“I’ll take you,” he said, turning back to her. “Where’s your coat?”
Frances shrugged. Papa stood and went to the door. He called to the footman to fetch a coat for Miss Lumlee. Frances heard Mama Genevieve telling the footman where to find the coat, and she tensed. Now she would be scolded because she was not in the nursery. But Papa said something to Mama Genevieve, and she didn’t come inside the library to scold her.
Frances hopped down from the chair and gathered Harriet in her arms. She walked to the library door and peered out from behind Papa. Mama Genevieve looked down at her. “Why didn’t you tell me you wished to talk to your father?” she asked.
Frances lifted her shoulders.
“Do not shrug,” her father said. “It’s unbecoming.”
Frances wasn’t sure whatunbecomingmeant, but she certainly did it often enough.
“Answer your…” He gestured to Mama Genevieve.
Frances looked up at her and took a breath. “I didn’t want to hurt your feelings.”
“Why would my—Oh, because you want to see your mama? That doesn’t hurt my feelings. Youshouldsee her grave, sweetheart.” She knelt down and gave Frances a hug. Frances liked the way Mama Genevieve smelled. She didn’t smell like Mama, but it was still a nice smell.
“I wanted to tell her I still love her,” Frances whispered.
Mama Genevieve hugged her tighter. “I think that’s a very good thing to do.” She pulled back. “Don’t ever think I want you to stop loving your mama. Love isn’t like cake, you know.”
Frances glanced at Papa to see if he understood what Mama Genevieve was talking about. He shrugged, but she didn’t think now was the time to remind him that it was unbecoming.
“What I mean is,” Mama Genevieve continued, “love isn’t finite. Once you eat all the cake, it’s gone. But you can never run out of love. I think you have enough for your mama, your papa, Harriet, Admiral, even me.”
Frances nodded and held Harriet out. “Will you watch her while I go to the church?”
Mama Genevieve took Harriet in her arms. “Of course. Here’s your coat now.”
The footman helped her put it on, and Mama Genevieve tied her hat on. Then Papa took her hand, and they left the house and walked toward the church.
Frances had the song about the Baa Baa Black Sheep in her head, so she sang it as they walked. Her Papa sang along, and she laughed at how he sang “b-a-a-a” and sounded like a sheep.
Finally, they reached the chapel, and Papa brought her to the little wrought-iron fence. Frances felt her heart pounding, but she allowed Papa to lead her inside and to a gray, rectangularstone sticking out of the ground. He hunched down in front of the stone and looked at her. “Can you read that?”
Frances nodded. “‘Harriet Eugenie Dowling,’” she read. “What’s that word?”
“Devoted,” he told her.
She nodded. “‘Devoted wife and mother.’ What are the numbers?”
“This is when she was born. See, it’s the fourteenth of December, 1787. This is when she died—the twenty-third of February, 1814.”
Frances looked around. “You said she was here. I don’t see her.”
“She’s under the stone,” he said. “After the accident, we brought her and your baby brother here. The vicar prayed for them, and then we buried the bodies and marked this special place.”
“Do you think she is scared under the ground? She might be afraid of the dark.”
Papa sighed and rubbed Frances’s back. “She isn’t with us anymore, sweetheart. It’s only her body. Her spirit—the part of her that was alive—went to heaven to be with God.”
Frances considered this. “The Kingdom of Heaven?” she asked.
“That’s right. Sometimes we call it that.”
“So she is in a kingdom.”
“In a manner of speaking, yes.”
