I had not counted on the Graces’ fear of death. By the time we reached Philadelphia on our journey back east, we had slept in the barns and sheds and church pews of smaller towns, and I’d thought they would be happy for real beds in the city, which Madame Elizabeth had promised we would find in her home.

Louisa saw the coffins first, and she reached for Experience’s hand. I think Experience would have spit at me if she could have.

Madame Elizabeth stood in the center of her shop and watched them. “I did not take you girls for being superstitious. I know you are good Christians and you know the only haint is the Holy Spirit.”

She had three coffins stacked alongside the shop’s dusty brick wall—a large one, for men, a slightly smaller one, for women, and then the smallest one, for children, stacked at the very top. The room was divided between coffins and dresses—on the left, the stacked coffins, on the right, a headless, armless torso in a long muslin skirt, horsehair blooming out of its stitched shoulders, and a table scattered with bolts of cloth.

Madame Elizabeth had us sit at the hearth that straddled both sides, to recover.

“Lord, but you must be busy,” she said to me.

“Yes, I suppose,” I said.

“A full year of studies done. I am sure you are tired.” She smiled and held my gaze.

I shook my head and looked into the fire. “But is Mama well?” I said. And then, “She seems to have aid in her new pupil—”

“Emmanuel, yes.” Madame Elizabeth nodded. “A fine boy, from a good family. He and Lucien were the best of friends, before they left for Haiti. He is very handsome, too.” She directed this to Experience, the lightest of us. I had forgotten how color-conscious Madame Elizabeth was. Experience, realizing she was the intended recipient of this information, blushed and cleared her throat.

“Yes, Emmanuel’s all right,” Lucien said. He had been sitting by the coffins, wiping one of them down with a rag, and had been watching the Graces with a smile that was not altogether kind. “I wish Emmanuel’d stayed down here with us. It would have made my life less dull.”

Madame Elizabeth laughed. “More like you would have gotten into more trouble than you already do.”

“So you see,” I said, “Mama has no need of word from me.”

“Oh, Libertie,” Madame Elizabeth said, “you’re a smart girl. You know you’d whip him in any contest. Especially after a full year at school. You do not ever have to worry of being crowded out of her affections. You are too old to be jealous of a person you’ve not even met.”