So Rosalie would like to ask Edwin to consult with John as if they are equals. To try not to provide such a vivid contrast to John’s failures. At the very least, Edwin could stop talking about the way poor Mother has been supporting them all, educating, clothing, feeding them on the paltry hundred or so dollars left in Father’s estate, as if John had been nothing but another mouth at the table, another millstone around Mother’s neck. Another albatross, just like his sisters.

—

Rosalie and Asia are working together in the parlor. Outside, a chilly winter morning. Inside, the bright sunlight is streaming between and through the lace curtains, dappling the floor.

Outside, the mulberry trees are dripping free of their glittering ice casings. Inside, it’s just turning warm enough to let the morning fire die. One charred log rests on a mound of glowing ash. Soon enough, when the sun shifts and the chill returns, Rosalie will coax that log into flame. For now, the sunshine suffices.

Asia is standing on a chair, in her work clothes, gingham skirt, burlap apron. She’s pulling books off the higher shelves and handing them down to Rosalie to be dusted. Asia’s talking to the books as she does this. “Hello, Homer, you old blind fool. Hello, Byron, you mad, bad man. Come! Let us clean your dirty faces.”

The stack of Mother’s Godey’s Lady’s Books can only be handed down a few at a time, so heavy are they with advice, fashion, and receipts for the modern woman. “Hello, little Oliver,” Asia says and hands Rosalie her own beloved Oliver Twist.

Rosalie blows the dust from the top of the pages. It dances through the sunlight and up Rosalie’s nose. She sneezes three times. “Bless you,” Asia says. “Bless you. And bless you again.”

If Asia weren’t there, working away, Rosalie would take a break now. Her crooked back is aching. She would sink onto the settee, put her feet up like a girl, open Oliver Twist, and read it again from the beginning.

She does this instead. She closes her eyes, asks for advice from Mr. Dickens concerning her talk with Edwin. She chooses a random page, and points. The sentences on which her finger has landed are these:

I only know two sorts of boys. Mealy boys and beef-faced boys.

Rosalie can, in fact, make this relevant to her current predicament. What she cannot do is make it helpful.

—