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"Are there any twins in the orphanage?" he asked abruptly

Again, they all blinked at hiirl said, "Jane-Lucinda and Jane-Phyllinda were born on the same day, sir"

"Did they have the same mother?"

They all nodded at that

"Where are they?"

"Phyllinda was rude again and they’re--" the youngest girl piped up, and abruptly went silent after a ferocious look froirl

"I’m sure ouldn’t know, sir," she said calold twist"

"Snails!"

She didn’t s snail buttons, trimmed with French knots Sometimes known as death’s-head buttons," she added

Villiers looked down the row of perfectly solemn faces "You refer to yourself as snails?"

"We make snail buttons"

He nodded "And your names?"

"Mary-Alice, Mary-Bertha, Mary…" And so it went There were six Marys

Villiers bowed "Where will I find the Janes?"

There was a irl said finally

"But you won’t--" said the little girl, and stopped again

In the hallway everything was quiet Two doors down on the left he found a circle of girls The only difference was that these girls earing brown pinafores over their white dresses "Are you the Janes?" he asked

They sprang to their feet, lined up and dropped a curtsy He looked them up and down but there wasn’t a face there that resembled his own

"Where are Jane-Lucinda and Jane-Phyllinda?" he asked

The youngest girl in the row put her fingers in her mouth, but otherwise no one irl finally said

He looked down the roed, dull eyes stared back at hiers Her eyes were bright blue: cautious, but awake He walked over to her

"What is your naers

"Hands out of your ers out of her rabbed her wrist before he was even aware of what he was doing Her fingers were bleeding, four of them, and the fifth was deeply scored

"What in the hell is this about?" he asked, putting her hand down gently and turning to the head of the line

"Gold twist can be hard to irl said

He picked up the hands of the girl next in line Her fingers were swollen, grotesque, and bleeding sluggishly in a few spots The brown pinafores suddenly made sense

In thein the sunlight Before each chair was a half-covered bobbin, a nub of a button in the process of being wound with the treacherously fine, cutting gold twist