Sometimes Hester was so exhausted that she begged Henrietta to take Caroline with her too, so that she could nap with Elaine. At five, Caroline was too young to sit still for long or to manage the tools the older children used—but she was genuinely fascinated by the caterpillars and moths. She made the room untidy, she ruptured Henrietta’s careful plans (where had the calm days with Hester gone?), but still her interest was thrilling. Why? she asked, throughout the afternoons. Why did the caterpillars shed their skins? Why did some eat their shed skins, and why were the heads first too big and then too small, and why did some have horns? She tore open a chrysalis when Henrietta wasn’t looking, prying inside with a sharp stick: Why couldn’t she find the moth growing in there, what was all that jelly? Henrietta had to guard against neglecting the others while devoting too much attention to Caroline’s questions and trying to explain to her what an experiment was, and how it was useful. Exhausting, that curiosity. Annoying—but also delightful. Less delightful was the pained look on Marion’s face when she saw her sister absorbing so much of Henrietta’s time.

HENCE THE ROSY maple moths of that afternoon’s session: an offering. Pleasing in their color and texture if not their shape, a way of showing that Henrietta cared what Marion liked. She hadn’t counted on having Elaine with her that afternoon, though. Nor on Caroline being so curious about the wiggling pupae. As she tucked Elaine more securely into the crate on the floor, Henrietta looked into Caroline’s eyes and emphasized her responsibility again.

“Just you,” she repeated.

Caroline nodded, even as Henrietta resolved to watch the pair closely. The box was the same as when Marion had used it, but everything else was different. No Hester, working with her companionably. No beloved mother in the house across the garden, ready to take over if a baby cried. And all her youngsters this year were young.

Eager, though, and intelligent: Emily, Franklin, Clover, and James had helped Henrietta collect a heap of green-striped mapleworms last fall, decanting them carefully into shallow trays of earth that they dotted with maple leaves. They’d watched the redheaded worms burrow into the dirt and transform into slim dark pupae, but then, after Henrietta tucked the trays in the root cellar, forgotten about them over the winter. Now they were thrilled to see them wake in the warm room. Clover touched the pointed fork on one and said, “Look! It moved!” And then Franklin said, “That one’s cracking open!”