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pneumonia take them that was careless in such things.”
    Susannah nodded, touched by the woman’s concern. They were, she suspected, more alike than different, for, like Maisie, Susannah had taken care of others for the better part of her life. “I’ll be careful,” she said. She wasn’t planning to go out, at least not that day, but she would need to put up fliers soon, offering her services as a piano teacher in order to have money of her own.
    â€œYou hurry yourself, young feller,” Maisie said to the boy. “School’ll be startin’ right quick.”
    Jasper made a face. Like his mother, he was unremarkable in appearance, but Susannah had a sense that he shared Maisie’s determined, kindly nature. Then heproceeded to finish his oatmeal, and Susannah did likewise.
    A feathery snow was just beginning to fall when Jasper and Maisie left the house, both of them bundled against the cold, and Victoria summoned Susannah with a furious shriek of hunger.
    After a number of days spent sitting upright on a noisy, filthy train, surrounded by strangers, it was utter bliss to move about a warm, clean house, attending to ordinary tasks. She hummed as she took the warm bottle from its pan next to the stove, grabbed up the diapers and pins, and hurried up the stairs. Victoria began to scream with the lust of an opera singer.
    She was changing the baby’s diapers, amidst the din, a difficult proposition when she did not dare uncover the infant to the chill, when an impatient knock sounded at her half-open door and Mr. Fairgrieve stuck his rumpled head into the room. He was fully dressed, though in need of a shave, and Susannah wondered where, he’d passed the night, recalling that Maisie had said he hadn’t slept in his bed.
    â€œIs that kid dying or what?” he demanded. “For God’s sake, do something before she raises the dead.”
    â€œShe’s hungry,” Susannah said, somewhat testily. Victoria was in fine form, wriggling and kicking both feet. “I’ll attend to that as soon as I’ve finished with the diapers.”
    He thrust out a martyr’s sigh. “Well, hurry it up. I’m getting a headache.”
    â€œPerhaps,” Susannah pointed out, irritated not, oddly enough, because he was behaving impatiently but because he had been out all night, “if you went elsewhere, the noise wouldn’t bother you so much.”
    The baby continued to kick and flail and scream at the top of her tiny lungs, as if to put in her two cents’ worth. Muttering, Aubrey closed the door. Susannahfinished with the diaper, made a quick trip to the bathroom to wash her hands, and returned to give Victoria the bottle.
    Fifteen minutes later, sated at last, Victoria nodded off to sleep again. Smiling, Susannah kissed her smooth little forehead and laid her gently in the crib. Then she simply stood there, watching the baby sleep; the sight was infinitely beautiful to Susannah, and she was filled with a kind of joy she had never known before. Victoria was not hers, she had no illusions on that score, and yet, in the brief interval since her arrival in the household, Susannah had formed an enduring attachment to the child.
    She went to the chair near the window, sat down, and leaned forward slightly, resting her forehead on her palms while she struggled to rein in her emotions. She was normally level-headed; it was not like her to feel so deeply, and she was frightened.
    Maisie found her there minutes later. Although she had shed her cloak, her cheeks were bright from the cold outside. “Here now,” she said in a gruff whisper. “The little mite’s dropped off to sleep. Let’s you and me head downstairs and have ourselves some tea.”
    Gratefully, Susannah nodded and rose to follow Maisie out of the room and down to the kitchen.
    â€œThat Jasper,” Maisie remarked fondly, setting the kettle on to heat with a clunk of metal