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Doffy is very small, and he is very confused. He doesn't understand where his family is going, or why they have to leave. When they depart, he leaves behind a small collection of friends his own age whom he has not been permitted to say goodbye to and who, he realizes a long time later, will never want to speak to him again.
He asks his father where they're going when they're on the ship, and his father says they are going somewhere new to start a new life, and that it will be exciting and rewarding. He doesn't tell Doffy what he really wants to know– where, or why, or what will be so rewarding about it. He treats him like a child who would be incapable of understanding, and so Doflamingo does not understand. And he worries instead.
He puts on a brave face for his little brother Rosi, and promises that if things are too exciting, he'll protect him.
Doffy's mother smiles and she promises Doffy that it will be alright.She holds his hand, and she sings nursery rhymes with him that soon he will insist that he's too old for. He catches her sneaking worried glances at his father, who has a large, optimistic smile on his face.
When they finally arrive at the little mansion by the sea there is a smell in the air that makes Doffy's nose wrinkle– it is strong, and sour and chemical. Soon enough Doffy will learn that it comes from the smokestacks of the factories that litter the archipelago here.
He watches his parents tire and become out of breath as they unpack and doesn't understand why they would go to such effort.
"Where are the slaves?" he asks, worry gnawing at his heart. "Why should you have to do all this?"
His mother and father exchange a look, and he does not get an answer that he understands.
He doesn't understand why when mother changes his hair, or when he's forced to wear clothing that feels like it will rub his skin raw.
He doesn't understand why the people in the street stare and mutter instead of bowing and averting their eyes. He feels the weight of dozens of creatures looking at him as if he was something unusual, or disgusting.
When he cries; confused and friendless, he does it alone, where he thinks no one will find him. He curls into a ball at the bottom of the pantry and he holds himself tightly. He has seen his mother crying too, though she hid her tears, and loving her he pretended not to notice.
As he lays at the bottom of tha pantry with the narrow sliver of light peeking out of the bottom he hears the voices of their mother and father. He has never heard his mother raise her voice before but she does now.
She has tried her best to honor her husband's ideas but she is tired. Her hands ache. There is no one to help her dress in the morning. There is no one to cook and she is bad at it. She has given it her best try and she simply does not understand how to do it.
He must hire a cook and a maid, at least. Surely it would not be immoral to hire a cook maid. Not if they pay them. Plenty of humans do such a thing.
His father relents. Days later their household is joined by a swarthy, tattooed cook and a delicate smiling chambermaid. Doffy and Rosi's father is quick to remind his children that the cook and the maid are not slaves, and they must not be treated as such.
Doffy doesn't go near the maid. Rosi likes the maid, but Doffy doesn't like the way her big doe eyes watch him, or the way she looks at the things in their house. He takes an interest instead in the cook who talks to him like an adult, and answers questions when he asks.
In the end he will never know which of the two of them betrayed their family, or even if it was meant, or merely an accident of loose talk. He just knows that a week after they are hired people have started talking and whispering.
And two weeks after they're hired, there is a mob with torches heading for their door.