June Beck brought a cup her sister had disliked.
“She said the handle was too small,” she told Lyra. “Kept using it anyway.”
The cup had survived two house moves and a crack repaired with pale resin. June set it on the chapel table as carefully as though Cora might arrive to complain about it.
June turned the cup until its handle faced the chair beside it, then looked embarrassed by the care she had taken. Lyra moved nothing. When the woman asked for a cloth beneath the cracked base, she fetched one and waited while June set it down.
Other families brought smaller things. An embroidered sleeve never collected. A letter asking for more socks. A folded work apron whose owner had left expecting to need it again.
Keeper Tallis opened the ordinary funeral register.
The first question required a date of death.
Nobody answered.
