couldn’t hear Nick’s muttered reply, for she was trying to avoid confrontations with the little man for the major’s sake. She was still uncertain of Nick’s precise function at the house, and she wished to postpone serious decisions until her head cleared.
It was also a good thing she didn’t return to the kitchen soon, to visit “her” kitten, or she would have seen all the cats ensconced on Boy’s new bed, while a mangy, windy old mutt snored on the abandoned straw mattress. She didn’t have to venture down the stairs though. Boy brought the scrap cat to her, with devastating regularity.
A more welcome diversion was one of the boarders, Marie. Cristabel hadn’t yet learned to put names to faces, for most of the renters breezed past her short stays in the parlor between naps. Some of the women looked away, unsure of their welcomes, others waved cheery hellos or good-byes on their frequent outings. She was neither fish nor fowl to them, Cristabel realized, neither working class nor aristocrat, and most had nothing to say to her despite their similar ages. For her part, they seemed very busy, very gay, if a trifle loud in their manners which must, no doubt, be due to London’s freer, more temperate moral climate. She also noticed that they were dressed better than she would have thought possible for shop girls and bakers’ assistants, but what did she know of fashion? She knew they were all dressed better than she was!
Marie was different. Her mother was a housekeeper, so she had been raised with the children of a great estate. She was used to the limbo of governesses and companions, and women who were educated beyond their usefulness as maids and dressers. She was polite without being deferent and friendly without being encroaching. She never asked about Cristabel’s circumstances, so Miss Swann had to curb her own curiosity, which was hard, since she had little to occupy her at these times between headaches and sleepiness. Marie, on the other hand, was always sewing.
“Are you a seamstress, then?”
“I do piecework. The other girls are always tearing a hem or ripping a flounce. Sometimes I’ll copy a gown for them from the fashion plates. It’s extra money.”
“Do you think you could…? I’d pay you, of course.” Cristabel plucked at the brown bombazine dress she wore.
“I was hoping you’d ask! I kept thinking you would feel so much better in brighter colors, but I didn’t want to offend, if you were in mourning.”
“No, only in what Miss Meadow deemed respectable garb.”
“Grain sacks, more like,” and they both laughed, the friendship sprouting on the fertile ground of fashion. Marie was running up and down the stairs with ladies’ magazines and pattern pieces, swatches of colors and textures to debate and select. She wouldn’t hear of Cristabel accompanying her on the shopping expedition once their lists were complete. “What, in this damp? Mac would have my head on a platter.” Marie made no comment on Cristabel’s pink cheeks, only reassuring her that this was just a preliminary foray to Grafton’s, where the quality was high, the prices low.
“As soon as you are up and about, there’s the Pantheon Bazaar and the silk warehouses…and there are more booteries and corsetieres than you can shake a feather at. Plumasiers too, of course. What we need to do is make you presentable enough to go shopping!”
“I’d be happy just to go for a walk, but Fanny and Mac—Major MacDermott say I mustn’t yet.”
“They’re quite right. You need to be much stronger. Why, you can hardly hold your head up now. You need to loll around eating all the pastries Fanny buys and the bonbons Mac brings you so I won’t have to keep letting out seams later. What’s more, no lady of fashion would be caught dead in a gown buttoned up to the throat, and bones aren’t what’s meant to show in a décolletage.”
“Oh, but I couldn’t—”
“Why not? You’ve got the perfect figure
It was also a good thing she didn’t return to the kitchen soon, to visit “her” kitten, or she would have seen all the cats ensconced on Boy’s new bed, while a mangy, windy old mutt snored on the abandoned straw mattress. She didn’t have to venture down the stairs though. Boy brought the scrap cat to her, with devastating regularity.
A more welcome diversion was one of the boarders, Marie. Cristabel hadn’t yet learned to put names to faces, for most of the renters breezed past her short stays in the parlor between naps. Some of the women looked away, unsure of their welcomes, others waved cheery hellos or good-byes on their frequent outings. She was neither fish nor fowl to them, Cristabel realized, neither working class nor aristocrat, and most had nothing to say to her despite their similar ages. For her part, they seemed very busy, very gay, if a trifle loud in their manners which must, no doubt, be due to London’s freer, more temperate moral climate. She also noticed that they were dressed better than she would have thought possible for shop girls and bakers’ assistants, but what did she know of fashion? She knew they were all dressed better than she was!
Marie was different. Her mother was a housekeeper, so she had been raised with the children of a great estate. She was used to the limbo of governesses and companions, and women who were educated beyond their usefulness as maids and dressers. She was polite without being deferent and friendly without being encroaching. She never asked about Cristabel’s circumstances, so Miss Swann had to curb her own curiosity, which was hard, since she had little to occupy her at these times between headaches and sleepiness. Marie, on the other hand, was always sewing.
“Are you a seamstress, then?”
“I do piecework. The other girls are always tearing a hem or ripping a flounce. Sometimes I’ll copy a gown for them from the fashion plates. It’s extra money.”
“Do you think you could…? I’d pay you, of course.” Cristabel plucked at the brown bombazine dress she wore.
“I was hoping you’d ask! I kept thinking you would feel so much better in brighter colors, but I didn’t want to offend, if you were in mourning.”
“No, only in what Miss Meadow deemed respectable garb.”
“Grain sacks, more like,” and they both laughed, the friendship sprouting on the fertile ground of fashion. Marie was running up and down the stairs with ladies’ magazines and pattern pieces, swatches of colors and textures to debate and select. She wouldn’t hear of Cristabel accompanying her on the shopping expedition once their lists were complete. “What, in this damp? Mac would have my head on a platter.” Marie made no comment on Cristabel’s pink cheeks, only reassuring her that this was just a preliminary foray to Grafton’s, where the quality was high, the prices low.
“As soon as you are up and about, there’s the Pantheon Bazaar and the silk warehouses…and there are more booteries and corsetieres than you can shake a feather at. Plumasiers too, of course. What we need to do is make you presentable enough to go shopping!”
“I’d be happy just to go for a walk, but Fanny and Mac—Major MacDermott say I mustn’t yet.”
“They’re quite right. You need to be much stronger. Why, you can hardly hold your head up now. You need to loll around eating all the pastries Fanny buys and the bonbons Mac brings you so I won’t have to keep letting out seams later. What’s more, no lady of fashion would be caught dead in a gown buttoned up to the throat, and bones aren’t what’s meant to show in a décolletage.”
“Oh, but I couldn’t—”
“Why not? You’ve got the perfect figure
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