A Dress for the Wicked

by Autumn Krause

  “Sounds fine.”

  I glanced at my bed. Tilda had turned down the covers (sloppily, of course) and the thick layers of sheets and puffy blankets beckoned me. I wanted to slip into it and ease my aching body. Still, I pressed on. “There’s also the invitations to the press and members of Parliament who are interesting in currying favor from the queen. Since I’m doing the pattern, would you do those?”

  “Yes.” As she lay on the chaise, she gathered up her thick hair and wound it into a topknot. “Alexander has mentioned several of their names to me.”

  “I suppose he would know who to ask . . . but let’s try to keep his involvement to a minimum.” I didn’t want his help—I didn’t want to ever see him again. But we needed him. From Sophie’s account to his contacts, he was involved in our new line. “We also need to book a venue for the show.”

  “I can do that when I mail the invites,” Sophie said. “I know where the exhibition is going to be held, so I’ll find a place nearby.”

  I nodded. Things were coming together. Maybe—just maybe—we really would pull this off.

  Chapter Sixteen

  THE NEXT DAY WAS SATURDAY, typically one of the Fashion House’s busiest days. However, since the gala had been the night before, we were closed until Monday. We hadn’t had a single day off since the Fashion House Interview began, so work on our wedding gowns was prohibited to give us time to rest.

  “Madame Jolène has interviews with the Avon-upon-Kynt Times and several other smaller papers today,” Francesco informed us that morning at breakfast. His voice was a raspy whisper, and he winced anytime the morning light hit his eyes. In one hand, he held a mug of fragrant peppermint tea. He kept drinking it, but it didn’t seem to be reviving him. “You ladies may enjoy the day. Just do stay out of the way, and please, no loud sounds.”

  Ky and Alice, who were sitting across from me, immediately grinned at each other.

  “Paddington Park?” Alice whispered to Ky. Ky nodded vigorously. The main street winding through the Quarter District ended at Paddington Park, where several of Avon-upon-Kynt’s eligible bachelors often played croquet and polo.

  While they would chase after titled gentlemen and enjoy a day outside the Fashion House, I’d finally have uninterrupted time to sketch and work on the collection.

  I pushed my chair back and started to leave the dining room to head to my chamber. Then I stopped. Francesco was still in the dining room, trying to cure his hangover. Everyone else was finishing up breakfast. This was the perfect opportunity to take Cynthia’s measurements card from the filing cabinet.

  I hurried down the stairs to the fitting-room hallway. The card cabinet sat right outside it. Francesco organized and maintained the cards and pulled the ones we needed for our appointments every morning. Thankfully, he never threw any of them out. His motto was, “Once a Fashion House customer, always a Fashion House customer.” Supposedly, even the cards of deceased clients were still in there, filed right alongside the current ones.

  And, luckily for me, blacklisted clients as well.

  The large black cabinet had gold letters affixed to each drawer. Approaching it slowly, I listened for any footsteps. Aside from the soft breakfast sounds trickling out of the dining room and down the stairs, everything was silent. Quickly, I found the S drawer and pulled it open, revealing rows and rows of thin cards inside. I ran my finger over them, my panic subsiding a little. Each one belonged to a woman who had come to the Fashion House for a custom gown. I could only imagine how many stories and lives were represented in these rows. Almost reverently, I ran my fingers over the different names on the cards. Most were traditional English names, but there were others in languages I didn’t recognize, along with a variety of titles: Her Imperial Highness, Maharani, Czarina.

  And there, right in the middle of the S drawer, was Cynthia’s card. I pulled it out and read it.

  CLIENT PROFILE: CYNTHIA SANDRINGHAM, DUCHESS OF KREMWALL ESTATES

  FIRST APPOINTMENT NOTES

  CLIENT’S NEEDS: HIGH-END COUTURE, READY-TO-WEAR, CUSTOM, TRAVELING AND SEASONAL WARDROBES

  MEASUREMENTS:

  BUST: 35.5"

  WAIST: 25"

  HIPS: 37"

  HOLLOW TO HEM: 56.5"

  BEST COLORS: WINTERS—EARTHY BROWNS, DEEP GREENS, BURGUNDIES

  Big, black letters covered the bottom.

