But even in the midst of that joy, I knew that I would have to leave the babe nursing at his mother’s breast and return to my own cottage, silent and empty, where the only sound that would greet me would be the phantom echoes of my own boys’ infant cries. And so, before we took our leave of the Daniels, I found the phial of poppy in Mrs. Mompellion’s whisket. I closed my hand upon it, stealthy as a practiced thief, and plunged
