Miss McCleethy shakes her head thoughtfully. “True progress can only happen when there is safety first.”
“What if safety…is only an illusion?” I say, thinking aloud. “What if there is no such thing?”
“Then we fall.” Miss McCleethy squeezes what’s left of her cake, and it falls to bits. “Chaos.”
I take a small bite of my cake. “What if that is only the beginning of something new? What if, once we let go, we are freed?”
“Would you take that chance, Miss Doyle?” Miss McCleethy holds my gaze till I’m forced to look away.
“What are we talking about?” Elizabeth clucks.
“Miss McCleethy, the ground is so hard. Couldn’t we return to Spence now?” Martha complains.
“Yes, very well. Miss Worthington, I leave you in charge. Girls, follow her lead.” Miss McCleethy places the crumbles of cake into a napkin and ties it up neatly. “Order. That is the key. Miss Doyle, I’ll need your help to gather our things.”
Felicity and I exchange glances. She draws her finger across her throat like a blade, and I make a note to tell her later how very witty I find her. Miss McCleethy takes a bouquet of wildflowers and bids me follow her farther into the graveyard. It is a steep climb to the very top of the hill. The wind blows hard here. It pulls tendrils of her hair free so that they whip wildly about her face, lessening its severity. From here I can see the girls tripping through the trees in a merry line, Ann bringing up the rear. In the distance, Spence rises from the land as if it were a part of it, as if it has always existed, like the trees or the hedgerows or the distant Thames.
Miss McCleethy lays the flowers at the base of a simple headstone. Eugenia Spence, Beloved Sister. May 6, 1812–June 21, 1871.
“I did not know there was a gravestone for Mrs. Spence.”
“It is how she would have wanted to be remembered—simply, without ceremony.”
“What was she like?” I ask.
“Eugenia? She had a quick mind and a skilled grasp of the magic. In her time, she was the most powerful of the Order. Kind but firm. She believed that the rules must be followed without exception, for to deviate in any way was to court disaster. This school was her life’s work. I learned a great deal from her. She was my mentor. I loved her dearly.”