And how dare she suggest that Miss Temple herself faced anything resembling the same crossroads?

Suitably affronted to set the paper back down, Miss Temple turned her attentions elsewhere. Lydia Vandaariff's closet had a metal hip-bath and a very large Chinese jug of water. To either side of a tall mirror stood elegant tables, three-tiered like cakes and entirely cluttered with pins, ribbons, bottles, powders, paints, and perfumes. She tore off the corset and ill-fitting shift she had worn since her bath in Lina's kitchen and then, quite determined to be clean once more, sat naked on the carpet to unlace her boots.

THOUGH THE water was unheated, there was still a splendid array of sponges and soaps, and Miss Temple took the opportunity to scrub the whole of her body without any impediment of time. She must leave Harschmort eventually, but did it not make sense to wait until nightfall—a decision which, once made, allowed her hours? Washed and toweled at some leisure, she entered into a scrupulous investigation of Lydia's wide array of scents. While Miss Temple could not but view so many choices as emblematic of Lydia's essential lack of character, she was nevertheless curious whether her own sensible routine might be improved. Out of deliberately minded perversity, she settled upon a concoction of frangipani flowers, the Contessa's signature scent, placing a drop behind each ear, on each wrist, and then dragging one wet fingertip from the join of her collarbones down between her breasts.

Though Lydia had been taller than she, Miss Temple found several dresses that fit and one in particular that would allow her to run. This was a murky shade of violet that went quite well with both her boots (she was committed to her boots) and with her hair. That the fabric was dark meant it would not so eagerly show the dirt her actions must acquire, that it was sensible wool meant she would not be cold—practical insights that pleased Miss Temple very much.

Yet before the dress came an exacting selection of undergarments, and here, more than anywhere, the late Miss Vandaariff had not skimped. The possibilities presented to Miss Temple became quite literally overwhelming, as each new garment opened lurid implications— a veritable advent calendar of wickedness—in her mind. She was forced to pause, eyes open, cheeks flushed, and thighs tight together, until the fluttering tide had passed. With trembling fingers she selected silk replacements for her long-lost little pants and bodice, then petticoats, and a corset she put on backwards, tightened as well as she could, and then inched around until the laces were behind her. This done, Miss Temple sat at Lydia's mirror and did her steady best, availing herself freely of pins, ribbon, and a tortoiseshell comb, to strip the knots from her hair and restore the sausage curls she associated with her own accustomed presentation. She was not her maid Marthe— and had she been asked, she might well have admitted it—but she possessed some skill with her own hair (and since it had before been such a fright, the merest measure of success was welcome). Another half an hour slipped past before Miss Temple was at last presentable, the canvas sack exchanged for an elegant leather travel case, the glass book inside doubly wrapped within two silk pillowcases.

She knew she was dawdling, to keep away from outright danger and to indulge herself in the luxury to which she had been for far too long denied. She had even, as she washed herself and patted powder along her limbs, enjoyed the sensual tension of the Contessa's book, hovering like a cloud of golden bees just beyond reach, testing the limits of what she might allow and when she must bite the inside of her mouth to quell the sweetening tides. But then she came aware of another strain—an impatience with the petty vanity of her toilette— and she watched with fascination, both within the emotion and apart enough to see it, as the impatience grew into anger—with herself, with the luxury around her, with everything the useless life of Lydia Vandaariff had stood for. She shot home the latches on the case and picked it up. Without any thought but bitter disapproval, Miss Temple's hand lashed out at an especially over-glazed Chinese ginger jar and boxed it from its stand. The jar broke on the floor like a disconsolate egg, and she smiled. She stopped and snatched up another just like it. With grim satisfaction Miss Temple hurled the thing all the way back into the closet's mahogany door, the completeness of its destruction the exact expression of sharp justice she had desired.

MISS TEMPLE, now unsettled and sour, retraced her path down the corridor. If she could suppress the glass books' active interference with her thoughts, she could not expunge the fact of their encroachment—nor pretend that suppression was any lasting victory. As she walked, she sensed the prison's bones behind the paint and powder of Harschmort's splendor. Was she any different? Just as the lurid memories from the Contessa's book mocked Miss Temple's most secret desires, the Comte's book made clear its own web of grim connection—that death was shot through her past, her family, her wealth, and in her every morsel of anger or condescension or contempt.

She glanced into a mirror on the wall, its heavy gold frame carved with impossibly lush peonies, the blossoms blown open in a way that made Miss Temple uncomfortable. But what caused her to stop before the glass and rise to her toes was the pallor of her face. There had been mirrors in Lydia's chamber, and she had naturally glanced at her own body as she bathed—the shape of her legs, the appearance of her bosom, the tightly curled hair between her legs when it was wet and soaped—but this was a way of looking and not seeing. Miss Temple poked a finger into the skin below her eye and took it away—there was a brief impression of pink where the fingertip had been, but it faded at once, leaving her complexion waxy and drawn. She bared her teeth and was distressed to see the edges of her gums were red as the flesh of a fresh-cut strawberry.

MISS TEMPLE peeked over the railing of the main staircase, her newly set curls hanging over her face, and saw a passing line of bright red uniforms far below. There had been no soldiers accompanying their coach, which meant others had arrived. Did this mean Colonel Aspiche? She could not descend to the foyer if there was anyone who might recognize her. She quickly darted down one flight, just to the next landing. She would cut along this hallway, stay out of sight, and find a servant's staircase to the ground. But when Miss Temple hurried around the first corner she nearly collided with a Captain of Dragoons.

He was fair-haired with an elegantly curled moustache and side whiskers. It was the officer she'd seen in the corridor of Stäelmaere House, sick and tottering after his audience with the Duke. Behind him in a line, the oldest holding hands with the Captain, were three primly dressed children.

“Good afternoon,” said Miss Temple, bobbing in a tardy sketch of a curtsey.

“Closer to evening, I think,” replied the Captain. His voice was soft but sharp, like a talking fox in a tale.

“And who are all of you?” asked Miss Temple (who did not appreciate foxes), smiling past the officer at the three children. She did not especially appreciate children either, but could be kind to them when they were silent. All three watched her with wide, solemn eyes.

“I am Charles,” said the middle child, a ginger-haired boy in a brushed black-velvet suit. He sniffed. “Master Charles Trapping.”

“Hello, Charles.” Miss Temple loathed the boy at once.

“I am Francesca,” said the oldest, a girl with hair near the color of Miss Temple's own. Her chin was small and her eyes too round, but her dress was a shade of lilac Miss Temple very much approved of. The girl's voice was low, as if she was not at all confident of her surroundings but as the oldest needed to assert precedence over her brash younger brother. Francesca turned to the third, a boy of perhaps three years, also in a velvet suit, holding in one hand the remains of a chocolate biscuit. “That is Ronald.”