Page 89 of Pandora

And as Miss Ponsenby enthusiastically describes a tiara, Dora begins to sketch.

***

Six more ladies and two gentlemen pass through the doors of Blake’s Emporium to ask for a jewelry commission, and Dora’s pencil cannot move fast enough across the pages to accommodate them. At one point she is interrupted by an old man with a long white beard who hovers a little too long near the forged Ming dynasty porcelain, but after asking some cursory questions as to the origin of a bowl which has a series of bulls painted in blue around its rim, he made himself scarce without purchasing it. Hezekiah would be near apoplectic if he had seen.

As for Hezekiah, he has not come back from wherever he stormed off to, not even to oversee the return of the pithos, delivered by Mr. Tibb and three other of his fecal-fragrant helpers (no Mr. Coombe this time, Dora notices) at three o’clock. At four, Dora draws the bolts of the shop door.

Her head is spinning with the commissions she has received. Never before has she been so busy in the shop, and on account of her own doing, too! If she could have stayed open she would have, but since Mr. Ashmole’s carriage is to arrive soon she must prepare. With Hermes on her shoulder Dora has just placed her foot on the bottom step of the stairs when she hears a loud shattering noise come from the kitchen. Almost immediately the noise comes again, and Dora stares at the paneled door. Porcelain. Unmistakable. Brow creasing, she rushes down the hall, pushes open the kitchen door.

It is a small space, but it does well enough for Lottie since it is only she who works in it. Dora wondered at first if the housekeeper were killing something in here—a chicken, perhaps—and there is indeed evidence of feathers, the smell of poultry in the air, but Dora is unprepared to see Lottie sitting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by broken crockery, sobbing into her hands.

“Lottie!”

Dora rushes to her side, but the housekeeper waves her off.

“Are you hurt? You—” The words catch in Dora’s throat.

Lottie’s face is a purple bruise, one eye partially closed.

Dora places Hermes on the floor, and he begins to peck at the blue and white shards.

“What happened?” she asks gently.

The housekeeper stares hard at her lap, takes a shuddering gulp.

“I don’t suppose you’ll believe me if I said I fell again.”

“You know I wouldn’t,” Dora says quietly. Lottie shakes her head; a fat tear falls onto her apron.

“He was...” She trails off, voice trembling. She sniffs, tries again. “He was so angry you had gone out, that you’d taken it. I tried to comfort him. That’s always worked before, but this time...” Lottie rubs her fingers across her cheek, her irritation at being found vulnerable evidently clear.

I have done this, Dora thinks guiltily. No, she may not have made the physical blow, but if she had not attended the soirée...

Hermes pecks lightly now at Lottie’s skirts. Dora makes to shoo him away but to her surprise Lottie stills Dora’s hand.

“No,” she hiccups. “Leave him.”

Dora blinks. Lottie keeps her hand on hers. This is the first time, it occurs to Dora, that she has ever touched her. She offers Lottie a handkerchief from her pocket. The housekeeper hesitates, takes it, then blows her nose loudly into the cotton.

“I couldn’t see what I was doing,” Lottie says after a moment. “Bumped into the table. Dropped the plates.” The housekeeper touches the handkerchief to her lip; it comes away blood-spotted. “He never used to be like this, you know. He was my favorite customer, way back then. Long before your time.”

Dora watches her, sees the trouble it takes for Lottie to say the words.

“Why did you leave it all?”

For a long time the housekeeper does not answer. They listen to the spit of the fire, the magpie’s talons against flagstone. Eventually Lottie shrugs, folds the handkerchief into a tiny square.

“He offered me a home, safety. Money of my own. Women like me... It’s no life, missum. I’d wish it on no one. I didn’t have much of a choice.”

Dora bites her lip. There are other questions she wishes to ask, but now that her tears have stopped Dora senses that Lottie is likely to keep her cards close—to push for more will not entice her to reveal them.

“I’m sorry, Lottie,” Dora says instead.

The housekeeper squints at her. “What for?”

“This is my fault.”

“Don’t talk nonsense. He’s responsible for his own fists.”

---