The Noble Ladies' Orphanage

Chapter 24

"Who wants to ride in my carriage?" Dr. Richter asked the bundled up girls on the front steps of the Noble Ladies' Orphanage. Livie, Ester, and Ursula climbed into his carriage. He lifted his eyebrows and looked directly at Susana as if to ask if she would join him. She kept her face expressionless and turned away.

Peter, chatting with Maria as he fastened the horses to another carriage, noticed Susana's response to Dr. Richter's invitation. "There's plenty of room in this carriage, Susana," he said.

"Thank you," Susana said. "I'm just going to check on the trunks." She went around the back side of each carriage and looked inside the trunks that were bound to the jump seats. Inside the trunks, the girls had carefully placed candles in glass jars and floral wreaths made from flowers grown in the orphanage's green house. The gardener had helped them learn how to grow them, and they were very proud of their work.

"It looks like we're short one seat," Agnes said, walking among the three carriages and counting the girls with her index finger.

"It's all right," Maria said. "I'll sit in the driver's seat with Peter."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Agnes said.

"Would you rather have me sit on your lap?" Maria asked.

"Very well," Agnes said. Peter helped Maria to climb up on the driver's seat, and Agnes got in one of the carriages. Each carriage had a footman, and the footmen now closed the carriage doors.

The girls had all participated in All Saints' Day before, but only to put flowers and candles on the graves of grandparents or great-grandparents. Today, when so many of them planned to decorate the graves of their own parents, they felt more solemn.

As they approached the first graveyard, the graveyard requisitioned by the Hapsburgs for burying their military heroes, Maria's mood became somber. The carriages slowed to a standstill, and the girls emerged from the black carriages. The moon was just rising, but they didn't need its light because hundreds of candles in glass jars and vases lit the graveyard like fireflies. Peter helped Maria down from the driver's seat and she retrieved her wreath and candle from the trunk attached to the back of the carriage. She had grown bold red Gerber daisies for her father and attached them to a lush wreath of rosemary bows. She held it to her face and closed her eyes as she breathed in the piney scent.

Joanna and Elizabeth also had parents buried in this graveyard, and they all split up to pay their respects.

Maria walked past a tall crypt and pushed willow branches out of her way. She remembered exactly where her father's grave was, but she stopped short when she saw someone standing there in front of the grave. At first she thought it might be Claudia, and she felt a twinge of guilt that she hadn't tried to spend more time with her. The person standing at the grave turned at the sound of her footsteps. It wasn't Claudia. It was Lieutenant Nagel. He held his feathered hat against his chest, and he had already lit a candle and placed it on Captain Roth's grave.

"Hello," he said, stepping back and making room for Maria in front of her father's grave.

"Hello," she said.

She laid her jar next to his at the base of the gravestone. "May I help light your candle?" Lieutenant Nagel asked.

"Yes, please," Maria said. He took the candle out of his own jar and bent it to the candle in her jar. When the wicks came together, tiny sparks rose from Maria's candle and hissed until the flame settled into a fluid, still light.

"How have you been?" Lieutenant Nagel asked.

"Very well," Maria said, "all things considering."