She inhaled the clean, pine-scented air as she recalled the hustle to the Stillwell station. “I was winded, but Ivy was with me.”
His thumb circled the back of her hand. “I admire that you’re pushing yourself to grow stronger. Just be reasonable about the pace you set for yourself, all right?”
A trio of Canada geese honked and soared overhead. “I want to fly, Luke,” she told him. “Ever since I was a little girl confined to bed, told I may never walk again, I’ve wanted to know what it would feel like to be fast and light in the air, like all these birds I’ve spent my life studying. But I’ve decided to content myself with keeping both feet on the ground. I want to walk and not faint. What could be more reasonable than that?”
Elsa’s body proved less than cooperative. After three trips to the second floor to bring the remaining birds down to the dining hall, both legs ached—the weak one from the pain, and the strong one from compensating for it. Pulse still throbbing, she stood at the table and unpacked the box she’d brought down.
The dining hall table was large enough to seat twenty people. Eating here must have felt lonely for the Van Tessels with all theseempty chairs, but at the moment Elsa was grateful for the space. She spread the birds out in rows by color since that was how they’d been ordered when she collected them from the rooms. Now that her fresh ledger had been alphabetized, it would be a snap to find the entry and make a matching catalog tag for each bird.
“Now we’re on the trolley,” Elsa murmured once all three hundred birds were lined up and ready for proper identification at last. Circling the table to begin, she caught a glimpse of movement outside the window.
Tatiana and Danielle were coming this way from the direction of their cottage. A wicker basket swung from Tatiana’s arm.
Elsa waved, but they didn’t see her. Ignoring her body’s protests, she walked to the corridor and outside to the covered veranda. “What a nice surprise! Please, come in!”
Tatiana smiled. “Thank you, dear, but we’d better not.”
Danielle kicked at a pebble.
“The family isn’t here right now,” Elsa reassured them. Wesley’s Packard remained parked in the drive, but neither he nor Jane were in the mansion at present.
“All the same. We’ve just come to bring you some refreshment in case you’re hungry.”
How on earth had Tatiana managed to think of that, when her own concerns were greater? Elsa was humbled by this woman. No wonder Birdie had cared for the Petrovics so much.
“That sounds wonderful,” Elsa said. “I have some things to show Danielle, too. Why don’t we visit in the courtyard?”
When Tatiana and Danielle agreed, Elsa convinced them to simply walk through the house to reach the courtyard behind it, rather than meandering all the way around.
“I need to pick something up from the dining hall. I’d be happy to show you what I’m working on right now, if you’d like to see it.”
Danielle nodded. “I want to see.”
Elsa drew a deep breath and hoped she hadn’t made a misstep with this offer. Danielle had been upset about the birds leaving the mansion before. Seeing them laid out might trigger more dismay. On the other hand, Danielle may feel better if she understood more about Elsa’s work with the museum and saw them for herself one last time.
With a smile, she ushered them into the dining hall and prayed the Spalding siblings wouldn’t return soon enough to interrupt them. “You’re so good at classifying things, Danielle. Let me show you what I’m doing.”
Tatiana rested the basket on the floor and stood back, hands folded, as if afraid to touch anything.
“They’re still grouped by color,” Danielle observed. “Miss Birdie did that for me. Red belongs with red, I told her. Blue with blue. Green with green. Yellows together, and blacks on their own. Every color should be separate.”
Elsa smiled. She hadn’t realized that Danielle was Birdie’s interior decorating muse. “It’s striking to see the colors together like that. May I show you how we order things for the museum?”
Danielle flicked a gaze at Elsa. “Yes.”
Elsa explained the habitat groups inside the museum, with groups of birds based on geographic location. “But in the catalogs, like this one, they are alphabetized by their Latin names.” She went on to explain that each bird would be assigned a number and a tag to match it to its field data.
Frowning, Danielle peered at the ledger Elsa showed her, and then at the rows of birds. “They don’t match up. They’re not in order.”
“That’s all right. I can look at the bird on the table and then locate it in the chart very easily by its name, now that this is alphabetized.”
Tatiana brushed a loose thread from her skirt. “What will happen to the birds once they move into their new home?” she asked. “Will other children have the chance to see them, too?”
Elsa appreciated the thoughtful prompt. “Yes. Children come every day—and grown-ups, too—so they can see things they wouldn’t normally. They will love Miss Birdie’s collection, I’m sure.”
“That is what she would have wanted. Isn’t it, sweetheart?” Tatiana rested her hand on her daughter’s shoulder. “This is why she wrote it in her will that the museum should have the birds. To share them with many, many others, so they wouldn’t go to waste.”
Danielle pursed her lips but didn’t argue. She pulled a strand of hair around her finger and twisted it round and round.
