A series of flashbacks reveal that when she began working for Vera Donovan, Dolores was the victim of an abusive husband who, as she eventually learns, was also molesting their daughter.
Vera suggests Dolores take advantage of the up-coming eclipse to solve her problem, singing, "accidents can be an unhappy woman's best friend."
She is joined by Selena, her now adult daughter, who tells the police Dolores could not have murdered Vera as the two had become very close after 40 years together.
Early in the first act, Vera’s admonition to her maids about properly hanging the sheets to dry, set to angular jitters, opens up into sumptuous ardor, then closes again into anxiety, with an ease of transition that recalls Janacek.
The collaborators have invented an ingeniously creepy nursery rhyme for Joe (the resonant, fearless bass-baritone Wayne Tigges) to sing as he molests Selena, with a translucent, percussive accompaniment.