Chapter Text
The sound of carriages and people chattering is faint, but still there. The afternoon is bustling with The Season just around the corner.
"Why would the Earl be coming to visit?" I asked the darting Undertaker as he moved to and fro across the shop, chuckling to himself. Setting down candles on the floor and repositioning the coffins. Maybe adjusting little things here and there.
Currently, he was in the front end of the room, by the white coffin with a black cross, his favorite, where he was lighting a few candles on the floor.
He was great, always creating fun and messing with people, but he was also very… unpredictable.
I sat cross-legged on the floor, hands nested in my lap as I swayed my upper body in my spot. Incapable of holding still for long.
He zipped from laying the black coffin next to his own on one side of the room, to resituating the 'ominous-ness' of his desk in the back, and then continuing to light candles on the other end of the room.
At least, that's what I thought he might be doing. One would be surprised at how difficult it was to tell.
"...hey!" I asked. "Hey!"
He turned to me for a moment, stopping what he was doing. And then a grin.
He came closer with a little wave in his step, as always.
" Oh , silly-silly little one!" He smiled - smiled - down at me, wagging a finger in front of my face. "Don't you know that today is special ?"
" Special ?" My eyes lit up as I sit up straighter and look up at him.
"Oh yes! Very special! See now, little one, the people on the street have spoken of terrible, terrible things," said he, leaning over and pressing a fingertip to my nose.
"Of people, girls, being hurt in the most awful ways! Hihi! (Though you most likely don't remember. Sleeping at the time, I believe.) They were making my job more difficult, you know! And how distressed the people are!"
I cocked my head at him, eyebrows furrowed.
"...I don't get it," I confessed. "Why is this special? People come to us all the time... and, why does the Earl need to come here?"
"Ah yes, but see! That's why it's different!" He points a finger animatedly, now sitting at my side. "Now, the people in polite society are becoming worried, thus the Queen needs to fix this problem, yes?"
I nod, looking down as I followed along.
"And if the Queen is worried…?" He prompted.
"...she hands the problem to the Watchdog! And so the Earl is the Watchdog, which means he will investigate?" I look up at him. He grins.
"Exactly! Hihi!" The Undertaker pats my head, walking to finish lighting candles.
I think for a moment, following behind him and assisting in lighting.
"But, wait…" I begin, struggling to light a little tree-looking candelabra; my favorite. "Why does this mean it's special?"
I turn to Undertaker, who wraps his hand in mine, helping me flick the match. He guides my hand to one candle, and lights it.
"Her 'royal Majesty' will not help him,” he guides me to light another, "and Scotland Yard has no information with which to assist him. He won't see the scene." I light it, distracted by flickering beauties.
And move to the third myself. "So he has to come to us! "
"Hihi! He has to come to us today," he pokes my nose in agreement. "And today , my dear, is special . So we've got important things to do~ (ihihi)."
Somehow, my question feels no more answered than it was before.