On the fourth night of feverish reading, we finish Jane Eyre and pick apart the ending in the flickering candlelight. Lottie is pleased that Jane married Rochester and had a child. I’m pleased, too, but less so. Mother, it seems, is right. Money is important. Money changes everything. Where would Jane be without that inheritance from her long-lost uncle? If she was in Swaziland, I’ll tell you where she’d be: Living in a grass hut with nothing to eat but porridge. A blind and crippled husband. No running water. No money for school fees. No happy ending.

Without her uncle’s money, Jane is a righteous pauper. And where’s the harm in being Rochester’s second wife so long as he takes care of her and her children the way that Father takes care of Rian and me? Mother would find Jane foolish to have run from linen sheets and shelter only to return to the ashes of Thornfield Hall.

I keep my thoughts to myself, because Lottie is “ecstatic” that Jane remained true to herself and got what she wanted in the end. Jane is “steadfast” and “tenacious.” A “heroine.”

“Lucky about that inheritance,” I say, feeling disloyal to both Jane and Lottie.

“True.” Lottie laughs and lifts her dreidel so the light catches the Hebrew symbols painted on the sides. “When my father died, he left me this and his work boots. What will you get?”

I shrug. “Rian and I are a secret, so Father’s other children will probably get whatever he has. That’s why my mother likes money. The coins and paper notes are right there in her hand. She doesn’t have to wait, and she doesn’t have to guess what’s around the corner.”

“Do you love him?” Lottie asks.

A strange feeling shoots through me. I have no answer for her question.

She persists. “Do you love your father?” she asks, and I puff out a breath, annoyed at her. Lottie waits for my reply.

“Of course I love him,” I say, and then I add, “He pays the bills, so what choice do I have?”

“That’s not how love works,” Lottie says.

“Says who?”

“Says me and the books and the songs and the Bible. Do you love him? Yes or no, Adele.”

She won’t let go till she has her answer. I flex my hands to pump warmth to my fingertips, which are suddenly cold.

“I don’t know him. Not really.” I try to explain. “And I don’t know if I love him or if I’m just grateful to him for giving us a house and paying my school fees. He visits us when he can, and Mother calls him every Thursday. When he comes to Manzini, we’re glad to see him and he’s glad to see us . . . I don’t know.”

“Well, all right . . .” Lottie spins the dreidel between her fingers and changes the subject. A kindness. “We can still be Jane. But without the inheritance.”