“I’d forgotten about the coffin,” Rose said. “My mother said, ‘It’s time to close the coffin.’ ”

“With all they have in this house,” Mary said, “all their belongings and all their money and all, you’d think they’d have different keys for the rooms, but no, it’s the same key for all the rooms. The kitchen used to be in the basement but they brought it upstairs. They can do anything they like.”

“Is it very hard work, Mary?” Rose asked.

“Oh, it’s more tedious than anything,” Mary said. “Not hard. But look, there’s someone on the stairs. Come on back in here with me.”

She pushed open the door of the room she had just left and went in there, with Rose following her, and closed the door softly behind them. The room was dark except for the faint red light cast by an altar lamp that burned low under a large picture of the Sacred Heart. The picture was hung between two windows, and the lamp was set on top of a glass-fronted cabinet that stood against the wall there. Rose could see the shine of the glass panels and through the glass small white shapes, of little ornaments, perhaps, precious china ornaments that were too good to be left out where they might be touched. The curtains were drawn across the windows; she could see only tall dark forms where the light would enter in the daytime. And where the darkness became impenetrable she knew the bed was, by the outline and the bulk she sensed there. But Mary was pulling her by the arm.

“Look, Rose. Look at that. Did you ever see the like of that? It’s her dressing table. I’ll never forget the first time I saw it. It’s all glass. Even the little knobs on the drawers are glass. Only the legs are wooden. Isn’t it lovely?”

“It’s lovely,” Rose said, and as she approached it, walking only a few steps to it, she began to see her own shadow and then her face in the large oval mirror that made its center, and then she saw Mary, who was standing behind her, and the two girls stood and watched themselves.

“We look very mysterious,” Mary said. “Don’t you think we look mysterious — as if we weren’t here at all. I wish I looked like this always. I’m fatter than you are.”

“It’s the uniform,” Rose said. “It’s too big for you.”