“Remain calm, whatever happens.”

“She says things…really quite horrible, and be prepared to duck.”

“Whatever you do, do not criticize her dress.”

“Keep what you say ambivalent.”

“Don’t break anything…she’ll do that for you.”

“It’s perfectly all right if you are uncomfortable with this.”

Jaq stared at them, calm as could be. She opened the door to the library a crack. “She’s drawing.”

“Mind the pencils,” Owensby advised. Jaq gave them a lingering expression and then shut the door behind her.

“This way!” Mrs. Wroll whispered. She ascended the staircase and they split up, gazing through the octagonal windows that let people on the stairwell see into the magnificent library. The windows were on a central axis, allowing them to be rotated slightly to hear the proceedings.

Isabelle greeted Jaq much as she had Vanessa, jumping up and hugging her. “I didn’t think you’d come!”

“You summoned, so here I am,” Jaq said, a smile in her voice but her back was to them. “What are you working on?”

Isabelle showed her the paper. “I’m trying to draw the street, but I can’t get it right.”

Jaq held the sheet and looked between it and the window opposite Isabelle’s table. “You’re restricted by your vantage point. Get closer. I wouldn’t worry about the window frame.” Jaq handed the drawing back and began moving the table across the carpet, toward the window.

Isabelle giggled. “Vanessa and Agatha won’t like that.”

“I’ve never seen much point in being angry over something that can be easily fixed. We’ll move it back later,” Jaq said. She arranged a new sheet of paper. “Try again. It will be easier than erasing.”

Isabelle brought the chair over and sat. After several minutes, Jaq peeked at her work. “Hatching might be better.”

“Good god, what is she doing?” Owensby muttered.

“What’s that?” Isabelle asked. The eavesdroppers collectively held their breath as Jaq took the paper and demonstrated.

“It’s a method of shading. The tighter you cross these lines,” she explained. “The darker the area seems. You can apply the texture of the street as well as shade it, making it look like an actual street and not just a stripe. Does that make sense?”

“Yes!” Isabelle said excitedly. Jaq slid the page back to her. “What about the things far away?”

“Well…” Jaq crouched down to Isabelle’s level and lifted the paper. “If you hold the paper up and mark where things are in relation to outside…” She did so with a pencil. “Treat the edges of the paper like the window frame. The street is here, that carriage was here, the trees are up here…. Do you see how things farther away are higher on the page?”

“They’re smaller too,” Isabelle nodded.

Jaq relinquished the items. “You’ve got it. Just draw what you see.”

Isabelle did so diligently, allowing Jaq to roam through the library. She plucked a book off the shelf, flipped through it, but she ultimately used it as a hard surface to draw on. Settling on the sofa against the wall facing Isabelle, Jaq borrowed one of the papers.

Thomas, Owensby, Viktor, and Mrs. Wroll glanced at each other. For what must have been an hour, all they did was watch these two figures in complete silence. Isabelle was perfectly well behaved.

Finally, the girl hopped up to show Jaq the image. Jaq congratulated her and told her to sign and date it, to track her progress. “Let me see yours!”

They could not see the image from the staircase, but Isabelle became very quiet. “It’s…so much better than mine.”

“Only because I’m older,” Jaq said. “I’ve had a lot of time to practice.”

“That’s me drawing!” Isabelle exclaimed. “It looks almost like a daguerreotype!”

“Aw, that’s sweet of you.”

“You see things like I do.”

“What do you mean?” Jaq asked, not unkindly. Those on the staircase shifted uncomfortably.

“You see what others don’t.”

“I’m a butler. It’s my job.”

“Have you ever drawn with colour?” Isabelle inquired. Jaq nodded. “Vanessa does not let me work with colour,” she complained, rolling her eyes. “She worries it will stain.”

“Colour is harder than black and white,” Jaq considered. “And it does stain.”

“I tried pricking my finger once, for red,” Isabelle stated. Mrs. Wroll inhaled sharply.

Jaq laughed. “It turned brown, didn’t it?”

“Yes!” the girl piped. “And I tried eggs for yellow, but they rot.”

“There is a type of paint made from eggs,” Jaq provided. “Painters mix the yolk with colour pigments, and things that keep it from smelling. Mrs. Wroll might let you have watercolours. They are just coloured powder you mix with water and the least likely to stain.”

“Could you teach me?” Isabelle asked eagerly.

Jaq considered that. “If my employer allowed.”

“He will!” the girl assured. “And Vanessa could pay you! She’s full of her dead husband’s money.”

Owensby chuckled while Viktor and Mrs. Wroll exchanged glances.

