It had come for Mr. Griggs. Betsy and Bernie were with their mother. Dilly lay inside the shop, curled up in the shadows, almost as if she were waiting for Mr. Griggs to appear and take up his scissors and needle again. When she heard the horse and cart, she rushed to the doorway to bark at the men. “Quiet, girl,” I ordered. “Hold my horse’s head, will you, laddie?” asked one of the men, who had orange hair so like Nasty Ned’s I wondered if they were related. He was so cheerful it was hard to think of him as a coffin man. The men lifted a wooden coffin out of the back of the cart. They carried it past us, and we could hear them struggling to get it up the stairs. They came stumbling back down a few minutes later. A shiver went through me as I watched them load the long box into the cart. You could tell it was heavier now. “Poor Mr. Griggs,” Florrie said, tears filling her eyes. “He was the first, I guess.” The man with the orange hair overheard her. “This poor man might’ve been the first, but it won’t be long before we’re cartin’ folks off by the tens.
