In her mind, she cleared away the cobbler’s shop from this dingy little space. She imagined the walls painted in candy stripes of cream and turquoise, and the window hung with breezy peach-sorbet curtains. Three small cafe tables waited by the entrance, each with a sprig of yellow posies in a milk-glass vase. The stained and musty carpet was replaced with waxed marble tiles, and the cobbler’s old wooden counter would be exchanged for a glass case overflowing with cakes and gingerbreads, pies and strudels and chocolate-filled croissants. The back wall would be hung with baskets, each stuffed with fresh-baked bread. She saw herself behind the case, wearing a pink-chequered apron still dusted with that morning’s flour. She was filling a jar with biscotti while Mary Ann, in matching yellow chequers, wrapped up a dozen shortbread biscuits in a lime-green box.
Cath took in a long breath, then promptly started choking on the hookah smoke that filled her lungs, when she had been expecting spices and the chocolate and the steaming, yeasty buns. She covered her mouth, trying to muffle the coughing fit as well as she could, and turned back to the cobbler.
He was staring at her and Mary Ann. He had not touched the boots on the counter, though coming closer she could see that he was wearing an assortment of shoes himself – all different styles of boots and slippers taking up his many small feet.
‘Who,’ he said lazily, ‘are you?’
Cath attempted her most charming smile – the persuasive one she’d learned from her mother – and picked her way past the piles of shoes. ‘My name is Catherine Pinkerton. My maid and I happened to be passing by when we noticed the sign outside. I was wondering what’s to become of this shop once you’ve vacated. It would be a sore shame if it were to stay empty for long.’
‘It would not be a sore shame,’ Mr Caterpillar said, rather gruffly, before taking another puff off the hookah.
‘Oh, indeed, I only meant for the neighbourhood, you know. One always hates to lose an established business, but I’m sure you’re looking forward to, er . . . retirement, is it?’
He stared at her for so long she wondered that he would answer at all, or if she had offended him, when finally he said, ‘I have purchased a small plot of land in the forest, where I shall finally have quiet and solitude.’
Cath waited for him to go on, but that seemed to be the end of it. ‘I see,’ she finally said. ‘That sounds lovely.’ She cleared her throat, still tickling from the smoke. ‘Are you the owner of this building as well?’
‘No,’ said Mr Caterpillar. ‘The Duke has long been my landlord.’
‘The Duke! You mean Lord Warthog?’
‘The same, that bore.’ He yawned, as if growing bored by their conversation. ‘I like him well enough, though. He’s aloof-like. Not so nosy like the rest of you.’
Cath tried to disguise her frown, not only at the unjustified insult, but also because she’d been hoping the building’s owner would be someone she had no association with. Someone who wouldn’t be apt to discuss her business with the rest of the gentry, or her parents, until things were settled. She still hadn’t had the brazenness to ask her father about a loan to start up her bakery – or permission to use her dowry for the funds.
At least Mr Caterpillar was right about one thing. Lord Warthog didn’t seem the nosy sort, so perhaps she could trust him not to gossip about her plans.
Mary Ann stepped closer. ‘Do you know if there’s been much interest in someone leasing out the space once you’re gone?’
Mr Caterpillar slowly shifted his gaze to her. ‘Who are you?’
Mary Ann folded her hands in front of her skirt. ‘I’m Mary Ann.’
The Caterpillar yawned again. ‘Whosoever leases this space will be the Duke’s concern, not mine.’
‘I see,’ said Mary Ann. ‘But . . . would you happen to think that a bakery would do well here? Say, the most wondrous bakery in all of Hearts?’
The Caterpillar scratched at his cheek with the end of the hookah, pushing the skin around like overstretched marzipan. ‘Only if this bakery should serve clootie dumplings, which I prefer to all other dumplings.’
‘Oh, we would,’ said Cath. ‘I’d hunt down the treacle well, even, to ensure it’s the best clootie dumpling this side of the Looking Glass.’
She beamed, but the Caterpillar only turned his solemn gaze back to her and said, without humour, ‘The treacle well is naught but a myth.’
Cath deflated. ‘Yes. Naturally. I meant it as a joke.’
It was an old myth – that drinking from the treacle well could heal a person’s wounds or age them in reverse. Only problem was, no one had the faintest idea where to find the treacle well. Some said the well was in the Looking Glass maze, but moved around so that you would only get more and more lost if you ever tried to find it. Some said that only the most desperate of souls could ever find the treacle well. But most, like the cobbler, said it didn’t exist at all.
The Caterpillar grunted. ‘Your joke was not charming.’
‘I wasn’t meaning to be.’
‘What did you mean?’
Cath hesitated. ‘Only that . . . yes, we would have clootie dumplings?’
The Caterpillar peered at her a long, long moment, before sticking the hookah back into his mouth.
‘Right,’ she muttered. ‘Thank you for all of your help.’
Turning, she grabbed Mary Ann’s elbow and dragged her back outside, exiting to the sound of a few sleepy snorts from the bell.