Twenty-ThreeThe canary’s droppings smelled musty and added to the room’s stuffiness. Reaching into Ollie’s cage, Bridget folded in the corners of the soiled papers on the bottom. She’d woken that morning in the hard tub, her whole body stiff and exhausted. The basement dark and weighted. She counted the days she’d been hiding and healing at the brothel, though it felt only like working: seven. Even God rested after that long.
Plum Cake lay with her empty tray across her lap. Both plates bare. “Do you like them?” she asked. “They’re awful.”
“My pants?”
Waking in the tub and leaving the chapel earlier, Bridget first opened Lily’s door a c***k to see the room still dark and Lily in bed. Hurrying on to the attic to put away her coat and hat and change into her second shirt, she saw the fabr
