Second Voice: A cunning in his hand, sewed up in a dull fist. Speed, recoil, reach. Stands above it a slobbery mouth.
First Voice: Annie, then. Fifth child. White, delicate. Fair hair, gray eyes, a frail body.
Theodosia: An angel among the white angels of the graves. All the sweetness of the earth brought into one frame. A tired little child, used to call to me to wait, gentled by sickness and pain maybe. Her little mouth with the fresh dew of God on it.
First Voice: She was a nervous system, like all the others.
Second Voice: Something you might expect to see under a microscope.
Third Voice: James Henry Burden, then, sixth child born to Horace and first male heir to the house of Burden. I baptize thee, James Henry Burden, in the name of the.... Second male in the house of Bell, as far as is known. Easy to know. Sweet, blonde languors among the cushions in a portico.
First Voice: I saw the picture of a man, a real speaking likeness. It was a ten-thousand-footed octopus.
Theodosia: What color was it?
First Voice: White and gray. They called the stuff white matter and gray matter.
Theodosia: Excellent names.