Chocolate coloured curls framed the doll’s face, matching the swirls on the hand-woven rug. Christy clothed her in an ancestor’s Christening gown; the frilly hem a froth on the nursery floor.
She’d come up to the top of the house to peer from the barred window watching for him coming in his shiny motor car. She’d spent weeks picking the wallpaper, soft furnishings and cradle, arranging her dolls against the brass bedstead.
Christy decided that the baby would be blonde so she took the big doll with the chocolate curls and poured bleach on its little head until it cried.