"We are friends," Julianna whispered fiercely as she placed her own hand over her grandmother's and rubbed her cheek against it. "We will be friends forever and always! When you are… gone, I shall still confide in you and write for you -shall write letters to you as if you had merely moved away!"

"What a diverting idea," her grandmother teased. "And will you also post them to me?"

"Of course not, but you'll know what I have written nonetheless."

"What makes you think that?" she asked, genuinely puzzled.

"Because I heard you tell the vicar very bluntly that it is illogical to assume that the Almighty intends to let us lie around dozing until Judgment Day. You said that, having repeatedly warned us that we shall reap what we sow, God is more likely to insist we observe what we have sown from a much wider viewpoint."

"I do not think it wise, my dear, for you to put more credence in my theological notions than in those of the good vicar. I shouldn't like for you to waste your talent writing to me after I'm gone, instead of writing something for the living to read."

"I shan't be wasting my time," Julianna said with a confident smile, one of their familiar debates over nonsense lifting her spirits. "If I write you letters, I have every faith you will contrive a way to read them wherever you may be."

"Because you credit me with mystical powers?"

"No," Julianna teased, "because you cannot resist correcting my spelling!"

"Impertinent baggage," her grandmother huffed, but she smiled widely and her fingers spread, linking with Julianna's for a tight, affectionate squeeze.

The following year, on the eve of Christmas, her grandmother died, holding Julianna's hand one last time. "I’ll write to you, Grandmama." Julianna wept as her grandmother’s eyes closed forever. "Don’t forget to watch for my letters. Don't forget."

Four