Ophelia had reached the set of shelves which Bartholomew was unceremoniously scaling — he was rather nimble, for such a small and otherwise ungainly-looking creature — and reached out to catch him by the scruff of his neck, though the little devil dodged her hand and moved around to the back of the shelf, peering out at her with an inscrutable expression. Was he laughing at her, or were those deep breaths just exertion from his climb? Perhaps he didn't understand why Ophelia had come over at all, to try and ruin his fun. What a little scamp! She supposed left to his own devices he'd have the entire store turned upside down before he was finished. And where had her chaperone gotten off to? It was just a maid, of course, but the maids had plenty of experience grappling Bart down from various heights around the Dippet house, and might have made a cleaner job of it than Ophelia could.

And now it seemed that blasted woman had decided to wade her way through the wreckage and come over here, when Ophelia still had not succeeded in reclaiming her pet. Why did she have to do that? Couldn't she just mind her own business? Ophelia was almost grateful when she slipped and fell (and, truth be told, a little smug as well; Miss Scrimgeour did have a reputation for lacking a certain grace and ease on the dance floor, after all, and it seemed the rumors were well-founded if she couldn't manage to carry herself from one end of the aisle to the other without misadventure).

"Nothing over here," she lied, hoping she sounded confident enough to dissuade the girl from coming any closer. After glancing over her shoulder to ensure Miss Scrimgeour wasn't close enough (or, more appropriately, at the proper angle, now that she'd fallen) to see what Ophelia was doing, she nudged the items on the shelf aside and made another grab for her wayward pet. "You know, the shelves falling over might have had something to do with the merchandise. They sell all sorts of odd things here. It could have been — like a magical cookoo clock, that just went off at the wrong moment," she suggested. Of course it hadn't been, but this seemed relatively plausible to her ears, and she thought Miss Scrimgeour would probably want some sort of explanation sooner or later.

Her fingers brushed up against Bart's fur and Ophelia clamped down as hard as she could, dragging him forward across the shelf like a wayward child might be dragged back into the house by a governess. Now she just had to wrestle him back into his bag before Miss Scrimgeour recovered herself!