“There’s a problem, though,” Jaq said. She fingered the paper they used to draw on. “We need different paper to work with. Water paint will slide right off of these sheets.”

Isabelle frowned. “I don’t have any other paper.”

“I do,” Jaq promised.

Isabelle sat next to her on the couch. “You’re so much nicer than Vanessa,” she said quietly.

“She’s afraid for you, that’s all.”

“She’s afraid of me,” she corrected. “I get angry, and she doesn’t know what to do with me, same as my parents. She can’t marry me off.”

“Do you want to get married?”

Isabelle looked at her, surprised by the question. “I…well…I used to think so.”

“What do you think now?”

“I think my husband would grow to hate me…like everyone else.”

Jaq leaned back against the couch. She laced her fingers together over her abdomen and crossed her knees. Viktor suddenly had a memory of Ives in his mind. “Hate...is a mentality a majority of people inaccurately use. No one hates you. Besides, you’re just figuring things out like the rest of us. We all get angry. We’re all confused. Vanessa cares about you and wants to help you with that.”

“No she doesn’t.”

Jaq gazed openly at her. “Why do you think so?”

“Because she knows what my drawings mean. I’m dying, and she doesn’t care.”

The butler’s lips parted. “Dying of what?”

“She doesn’t care,” Isabelle continued, “and I’m afraid.”

“Of dying?”

“No, everything else. People talk about heaven and hell but I don’t know where I’m going.”

“Why shouldn’t you get into heaven?” Jaq asked consolingly. “It’s pretty nice from what I hear.”

“Are you going to heaven?”

Jaq shrugged with a laugh. “I suppose it’s not for me to say.”

“But you don’t go to church.”

“True.”

“Would a priest give you your last rights?”

Jaq replied mirthfully, “After a lot of Hail Marys, maybe.”

“Are you laughing at God?” Isabelle seemed desperate to understand.

“I’m laughing at people,” Jaq replied. “They make God out to be a loving creator, a forgiving Father, or contrarily a smiting, demanding being. His way or no way. Frankly, whoever decided to write ‘he’ in the books was not intimately familiar with who exactly does the creating. I like to think that if He, She, or It is omniscient, then They know what is in your heart and mind. Perhaps it is solely your actions that decide where you go, but I think if He was truly a loving being, He would know who the good are, and he wouldn’t let them suffer beyond this lifetime.”

Isabelle gazed at her for a long moment. “I want to be as optimistic as you.”

“It’s an effort, I promise.”

“But the things in my mind…my heart…they’re not good. And I’ve done bad things.”

“I’ll tell you a secret,” Jaq sat up, taking Isabelle’s hands and playing with her fingers. The girl seemed surprised Jaq was not terrified of touching her, and relieved by the contact. “We’ve all said bad things, and meant them. We’ve all thought bad things, and wanted them. Sometimes we do things we should regret, but we don’t. I think it is how we behave afterward that defines whether we are good, or bad. There’s only one door when we die and we all pass through it. We’ll all see each other on the other side, and whether there is a fork in the road at that point…isn’t for us to preoccupy ourselves with. How long have you been cooped up in this house?”

Isabelle blinked. “Um…since I was moved here. Vanessa isn’t comfortable with me going outside.”

“Well she’s going to have to get uncomfortable.” Jaq stood and held out her hand to Isabelle. “If you’re worried about death so much you should experience life a little more. We’re going for a walk.”

Isabelle eagerly gripped her hand. “Really?”

“Is there any park you miss?”

Isabelle giggled and they passed under the staircase to reach the front door, chatting on their way out of the house. Mrs. Wroll retreated to lean against the curved banister, contemplative.

“Astonishing,” Sir Owensby mused. “She seems totally aware of her condition.”

“Today is a good day,” Vanessa exhaled. “But we must keep that butler nearby for a lesser day.”

“Hmph,” he scoffed. “You are the pessimist.”

“What is she dying of?” Viktor inquired.

“If you can get close enough, Doctor, you are free to examine her,” Mrs. Wroll sighed. “The only thing I can imagine is that whatever is compelling her is draining her energy. She doesn’t eat as often as she used to and I worry about her weight.”

“It seems her thoughts are what is troubling her,” Sir Owensby pondered. “This may be a mental affliction, not a physical one. Or perhaps just puberty.”

“I was not aware adolescence granted psychic powers, Sir Owensby,” Mrs. Wroll stated sardonically. He harrumphed but did not reply. “Sir Teagan?”

Viktor snapped out of his reverie. “We might as well have a look at these drawings. Otherwise I suggest you send Agatha to get paint and paper.”