“I’ll do my best.” He moved back and patted his chest over his coat, digging out a few small items. “Here, take this and hide it, just in case you’re stuck.” He wrapped the items—a set of matches and a small folding knife—in a handkerchief and passed the little packet through the crack. “It should help you get to the morgue if you hit a snag. Now get going, and don’t raise any eyebrows for the next two days. Can you manage?”

“No promises.” Footsteps crunched over dry ground somewhere behind me. I spun, tucking the little packet in my belt.

“Just . . . be in that cellar.”

My relief was indescribable. “Done.”

I slipped back toward the laundry with fresh hope and new strength.

A scream split through the clank of machines, jerking me into alertness. I darted for the door. Bridget crouched on the ground between a tussling Clara and Kat, crying out over and over, banging fists on her forehead. Whistles blew as two nurses pulled the chaos of limbs apart, yelling above the hiss of steam, and Bridget launched herself up, flinging her arms about and striking a nurse.

I dropped my bucket and ran to Bridget. “What is this? What happened?”

No one answered me, but when they had Bridget standing, arms twisted behind her back, her dark eyes met mine and her gaze was steady. She gave a slight nod. Then they spun her and hauled her away.

“What’s happening?” I whispered to Clara.

She shrugged. “She goes to the stacks a lot—solitary. Can’t abide when people ruin her patterns, and some folks can’t abide her bossing them.” She looked me over. “You’re the lucky one, aren’t you? They were about to go see who was standing around out in the yard. Could have been you instead.”

Lucky, indeed. I watched that wiry frame disappear through the doorway between two nurses, recalling her secret look, and knew my near miss had nothing to do with luck. “How long will they keep her?”

Clara shrugged again, little pink lips pinched. “A day, most likely. She’s in there so often they daren’t keep her longer or she’d never see daylight.”

“What if it’s longer? Is there a way . . . could I go and see her?”

She frowned. “In solitary?”

“No, perhaps just a message. Clara, would you give her a message for me?”

“Tell her yourself. It’ll only be a day or two.”

“Right. Of course.”

I exhaled and rested my fingertips on the little packet tucked in my belt. One day in there, and I’d be able to thank her before I escaped. Another, and I’d have to choose.

15

I will seize fate by the throat; it shall certainly never wholly overcome me.

~Ludwig van Beethoven