Pandora(23)

‘Indeed.’

But Edward’s reply is lost, for Mr Blake is already limping out the door, coat-tails flapping. He leaves it swinging open and Miss Blake sighs, moves from behind the counter to shut it. When she turns back she links her fingers together – nervously, he thinks – and sends him a tight smile.

‘I am sorry, Mr Lawrence.’

‘Sorry?’

She returns to her post at the counter. ‘I’m afraid you have been duped, like everyone else who ventures through these doors.’ Miss Blake hands him the now fully wrapped cravat pin and Edward takes it, holds it loosely in front of him.

‘I’m well aware.’

She nods. ‘I suspected as much. You looked at everything far too closely.’

‘Yes.’ When she says nothing else Edwards adds, ‘But why trouble yourself to tell me this? You surely wish to gain a profit – isn’t it your business too?’

Something flashes in her eyes – the colour of spiced caramel, he sees clearly now – and his stomach gives a little flip.

‘I don’t know why I told you. Guilt, perhaps. And no. The business is not mine.’

A sharp caw makes them both jump. He had quite forgotten about the magpie high up on its perch. Miss Blake raises her hand on the beat of two softly spoken words – ?la edó, he thinks, Greek, perhaps? – and with a flurry of rainbow wing the bird flies to her. With a small smile Miss Blake places him on her shoulder where the magpie proceeds to stare at Edward in the same way it did on the street. Edward’s grip tightens on the package. He clears his throat, tries to ignore the bird’s insistent eyes.

‘I have a confession, Miss Blake.’

‘Oh?’

‘I came here today to see you.’

The fingers that have been stroking the magpie’s white breast pause. ‘Me?’

Her eyes crease in confusion and Edward holds out a hand, meaning to put her at ease.

The magpie lunges.

The quiet of the shop is shattered by the heavy beat of wings and sharp stuttered caws. The cravat pin drops, Edward cries out and Miss Blake gasps, wraps her hands around the flapping bird.

‘Hermes, no! Stop!’

Edward retreats to the ornate chair. The empty broth cup is knocked on its side and rolls across the floor. He sucks the fleshy V between forefinger and thumb, tastes the warm metallic of blood on his tongue.

‘Oh, Mr Lawrence, I’m so sorry!’ Miss Blake is rushing over, a bundle of wrapping cloth in her hands. Edward dares a glance upward, sees the magpie has been relegated back onto the bookcase. She sits on the other seat, takes his hand without asking. Her touch is gentle but firm. Miss Blake peers at his wound, dark head bent over his hand, and while the cut does indeed sting he finds far more interest in the curls on her crown, the heavy rope of dark glossy plait.

‘It is just a scratch,’ he murmurs.

‘It is not,’ she retorts, moving her head so he can see.

The ‘scratch’ resembles far more a small triangular wound and Edward blinks down at it in surprise. The bird has actually gouged out a chunk of skin.

Miss Blake sighs, presses the cloth tight against the wound. ‘Does it not hurt?’ she asks, and when Edward shakes his head – for, oddly, it really does feel no worse to him than a scratch – she shakes her head. ‘It will, in an hour or two. Believe me, I know.’ She tilts the hand that holds his. On her wrist is a small half-moon scar. ‘I made the mistake of trying to tidy his cage with him still in it.’ Miss Blake smiles, wry again. ‘Hermes is a very protective creature. If he feels something belongs to him, he will guard it steadfast.’

She releases the pressure, looks again. ‘I’ll wrap it now, before the bleeding worsens.’

Edward watches as Miss Blake binds his hand tightly with a strip of cloth. ‘It is odd,’ he says, ‘that you should be protected by a bird.’

‘It is not so strange.’

Miss Blake finishes up with a knot, releases his hand. For a moment he feels quite bereft.

‘I found him on the roof just outside my bedroom window, about four years ago now. Fallen from a nest, I think. I left him there at first, thinking perhaps the parents would claim him but they never did, and, well, I couldn’t bear to leave the little thing so helpless. So I took him in, nursed him myself. Magpies are clever. They remember who is kind to them.’

For a moment they both watch the bird which now stands balanced on one talon, cleaning its other claw. Then Miss Blake turns back to him.

‘Now, sir,’ she says. ‘What is it you wished to discuss with me?’





CHAPTER TWELVE





Dora has listened to Mr Lawrence’s plea – for that is what it most undoubtedly is – in silence and not without sympathy. This pale, fair-haired man watches her now with trepidation as he waits for her answer, and Dora’s heart goes to him – she understands completely what it means to want something that seems to thwart every step of the way – and so she is saddened to say the words, ‘I cannot help you.’

Mr Lawrence’s face drops. ‘You can’t?’

Dora stands, sweeps her arm about her in a gesture that shows clearly her distaste. ‘Look, sir, where we are. Look –’ and here she gestures to the cravat pin in its cloth wrapper still beached on the floor – ‘at the bauble on which you spent your hard-earned coin. You know as well as I that this is a shop of fakes and mere fripperies.’