Victorian Nocturne

( An American lady at an English dinner party? )

( It could only have ended in scandal! )

"My Bonnie lies over the ocean," Nanette's sweet, high voice lilted into the stillness of the attic. "My Bonnie lies over the sea..." She hummed the next lines to herself, focusing on the needle and thread in hand as she worked.

Nanette had always been somewhat proud of her needlework. Her first sampler, done at the tender age of eleven years so long ago, had been prized at the small school for the children of the upper crust in Havana. When visitors came to her father's plantation and Nanette was made to demonstrate her skills, her embroidery had always brought the most praise, even beyond her skillful playing of the piano and kind, astute manners. In later years, Dr. Passebon had taught her more intricate methods of stitching, which had come to be quite useful.

( Bring Back My Bonnie To Me )

"Martin!" she snapped, fist gripping a weathered stone pestle as she furiously ground it against the battered mortar. "Apuro!" She had taken the aged Mexican servant into her home when he was but a child, and though the years had been kinder to him than to most, he was still well beyond the years usually reserved for such arduous servitude, and moved much more slowly than Madame Passebon would have liked. The time was nearing, she knew, when he would be relegated to naught more than further fodder for her potions and serums, and he would have to be replaced.

But it was so difficult to find good help anymore! More and more, Nanette found herself longing for the days when a faithful servant was bought at the auction block and his loyalty and obedience wrought with the whip. The years might not have been hard on her pretty face, but they had certainly done their work upon her patience, and Nanette could not abide a slow, slovenly servant who might demand his wage.

"Martin!" she shouted again, just as the old man ambled in, carrying with him the limp corpse of a young prostitute, aged little more than Nanette looked. "Put it on the chaise and do try to keep the head tilted up, would you? The last, you'd left it lolling about and I'd gotten gore all over the upholstery."

"Si, Senora Passebon," the old man responded obediently, tottering towards the chaise.

( Beauty Ritual )