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Helena and Alma both looked up. “Pretend?” Alma asked, and her face held the same wariness I felt in my chest.

“Pretend you’re just friends. I can tell you’re not.”

My heart went from a canter to a gallop.

Lilja shrugged. “I don’t mind it if that’s what you think. I’m not like that.”

“It’s not you specifically,” Alma said. “It’s more that most people do mind.”

“But I don’t, and I won’t tell anyone either. I can keep a secret.”

Picking up the palette, she came over and sat next to me. I watched as she picked up the horse, turning it in her hand as if deciding how to start.

Alma and Helena chatted in low voices while I tried to concentrate on my chestnut, but as always, my eyes wouldn’t leave Lilja be. Her lashes lay dark along her cheeks as she dipped the brush. I had expected her to paint the wood in the likeness of a real horse. Maybe a dappled gray or a pinto.

What she did instead… I had never seen anything like it. With delicate strokes, she decorated the wood with spirals and flowers, with dots and leaves, all in different shades of blues and reds and greens. It looked like something out of a fairy tale.

“It’s beautiful,” I said.

“I love flowers. My father wouldn’t let me pick any.”

“That’s cruel.”

Lilja placed another stroke, the leaf of a deep-red rose. “He was very cruel.”

Chapter Ten

Lilja had been with us for three weeks when I was nearly out of wood. On Sunday morning, I woke up to ice flowers blooming on the glass of every window. The cold had truly arrived, but there was nothing for it. I had to go get more wood. My ledger was filled with Christmas orders in Lilja’s neat script.

I was tying my scarf over my coat when she stepped into the workshop. She was wearing Helena’s plum-colored dress and mantle set. I ought to offer for Helena or Alma to take her to the tailor soon.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Out of town to get wood.”

“Can I come with you?”

“If you’d like.”

I would have asked her if I had thought she wanted to go, but I had assumed she felt more comfortable here in the house. It was cold out, and she still seemed frightened at times, casting glances out the store’s window.

“Give me a moment,” she said. I pulled on my gloves as I waited. When she returned, she had on her shawl, a pair of gloves of her own, and one of Helena’s knitted bonnets on her head. I grabbed a blanket from the chest by the workshop door before we left, tugging it under my arm.

“How are we getting there?” she asked when we were walking down Storgatan.

“By borrowing a wagon and horse from Mr. Jonsson. He lets me use them whenever I need to in exchange for birthday presents for his daughters.”

“That’s nice of him.”

“One favor’s worth the other. I only have need of a wagon and horse four or five times a year. This saves me money.”

“Everyone seems to trust you.”

“They’ve known me since I was little. My father before then.”

“And they trusted him too?”

“He was a man of his word.”