“You know I have nowhere to go. I serve your will, your wishes. We all do. We must grind away to remake the world in your image. Not God’s, not our own, but yours!”

“I thought we were one on this, all of us.”

“Why must we all remake the world, Mary? What if I just want to live in it as it is?”

“I thought I was making a life for us, a life of independence—”

“Yes, we can be free so long as we are subservient to you. Even Fanny.”

“What about Fanny? She is here of her own will, we all are.”

“She is devoted to you beyond all reason.”

“We are the ruling passion of each other’s hearts and minds, no less.”

“And where does that leave us, your sisters? You treat us like children.”

“You behave like children! You want me to take care of you, while you do as little as possible on your own behalf, much less anyone else’s.”

“You go off to your lectures and discussion groups, your precious Dr. Price.”

“You want no part of that world. You’ve told me so yourself.”

“But did you know that Fanny stays behind to smooth our ruffled feathers? She is the sister we wish you were, Mary. And you seem not to see it at all. Not even to see her.”

“I see Fanny above all.”

“Then why haven’t you seen that she’s getting worse? Her coughing fits, her weakness? She cannot bear this damp, chilly England. It’s killing her. And yet you would work her to the bone. While she is the one keeping peace in this house. Behind your back.”

“Fanny is her own master.”

“Is she? Then ask her about Hugh Skeys.”

“You’ve had a letter from him, and didn’t tell me?”

It was her Sunday rest, of a sort. Fanny sat on top of the covers, propped against a pillow, shawl around her shoulders and thick wool socks on her feet. A piece of vellum on a makeshift easel rested against her bent knees; cloudy water and brushes in jars populated her bedside table, with pens and India ink, her paints, and a single flower, her subject. She still used her botanical drawings to earn money for her mother and siblings. This was her one day to do it.

Fanny’s ink-stained fingers slipped Skeys’s letter from under her pillow. “Two months ago.”

I sat on the edge of the bed with an offering of tea. She took it, set it on the table, along with the letter, but kept her eyes steady on her drawing.

“Words are not Hugh Skeys’s friend. Honestly, a cow could have written it better.”

I knew this was her way of dismissing the subject, so I kicked off my slippers, spun around, and sat on the bed beside her.