Chapter 16 Summary

After two days, Mattie is discharged. She climbs into a wagon full of orphaned fever survivors, and helps the smaller children along until they reach the orphanage. Mattie talks to one of the orphanage workers and tells her that she, Mattie, will be turning fifteen in just three more months. The orphanage worker suggests that Mattie could become a scullery maid at the orphanage, but Mattie declines the offer. Instead, she allows herself to contemplate her future and drifts off into a daydream about becoming a successful and wealthy coffeehouse matron.

As the wagon drives through Philadelphia Mattie's daydreams are interrupted by horrible scenes - dead bodies cast into the road, abandoned shops and homes, and frightened fugitives who flee when the hear the wagon's approach. The wagon drives by a huge cemetery full of freshly-dug trenches that are used as mass graves...