“Then His Grace will arrange for lessons. There is time.”
“There is not... I do not belong at a ball in a ball gown.”
Sarah’s eyes held hers a moment longer than usual, and whatever she saw there, she did not remark upon.
“You shall feel quite differently by the time the ball comes around, Your Grace. The beautiful dress alone will convince you of where you belong.”
Violet looked at the woman in the glass. The Reaper’s fourth wife. The girl who lied her way into a duke’s bed.
Chapter seven
Allowances
Violet
Madame Renard’s establishment occupied the first floor of a narrow building on Conduit Street. The stairs were carpeted. The walls were papered in a pale stripe. At the top of the stairs a woman perhaps in her forties met them with a curtsey that was precisely calibrated to be deep enough for a duchess, shallow enough to suggest that she curtsied to duchesses regularly.
“Your Grace, what a pleasure. Mrs Greer, how well you look. And Miss Baker, do come through.”
The fitting room was warm and smelled of new cloth and lavender. Bolts of fabric lined the walls. A large glass stood in the corner. Two young women in plain dresses waited with pincushions at their wrists.
“I have taken the liberty of selecting several fabrics I thought might suit Your Grace’s colouring.” Madame Renard gestured toward a table on which six or seven lengths of cloth had beenlaid out. “Now, then. If Your Grace would be so good as to step behind the screen.”
Violet stepped behind the screen. She removed the blue dress and stood in her chemise and stays. Madame Renard’s face made a small, unmistakable wince, but she said nothing. One of her assistants took the blue dress and hung it up. The other brought a tape measure.
Madame measured her and called out the numbers which one of the assistants wrote down.
“Your Grace is very slender.” Madame Renard wound the tape around her waist a second time. “We shall want to build the bodice to give some fullness here.” A finger tapped Violet’s sternum. “And here.” A tap on each hip. “The right boning and the right cut will do a great deal. A great deal can always be done, Your Grace, with the right modiste.”
Violet’s hands clenched at her sides. The underhanded insult cut where it had intended.
“Now, I understand we are dressing for Lady Carstairs’s ball.” The woman moved around her, eyes appraising. “That is rather soon, but I think we can manage. I always say one can do a great deal with the right fabric and a willing client.” She paused at Violet’s stays and ran a fingertip along the boning. “These are quite old, Your Grace. We shall want new ones before anything else. The foundation must be right, or everything built upon it shows.” She turned to her assistant. “Fetch the French coutil, the firm weight. And the longer busk.”
Violet’s hands clenched at her sides. Nothing the woman had said was wrong. The stays were old. The foundation did matter. But the pause, the taps, the way she had saideverything built upon it shows—those were not about stays.
Sarah, who was standing by the wall watching, dropped her gaze to the floor.
“I think that will be all, Madame Renard.” Violet ran her palms over her dress and stepped down from the small platform.
The modiste’s smile faltered. “Your Grace, we have not yet discussed—”
“Thank you. You have been most informative.”
She stepped behind the screen and Sarah helped her dress. When she came out, she did not look at Madame Renard. She thanked the assistants, walked down the stairs and out into Conduit Street.
Sarah caught up with her in the street. Mrs Greer, who had been waiting in the carriage, looked alarmed.
“Your Grace?”
“I should like to go home, Mrs Greer.”
She climbed into the carriage. She sat with her hands in her lap. Sarah climbed in after her and sat opposite.
“Your Grace,” Sarah said, as the carriage turned onto Regent Street. “Madame Renard is a very fine dressmaker.”
“I am sure she is.”
“There are other dressmakers, Your Grace.”