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remembering to shake it out only when she felt the first twinge of the ñame against her skin.
    “You all right?” he called.
    She scurried back around the corner, holding the lamp in triumph. “You go on down,” she said. “I’ll hold the lamp for you from up here.”
    “Scared to go down to the pits of hell with me?” he said, cocking his head and sending her what she was sure was a wink.
    Before she could reply, he was descending the ladder, lamb balanced perfectly on his shoulder, leaving her at the threshold of the cellar, breathless.

  

     

 
    n the evenings after supper, Reverend Joseph retired to his study with his pipe, his brandy, and his Bible. He was left there alone for exactly thirty minutes while Kassandra helped Clara clear away the supper dishes and put the kitchen back in order. When all was tidied away, Kassandra went to the study door and knocked softly three times. Sometimes she would be given a muffled, “Good night, Sparrow,” through the heavy wooden door, but other nights—and these were the nights she treasured—she would be summoned inside to sit on the thick, soft rug at Reverend Joseph’s feet.
    It was here that Kassandra first learned to speak English, carefully mimicking Reverend Joseph’s pronunciation and intonation as she recited Scriptures in the firelight. Meaningless words at first, but as her understanding of the language grew, so did her comprehension of God’s holy Word. One evening, when Kassandra was still a very little girl, Reverend Joseph leaned forward in his big leather chair and settled his Bible on his knees, running his well-groomed finger along the words as he read aloud in slow, clear English: “ Are not two sparrows sold for ajarthing? And one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.”
    Kassandra brought a hand up to her hair–just grown long enough to reach the bottom of her ears—and made a joke in broken English about what an easy job God would have counting the hairs on her head. Reverend Joseph had laughed gently, then took her small hand in his own.
    “Do you understand, mein kleiner Spatz , what this means?” he asked her. “It means that God—God, who created all of the universe, all of the world—knows exactly who you are.”
    “And He sees me?”
    “Always. He saw you when you were all alone in the city. He sees you now.”
    At that, Kassandra had shifted her gaze above Reverend Joseph’s head, her large gray eyes scanning the ornate ceiling, much to the older man’s amusement.
    “No, no, my Sparrow,” he said, chuckling. “This is not a cause for fear. Quite the contrary, in fact.”
    Reverend Joseph let go of her hand and stood to cross the room to a wall lined end to end, floor to ceiling, with bookshelves stocked solid with leather-bound tomes of religion and history with the occasional frivolous novel stuffed in between. The monotony of gilded spines was interrupted occasionally by the odd knickknack—most brought by his mother wrapped in soft cloths to survive the voyage from the old country. He scanned the shelves, as if looking for the perfect title, but his hand instead came to rest on a tiny figurine, a little brown-spotted bird that seemed poised to take flight from the brown china branch clutched in its perfectly painted claws. Reverend Joseph brought the tiny treasure over to where Kassandra sat, still coiled on the rug, and held it balanced in his open hand.
    “May I touch it?” Kassandra asked, her hand already hovering.
    “Yes,” Reverend Joseph said, kneeling, “but be careful. It is very fragile, you see. If it were to fall from my hand, it would break into a hundred little pieces.”
    Kassandra allowed her fingers to graze over the smooth, cool surface of the wings while her eyes took in the work of such intricate detail. The artist had taken great pains to give the tiny bird