition and returning home.
The new image is named for Gaṇeśa as the one who bears Candra, and the place is honoured as a place of accomplishment. The reconciliation is made visible in worship rather than left as a private exchange.
So the story does not end with someone being mocked and permanently cast away. The offence remains real; the spoken curse is not pretended away; refuge, austerity and pardon change what can still be changed.
The night remembers both things: the laugh that caused the hurt, and the refuge that was still given afterwards.