The crypt. The web-draped statuary. Unlit candles in iron candelabras. Moon-bright images in stained glass: youth and death and eternity: Christ suffering, Christ is risen. Floral bas-reliefs with secret skeletons engraved. Beautiful lips kissing holy skulls and other emptinesses ecclesiastically enshrined (as George Eliot once wrote). The tomb and inscribed effigies. Within, the mortal dust of the prince and his wife, too soon removed from us. The grave mold, the conquering worm, the bracelet of bright hair about the bone. The Gothic adoration.
         Fervid she prayed, her knees stinging on the cracked uneven stones.
         She was answered. A hollow voice emerged from the carved mouth of the dead prince, carried on a miasmic fetor: Whence comes this woman-thing?
         Lord, forgive my hope. Dearly I desire an intercession.
         Speak.
         A tale she told of grave illness in the family: one child lost, a father too, and a tiny boy whose soul was balanced between heaven and earth. No money for a doctor.
         A dragging silence. Then the response: The boy will recover his strength. He will be a comfort to you in your old age.
         She departed in gratitude.
         Some time later, the princess spoke to her man: That was not kind.
         What did she expect me to do about it? came the reply. Amn’t I dead?
         The boy died the next morning.
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