bed. Then there was Maisy, one of the pot-doll sisters—with a creeping screech the doll had turned her head to stare directly at the bear. The bear, knowing that he was the only one with life thread, could not understand how the doll managed to move. So he pushed her from the high shelf where she shattered on the wood below. Eleanor, who woke up with a start, for a moment was frightful at the noise of the shattering doll. But it was the bear she took from the shelf to hug. Maisy had lain in shatters ever since.
Night and nights Eleanor slept with shallow breath; she murmured worried words. The bear felt it also; his fur stood on end at some tangible discomfort. Here it was: the miasma that had entered Eleanor’s fears. The bear could not see it, but was aware of the presence. It was a tingle of spine, a creak on the stair, a curtain that moved without breeze and danced like a ballerina ghost.
The bear stood on the shelf. “I know you are there.”
A voice like a scurrying of spiders. “I have come for the child—her sadness called me.”
Eleanor stirred; the bear whispered, “Are you cholera? I will not let you have her.”
The air thought thoughts, then suddenly the shadows lurched horribly, the bear was lifted and sent spinning across the room with a sickening growl. Eleanor sat upright; she screamed a silence, and the sound had been stolen.
Morning brought the sun but no comfort. The bear sat where he had landed the night before, and waited and waited until the sunlight seeped high through the break in the window shutters. Eleanor did not move; a rasping sound, a horrible gasping, floated from Eleanor’s bed. The bear, with little choice and so much fear for his Eleanor, dared to do what he was never to do: he moved in her presence. He crawled slowly at first, moving past the broken pot-doll sister, the tatty giraffe; he climbed onto the bed and stood next to the sleeping Eleanor’s face. She was pale and damp; the bear stroked her cheek, his paw instantly soaked with the sweat on her brow and pale skin. Gently the bear leaned and pushed her; he was ready to freeze the moment her eyes opened, and the moment never arrived.
He needed help so the bear went to find the father. He crept across hall, making his way to where the father slept. Except not now—even in the gloom the bear could see the father was absent. Instead there were empty bottles and overturned furniture. By the bear’s feet lay a spider web of glass picture frame. It held a grey picture of the mother, and she was smiling and shared the smile Eleanor once had. The bear would never let Eleanor become splinters, and he would never let the haunting take her. The bear made his way back to the room and there was his Eleanor, as beautiful as ever, waiting for him. Her eyes were closed and as deep as ever. Droplets covered her brow like tiny blisters. She was perfect. So engrossed was the bear he did not see the wretchedness that held Eleanor aloft in thick black tendrils of shadow and harm. He did not see as darkness drowned the world, pouring and suffocating, twisting, tightening, squeezing the bear.
“Bear,” it whispered, “you can see her one last time, then her sadness is mine and you will be tatters.”
“You cannot have her. Just go away,” the bear demanded , in the tiniest and strongest of voices ever spoken.
“You dare defy my want? Even now as you face oblivion?”
“No,” cried the bear, “she is mine and will forever be.”
Eleanor opened her eyes. Her mouth opened to shriek but confusion formed instead.
“Bear?” Her first and last word ever spoken to him.
The bear smiled, from shadow and was the shadow. The darkness rose from it and spread like creeping vines around the room, completely engulfing Eleanor. The bear spoke with a voice like the scurrying of spiders, its true voice, the voice of a creature and the bear in one.
“You will always be mine. You will never leave me. I will take your sadness away.”
However in that moment the bear caught the reflection in her terrified eyes and saw the truth of the matter. In those eyes the bear saw his own memories. Of being a boy running across the cobbles, running excitedly to his mother, who called for him from the other side of the street. He saw his mother’s face smiling but quickly turning to horror. The boy, confused, turned to see too late the horse and carriage and he was crushed into the stones. Lonely in the never , the afterlife, the boy’s spirit cried for his mother. He stayed alone until the birth of a beautiful baby girl called to him. Life was good until time stolen and jealousy and loneliness replaced love once again.
The corrupted bear, lost in the revelation, didn’t notice as the father, arriving home and hearing the commotion, forced his way into the room, and without pause scooped up his only daughter into his arms as the bear, empty, fell to the floor. Eleanor told her story to the father. How her toy bear had been a presence of its own. How objects had been moved in her room of their own accord. She said she would dream of the bear, but it wasn’t her bear, it was a boy who died long ago who, feeling her sadness on the breeze, floated into her bear, giving it a voice of its own. Of course the father did not understand her story and Eleanor was sent to a place where doctors were. The bear found itself discarded on the street, lost to turmoil as the world passed it by. It was kicked and stood upon, neglected and left to fester in the gutter, That was until it was found again and taken to a place that welcomed bears with no human.
There was a doll-maker who had dedicated herself to making dolls for all children everywhere. And, oh, what dolls they were masterpieces of beauty. The children and their parents came on long journeys from far and wide just to visit The Doll House (so was named the shop). It seemed, however, that her dedication had come with a price. Now when the doll-maker looked into the mirror, an old grey woman returned her gaze where youth had once been. She was content with the happiness she had brought others, but also sorrowful for the happiness she had denied herself. Suitors had been and gone and could never draw the doll-maker’s attention from her work. She had once longed for a child of her own, yet time had taken away that option. This did not stop her, however—the doll-maker dreamt of whispers that filled the air and the doll-maker’s
Now when the children came to the doll shop they found the shutters firmly closed and the door bolted. Inside the shop the dolls sat on shelves and hung from the rafters. If the dolls, half-finished and otherwise, could have formed expressions they would have looked very, very worried.. Behind a red velvet curtain where the pieces dolls stayed, the doll-maker toiled under the watchful eye of the jars of eyes. Around her hunched figure as she worked, in a dusty darkness lit by a small candle, were the arms and legs and torsos of dolls. Bald heads with eyeless sockets swayed in the shadow of the candle. For seven days and seven nights she worked until her fingers bled. Occasionally there were knocks on the door, but in her obsession the doll-maker heard none.
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