  CLIENT TERMINATED

  There was no additional explanation. If the duchess lived anywhere else, such a thing wouldn’t matter as much. But she didn’t. She lived in Avon-upon-Kynt, and the Fashion House was the axis upon which the nation spun. Slowly, I tucked the card into my pocket and closed the drawer.

  “What are you doing?”

  I whirled around. There, standing behind me holding a broom in one hand and a rag in the other, was Tilda. My heart jumped straight up into my throat. I could feel the card in my pocket, its edges digging into my skin through my dress, proof of my theft. Had she seen me take it?

  “I was going for a stroll.” Even to myself I sounded strange—too panicked, scared even.

  “Down here by the fitting rooms?” Her beady eyes darted from me to the cabinet. “Is that drawer open?” She let the broom fall to the ground and jabbed a finger at the cabinet. I turned around to see the S drawer standing open a fraction of an inch.

  “Francesco must have left it open,” I said.

  “I’ve been cleaning down here all morning. I didn’t see him.”

  “Well, I don’t know anything about it.”

  “I’ve been working here for three years now,” Tilda said, drawing herself up. “I know this isn’t right. I’m going to tell Madame Jolène I found you down by the client cabinet. I’m sure she’ll be able to tell if anything is missing.” Triumphantly, she turned for the stairs.

  “No!” I lunged forward and managed to grab her wrist just in time, jerking her to a stop.

  “Ow!” she yelped. “Let go of me!”

  “Stay still!” Desperately, I spun her around to face me. “If you tell Madame Jolène you found me down here, I’ll tell her you’ve been stealing beads off the dressing room floors and selling them.” I didn’t even think of the lie ahead of time. It slipped right out of me, surprising me as much as her.

  “What?” The triumph in her face wavered, and she stopped struggling. “She would never believe that!”

  “I overheard Francesco talking to Madame Jolène.” Another lie. “He said he’s had his eye on you.”

  “He did? Why?”

  “Yes. He said you’ve been slacking—in fact, he asked me if I thought it was true, and I told him about how you keep leaving my room in disarray. Do you really want to get fired from the Fashion House? I don’t think anyone else would hire someone with that on their record.”

  She yanked her wrist out of my grip, but she didn’t run away or try to leave. She rubbed it, staring at me with big eyes. Shaking free of my cold gaze, she bent down and picked up the broom.

  “Fine. I won’t say anything.”

  “Good.”

  I sounded harsh. Cruel. I forced my face to remain rigid, but my stomach hurt—not just from the close call, but also from the awful way I’d treated her. Never in my life had I spoken to another person that way. Never had I grabbed them and stared into their eyes and threatened their livelihood.

  Tilda stomped away without looking back. Once she was gone, I raced up to my chambers, as though someone was chasing me. Safe in my room, I leaned against the door and slowly slid down to the ground so I was sitting on the marble, my limbs limp.

  It’s fine, I told myself over and over again. I closed my hand around the measurements card in my pocket. I would copy it and return it, just in case anyone did check.

  I pushed myself up to my feet and walked over to my vanity. Only one thing would calm me. I pulled out a piece of sketch paper and pencil.

  I took a breath in, let it out, and then started sketching Cynthia’s gown.

  By the time Tuesday came around
, we had the plan in motion. The money had been transferred successfully, and Sophie had bought the fabric for Cynthia’s dress while she was out on a date with an approved gentleman caller.

  “I think it’s the exact color you asked for,” Sophie said. We were in her fitting room. It was after hours, but we closed the curtain and only lit one candle. She pulled out a bolt of purple fabric from behind the bench and unfolded it so we could spread it out. It spilled across the floor, tumbling over itself, its lightness catching the air before settling onto the ground.

  After the encounter with Tilda last Saturday, I’d been a bundle of nerves. Everything seemed so complicated, gnarled, like a sewing thread with hundreds of tiny knots in it, impossible to undo.

  “It will be difficult to sew,” Sophie said, seemingly more to herself than to me. I bent down and touched the silk. The fabric was like liquid: soft, sinuous, reflective.

