Was it her fault that girls her own age were more often than not so silly they made her itch? That the only people she’d ever found who let her be herself were among that motley collection of academics in Room 40? Still. She smiled now at Dot and didn’t at all mind that the Lord had finally given in to Maman’s prayers on this score. “If at any point you want to leave, please believe that we won’t be offended.”

Generally speaking, Dot did fine enough once she was out. But Margot had also learned that there came a point in the day when she was just finished. When the world got to be too much and she had to get home before the anxiety clawed her to bits.

On the average workday, that time came about ten minutes after her usual dismissal time. Margot certainly didn’t want to be the cause of it springing upon her on a Sunday, the day she usually holed up in the safety of her flat after the hour at Mass.

“Your niece is precious.” Dot’s focus had gone to where Lukas and Willa stood chatting with someone, little Zurie positioned happily on her mother’s hip, fingers hooked in her mouth. She’d inherited Lukas’s dark hair and eyes, set in a face shaped more like Willa’s. She was indeed a pretty little thing, which wasn’t surprising. Lukas was as beautiful in a masculine way as their mother was in the feminine, and it stood to reason he’d pass the family beauty along to his children. Though Willa got a glint in her eyes anytime someone praised her daughter’s beauty. She had a prejudice against being called pretty—and apparently didn’t like it applied to her little one either.

Zurie blinked and followed an invisible something or other with her eyes, tilting her head back to watch it. A midge, perhaps, or a dust mote. Or something no one but she could imagine. What did babies think about all day? Try as she might to recall, Margot hadn’t many memories from before she was two. On the one hand, it seemed babies’ worlds must be very boring—nothing but food and nappies and the same rooms day in and day out. But, on the other hand, everything was new and yet to be discovered, which may indeed be the most interesting experiences of their lives.

If so, then it was rather a shame she could remember only fleeting glimpses of it.