Playing in the Plague Pit

She was four-years-old and slipped away when the guide turned to cough, under red velvet ropes, down stone steps, blue dust and bronzy bones, gasps and Oh, God thawed from the fourteenth century— fleas, black breath, bursting buboes, fingers blue, bells tolling, half of London dead and buried quick. But there were more jobs, the docent explained, peasant wages up, the Hundred Years War called off early, and people talking real English. Kelsie, get your butt over here! Her mother winged down, an apologetic angel amid laughter and chattering amazement that a little American girl would want to play in that horrible old plague pit.