Eleven-year-old orphan Maud Flynn is seen as a plain, ill-behaved child, and has given up hope of being adopted. So it comes as a surprise when, in the spring of 1909, she is taken from the Barbary Asylum for Female Orphans by elderly spinster Hyacinth Hawthorne and her sisters Victoria and Judith. The Hawthornes keep her as a "secret child" who must never be seen by the neighbors, and soon Maud learns why - the sisters are phony psychics who want her to help stage séances. At first Maud likes her new job, but as the months pass she becomes increasingly torn between her desire to please Hyacinth and her desire to do the right thing.
A Drowned Maiden's Hair contains examples of:
- Dead Person Conversation:
- Victoria tells Maud how the family business got started. She used to have dreams in which she talked to dead people in Heaven. One day a wealthy man asked her to talk to his dead son. Victoria saw the boy in Heaven, but he didn't say anything, so Victoria lied that he wanted his father to care for and educate his child laborers. Victoria thought she'd done a good thing, but afterwards her dreams stopped. People kept asking Victoria for help that she couldn't give them, so Hyacinth started claiming to have psychic powers and charging money for her to use them.
- Maud has dreams in which she talks to the eight-year-old drowning victim Caroline Lambert.
- Homeschooled Kids: Maud can't go to school, so Judith and Victoria have her take lessons at home.
- House Fire: During the final séance with Mrs. Lambert, Hyacinth accidentally knocks over a lantern, setting Judith's skirt on fire, then the tablecloth. The three women flee, leaving Maud hiding in her secret compartment. Maud manages to smash through the thin wall on the other side of the compartment into the next room, from which she makes sure Muffet isn't still inside and then flees the smoke-filled house. She later learns that Muffet was the only person who tried to rescue her - the two Hawthornes never even mentioned her to the firefighters. Judith had the excuse of suffering from burns, but Hyacinth just didn't care about her.
- The Mourning After: The first séance Maud ever helps with is with one of the Hawthornes' easiest and most reliable marks, a man named Horace Burckhardt. Thirty years ago, his wife Agnes suffered Death by Childbirth. He never remarried because he believes in being "true unto death." But now he's fallen in love again, and wants Agnes's permission to remarry. Hyacinth, pretending to be in a trance, tells him, "My darling Horace, you have been true too long! The time has come for you to love again!" Horace gratefully pays her a generous sum.
- Never Learned to Read: The Hawthornes' deaf servant, Muffet, has reached middle age with almost no knowledge of language, until Maud starts teaching her to read.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: Hyacinth gave Muffet her nickname because she's terrified of spiders. Everyone's been using the nickname for so long that they've completely forgotten her real name, which turns out to be Anna.
- Orphanage of Fear: Girls live in squalor in the severely underfunded Barbary Asylum, which is run by Miss Kitteridge, who seems to dislike kids and Maud in particular and is constantly inflicting harsh punishments.
- Ouija Board: Hyacinth purchases a board to use in the séances with Mrs. Lambert. Maud tries to use it to help Muffet learn to spell out letters, but she isn't interested.
- Parental Favoritism: Victoria laments that nobody ever loved her no matter how hard she tried to be good, while the charming Hyacinth, who never tried to be good, was loved by everyone. Their house at Hawthorne Grove was passed down to Hyacinth, even though she was the youngest, because their father liked her better.
- Parting-Words Regret: Caroline Lambert got in a fight with her mother on the last day of vacation at Cape Calypso because she wanted to swim in the ocean one last time and Mrs. Lambert said it wasn't safe to swim alone, and Caroline needed to help her pack. Eventually Caroline took her purse and went out to ride on the carousel, crowing that she was going to ride as many times as she wanted and her mother couldn't stop her. Mrs. Lambert snapped, "I don't want to stop you. It's worth the money to be rid of you. Go!" She meant that she'd have an easier time packing, but after Caroline was found dead, Mrs. Lambert wondered if she'd drowned herself on purpose because of her mother's words.
- Putting the Pee in Pool: Maud sleeps on the beach after the house burns down. When she wakes up the next morning, she desperately needs to pee, and goes in the ocean, to her embarrassment. She feels sorry for everyone who will go swimming that day.
- The Shut-In: At the sisters' home in Hawthorne Grove, Maud is not allowed to leave the house or even stand near an open window. She spends an hour outside every day in their dreary walled garden, where most of the plants are dead. When she goes with them to Cape Calypso, it's even worse because the neighbors are closer, and because the sisters leave the windows open to bring in cool air, so Maud can't even talk loudly and spends most of her time in the attic.
- Signature Scent: Hyacinth always smells of violets.
- Spooky Séance: Maud's duties in the séances include pulling on strings to make the chandelier sway and singing faintly along with the sisters so the customer will think she's a spirit. Before impersonating Caroline Lambert, she is told to keep her hand in a bucket of ice so it will be cold when she touches Mrs. Lambert's cheek.
- Tragic Keepsake: Maud's brother Samm'l, who was adopted away from her when she was five and he was eleven, tracks her down at her new home in Hawthorne Grove. He has to go west with his adoptive family, but before he leaves, he gives Maud a keepsake from their Catholic mother - a coral rosary with a silver crucifix. Hyacinth steals the rosary after the fire, and Maud never sees it again.
