It arrived on a Wednesday, in the estate's regular morning correspondence, unremarkable in its envelope except for the handwriting, which I recognized before I had fully registered that I was looking at it.
I had seen the Dowager's handwriting in administrative documents and household records and the three-sentence response she had sent to my formal courtesy note months ago. This was the same hand, but different in quality. The courtesy note had been written with the precise, controlled stroke of a woman performing correctness. This had the slightly looser quality of writing that had not been managed as carefully, writing that had come out of a different internal state.
I took it to the study and opened it there, alone.
