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gave it a little shove and was surprised to find that it moved slightly on its pedestal. She left it that way, an inch off center.
    Back in the car, she decided to head home and start researching adoptions on the Internet. She passed beneath the stone archway that marked the cemetery entrance, noticing how the bare trees in the distance appeared to have only two dimensions against the flat and patient dove-gray sky, as though they were etched on ceramic tile.

    YULIA DOLETSKAYA wore a polyester slacks suit in navy blue, her white shirt tucked inside the elastic waistband. Lucy glanced at the dandruff gathered on the jacket’s shoulders but tried not to look at the wiry hair that stuck out from a mole on Yulia’s left cheek. Her breath smelled of breakfast meat and strong coffee, and the top of her outdated computer monitor was crowded with dusty Beanie Babies. On the plus side, she had a firm handshake.
    Lucy sat down, knees together, hands folded, toward the edge of a worn couch draped in some sort of tweedy pumpkin-colored slipcover. She had been to five other adoption agencies within the first week after visiting Harlan’s grave, and all of them told her she needed at least $25,000, which was a problem. She had $10,000 in a savings account from when her great-aunt Paloma had died, and a money-market account with another $9,000 or so—her new-car fund—but she had no idea where she’d get the rest. It didn’t seem wise to start out with loans on top of an empty savings account. In addition to that, two of the agencies had frowned on single-parent adoptions. One woman had handed her a stack of paperwork as thick as the Baltimore phone book, with a request for eight personal references. Lucy wasn’t sure she knew eight people she could ask to vouch for her moral character.
    At first the roadblocks had only made her more determined, but increasingly, she had episodes of fevered anxiety. She combedthrough adoption Web sites and read message boards. She called friends who knew friends who had adopted. She filled out applications and waited for the phone to ring. Then she spotted a tiny ad in the
Baltimore Sun
classifieds: Doletskaya Adoptions. The agency, which handled Russian and Ukrainian adoptions, had seemed a little more relaxed, and now she knew why. The office had a secondhand feel to it, like a used-car dealership. She imagined the orphans with “JUST REDUCED” stickers slapped on their tiny-footed pajama-onesies.
    “So,” Yulia said, sitting down behind her desk. “I have important question: Do you want infant or older child?”
    “I’m pretty sure I want a baby,” Lucy said.
    “Most people want infant, but older children do very well. You say on the phone you have small apartment?”
    “Yes, but I can move to a two-bedroom duplex on campus. I’m on the waiting list.”
    “This is good,” Yulia said. “Social Services will want separate bedroom.”
    Lucy shifted as the coarse fibers of the pumpkin couch began to prick her skin through her black tights. She had worn a conservative black skirt to look motherly. She cleared her throat.
    “What kind of time line would we be talking about, assuming everything works out?” she asked.
    Yulia glanced out the window, then looked down and worked at the skin around her fingernails in the manner of someone waiting in a long line at the post office.
    “Russian system is very complex, some regions more demanding than others. Then we have also requirements from state and federal Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services. You could go to Russia over summer, depending on region. Many areas require two trips, but some can do entire adoption in one.”
    Lucy nodded, pleased that she might be able to travel over the summer when she wasn’t teaching. She wondered if she could manage a little field research on a saint she had always found fascinating: Savvati of Solovki, the patron of bees. Yulia interrupted her thoughts.
    “You have work, Miss McVie. You must