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June was mystified.

Tuppence’s graveside service had been officiated by Reverend Pelliver, a young curate from a local parish. He’d read the burial rites from the Book of Common Prayer and said a prayer of commendation to God. In an effort to comfort the group, he’d added a few words of his own about gratitude for the life of a woman who’d been a kind and beloved friend, and how not all crowns were made of gold. Some were made of love, he’d said, and that was the kind Tuppence was wearing now in heaven.

But as far as June could recall, Pelliver hadn’t said a blooming word about housemaids.

Maybe Reina, who was riding with Norman and Mr. Pembroke in the carriage ahead of them, would know what Belinda was talking about. June would ask her when they were back home.

Annoyed by their blank expressions, Belinda said, “Housemaids is just a little lower than the angels. That’s what he said.”

Enid stared hard at June, trying to capture her attention. “Psalm eight-five,” she said casually.

June blinked. Having lived with a stepfather who loved to show off his command of scripture, she knew the quote, which Reverend Pelliver had altered just slightly in his remarks: For thou hast made her a little lower than the angels.

Not for anything in the world would June embarrass Belinda by telling her she’d misheard it. And to June’s relief, Enid seemed to feel the same way.

“Bless me, I forgot that part,” June said, and shook her head as if lamenting her own poor memory.

They were all quiet the rest of the way home, feeling drained but peaceful. They had made it through the cemetery service in good form, except for the end. Reina had arranged for the bells to toll at a local church, and when the rich bronze-throated chimes of farewell had sung out through the gray mist, they’d all unraveled a bit.

For the past three days, the entire household had mourned together and struggled to keep their minds on their work. Whenever one of them needed supplies, or sat down to breakfast, or passed by the housekeeper’s room, the fresh pain of Tuppence’s absence cut straight to the bone.

What made it even stranger was the presence of the baby in the house. He and the wet nurse had been given Tuppence’s room, with the attached sitting area turned into a nursery. Despite the baby’s small size, he made more noise than the lot of them put together. He didn’t cry often, thank God, but when he did, the sound bored through your eardrums and rattled your skull.

Thankfully the wet nurse, a shy, pretty nineteen-year-old named Ivonne Zamudio, was good at soothing the infant. She knew all kinds of tricks, like swaddling him, rocking him in different ways, walking around the house, or making a gentle shushing noise. Sometimes she sang quietly, which never failed to mesmerize the baby—as well as the rest of them. Her voice wasn’t grand like an opera singer’s, but it flowed like honey and sank into you. It reminded June of a stone archway back in Nether Wallop, where someone had discovered by accident that when you sang under it, it gave your voice a kind of resonance. Something about the shape of it gathered up the notes and made them bloom.

June only wished the girl would sing something cheerful now and then, instead of melancholy lullabies. No one could blame her for that, though, after the hell Ivonne had gone through.

Her husband, Pedro, a charcoal burner’s son, had left Spain for a promised job at an East London woolen mill. They had planned for Ivonne and their infant daughter, Esperanza, to leave two months later, to join Pedro after he’d got himself situated. But Esperanza had come down with fever and cough mid-journey and died in Ivonne’s arms just as the ship reached England.

Heartbroken, Ivonne had gone to the Spanish Mutual Aid Society’s office, where Pedro had said he would leave word about where he was staying. But there had been nothing from him. When Ivonne had gone to visit the woolen mill that had originally offered him employment, the hiring agent said they’d decided to hire Irish laborers who’d been willing to work for less pay.

After that, Pedro had vanished.

Reina’s friends in the Sociedad were trying to find out where he might have gone. Maybe he was searching for work elsewhere in England. Maybe something dire had happened to him.

In the meantime, Ivonne was penniless in a country where she didn’t speak the language. For Reina to have provided a job and a safe place to stay was a stroke of luck and much appreciated by the Spanish community.

The nursery had been filled with supplies from the Sociedad: an ornately carved wooden cradle, baskets full of little woven blankets and infant napkins, lavishly embroidered bibs and bonnets, handmade olive oil soaps, and rose-scented rice powder. Reina’s friends Don Ramón and Doña Isabel had sent a massive walnut trunk with divided sections, its outside covered with tooled and hand-painted leather.

At first, June had been puzzled by the extent of their generosity to a baby that wasn’t even Spanish. But soon she’d realized it was because Reina intended to keep the infant and raise him as her own.

June would have expected Reina to discuss such a significant decision with her; in fact, it stung a bit that she hadn’t. But as June thought over the situation, she realized there were times when you made a decision and didn’t want to have to explain or defend it. Sometimes the best gift a friend could give was to accept your decision, even if they didn’t understand it.

And June did not understand it. Oh, she knew Reina had always been one for high-minded notions. Reina sometimes overestimated the number of burdens she could carry without collapsing. And she could be bloody impulsive, which was how she’d ended up with a staff of paroled prisoners in the first place.

But no one in his right mind would expect a young unmarried woman to take in the child of a servant she’d barely known. Even if Reina had made a deathbed promise to Tuppence, she could uphold it by giving the baby to someone else to raise and becoming a sort of patroness. She wasn’t obliged to change the rest of her life for the baby’s sake.

Reina knew all that, though. There was something else in her head—some other factor in the decision.

The problem with genius brains was they never knew when to stop thinking. June had always understood that Reina’s mind could work on levels so elevated, she often saw too many possibilities, too many connections and outcomes. But not all problems needed grand, complicated solutions.

There was a reason birds had legs: Sometimes it made more sense to walk than to fly.

The two hired carriages arrived at Westbrook House. Mad left the vehicle first and helped the rest of them out, with June being the last. She took his hand and stepped lightly to the ground, smiling up at him in thanks. It amused her that he answered with a blandly polite look. Out of concern for her dignity and reputation, Mad was determined not to reveal that anything might be going on between the two of them. He let down his guard only when he was absolutely sure they were alone.

Mr. Pembroke was helping Reina down from the other carriage. She took his hand and descended from the high carriage step, but her balance wavered as the vehicle jostled and the bustle and complex draperies of her skirts tilted her backward. Instantly Mr. Pembroke’s left hand came to her waist, steadying her as her foot touched the ground.

For all that Reina was flushed and a bit puffy-eyed from crying, she looked beautiful with her face framed by a veil of black Spanish lace. She was slim and regal in a dark dress and close-fitted jacket. Curiously, she seemed to avoid meeting Mr. Pembroke’s gaze. Usually the two of them seemed constantly aware of each other, but now there was a distance between them. A drawbridge had been pulled up.