The Sweetest Dark

Chapter Six

Here is the list of weapons I counted in the headmistress’s serene golden chamber:

The candles from the chandelier.

The poker and its stand by the fireplace.

The pink-daisied porcelain lamps, which had been unlit, on the secrétaire and side cabinet and reading table.

Every single oil painting, remarkably flammable.

The curtains.

The crystal vases.

The bronze-framed mirror.

The glass face of the clock.

The inkwell.

And, of course, the letter opener on her desk, made of hard, sharp bone.

Hattie Boyd once held a letter opener she’d snatched from a nurse’s hand to the jugular vein of Mrs. Buckler, the most vicious matron in Moor Gate. She held it there until she was promised one of the beef-and-potato pasties being served to the staff for supper. It cost her a blackened eye and two entire months in the isolation cell in the basement.

A few days before they managed to kill her for good, Hattie confided to me that that pasty was most delicious thing she’d ever tasted.