After Fordyce came in the early afternoon, mostly to declare the wine diet a success, Mary slept for a good few hours. There was nothing, anymore, to do. Visitors still sat in the parlor downstairs, wringing their hands, keeping Godwin company, hoping for one last word with Mary, but she’d said all the good-byes she had in her. How different it was, Mrs. B thought, waiting on death instead of birth. And still, perhaps the same. Both were a coming and going, a hello, a farewell. She hoped wherever it was Mary was going, it would be like another womb: no want, no thought, no pain, only sustenance, Heaven, and God’s love.

Reading, she fell asleep herself, hard and dreaming, and when her eyes opened, the first thing she saw in the shaft of gold light pouring in through the window was a spider finishing her web, knitting its gossamer filaments into a perfect whole. She heard Mary stir in the next room, a light moan, complaining of thirst.

“How strange to be as happy as I’ve ever been, and now to leave,” she said, after Mrs. B dripped water into her mouth from a soaked cloth, then dabbed her parched lips with it.

“Water,” said Mary. “How lovely.”

“All the water you want,” said Mrs. B. “What else can I do to ease your way?”

“What can I do to thank you, for having eased it already?”

Mrs. B looked down at Mary, surprised to feel no pity in her heart but a caring beyond what she’d ever known, in all the births, the stillbirths, the miscarries and unwanteds, the children birthing children, the wee worn-out dead babes whose mothers refused to surrender their bodies even after the stiffness set in. And now this, a woman whose caring she felt in return.

“There is one thing,” she said, a tremolo in her voice. “It’s about my James.”

“Your husband, James. I remember. Of forty years—”

“Died twelve days ago. In our bed. Right next to me, while I slept.”

“I’m so sorry,” said Mary, reaching for her hand. “If only you’d told us, Mrs.… Will you tell me your name?”

“Parthenia,” said the midwife.

“Parthenia Blenkinsop,” said Mary, her voice thin and breath shallow. “What a wonderful name.” Her heavy lids flickered; she tried to fix her gaze as best she could. “It’s so hard talking up at you.” She patted the pillow beside her with a thin hand, the one with the pretty orange ring. “Lie on the bed with me?”

Mrs. B looked down at her old black mules. Without a word, she slipped them off and stretched herself long on the bed to face Mary, feeling all her own weight, and gravity. She put her tired head on the pillow.

“Now, about your James.”

“It’s just, there are things I wish I’d said. And I thought, maybe, if you see him…”

“Tell me.”