127 Chapter 127

The tight knot in Splendor's throat-the only thing she seemed to have an abundance of these days-may have almost choked her, the cold may have snaked up through her thin linen dress, she still knelt on the dank ground. The simple wooden cross she'd just fashioned from two sticks and pushed into the earth bore witness to the stark reality of what she now had. Not much at all. Barely even the right to come here. In this hideous bonnet it was probably a good thing.

"I wrote to Mrs. Ferret, by the way. I know you'd have wanted me to square that up. I sent her the money. I thought it was best. If they'd found out I had it ... Well, they can't now. So it was the right thing to do. Reverend Charles has been kind. Even letting me do this."

A headstone with Topaz's name on it was just another thing she couldn't afford.