  “I know.” It had been my idea to get the slinky silk. “Madame Jolène prefers more structured fabrics because they can make bigger, more exaggerated silhouettes. But I want to do the opposite.”

  I started to take the pieces for Cynthia’s pattern out of my sewing box. I’d stashed them there earlier that morning so I could smuggle them down to Sophie’s sewing room without arousing suspicion.

  There were ten different pieces, each one fitting into the next. Slowly, I pieced them together to create the outline of the gown. The white shapes were stark and flat, and it was odd to know that even the most beautiful gowns started from these dull, lifeless scraps of paper.

  Hopefully, Cynthia’s measurements were still the same. We wouldn’t be able to tell until she had her first fitting.

  “It’s quite complicated,” Sophie said. I handed her the sketch of the dress so she could see it in its entirety.

  “I know,” I sighed. “But it’s our first dress, so it has to be magnificent. Do you like it?”

  Sophie examined the sketch and then knelt by the pattern. She glanced back and forth between the two and then gave a small nod. Coming from her, the nod might as well have been a glowing front-page article in the Avon-upon-Kynt Times.

  Suddenly, we heard a door open far down the hall.

  “Are you expecting someone?” Sophie whispered.

  Muffled footsteps sounded on the carpeted floor, moving toward us.

  “Of course not!”

  “Don’t just stand there!” she hissed. She yanked the silk hard, sending the pattern pieces flying like leaves in the wind, and tried to stuff the fabric into her sewing cabinet. I jumped to help her, but the material slid through my fingers, spilling out onto the floor as we tried to crumple it into the drawer. It seemed to grow in length and density with each passing moment.

  Sophie slammed the drawer shut just as the curtain flew open and the whole room flooded with light. Madame Jolène stood in the entryway, the brass oil lamp she was holding throwing its glow over us. I ducked my head. I could feel every secret written across my face.

  “Good evening,” Madame Jolène said.

  She was wearing a red evening robe embroidered with Japanese characters. Her blond hair draped loosely across her shoulders. I’d only seen her hair down one other time, when I’d met her in Evert. I’d been scared then, but I hadn’t felt the worst of it as I did now, standing before her with my heart thundering away inside my chest.

  “What are you two doing up so late?” Madame Jolène set the lamp down on a nearby cutting table. For a moment, I had the irrational fear that she could see through the sewing cabinet drawer to its incriminating contents.

  “We were looking at patterns,” Sophie said.

  “How sweet.” Madame Jolène surveyed the fitting room, her eyes finally coming to rest on me. “I trust you are well tonight, Emmaline?”

  “Yes.” I had to force the word out. My hands were clammy and cold, but sweat pricked my forehead.

  “What patterns were you looking at?”

  “We were—” I faltered, realizing with a streak of white-hot panic that I didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

  “Emmaline was showing me her pattern for Lady Harrison’s wedding gown,” Sophie interjected.

  “Is that so?” Madame Jolène spoke to Sophie, but she kept staring at me. “I find it refreshing that you girls aren’t letting the competition discourage your collaboration. Now, let’s see this pattern. Lay it out for me.”

  Obediently, we knelt and started assembling the pattern. The thin paper shapes all looked the same to me. As we fitted shapes together, my breath grew shorter until it was almost audible. There it was, our whole plan, slowly assembling beneath Madame Jolène’s eyes, a blueprint of our guilt.

  “It looks more like an evening gown than a wedding gown, no?” Madame Jolène asked.

  “I wanted to try something different,” I said weakly.

  “Emmaline was telling me that she wants to experiment with the idea of formal gowns versus informal gowns,” Sophie said.

  “I see. Well, it’s quite something.” Madame Jolène expertly assessed the pattern. She nodded, as though seeing it come together and understanding its nuances. “I’m impressed at your ingenuity and willingness to make something so difficult, Emmaline. But you’ve made an error.”

  She pointed down at the pattern pieces. Two black, chunky bracelets slid out from under her sleeve and down her wrist. Of course she wore jewelry during her retiring hours.

  “The dimensions are slightly off. Lady Harrison is only five feet and three inches tall, if I recall.”

  “It was on purpose. Emmaline intended the gown to be quite full with lots of crinoline,” Sophie said smoothly. I had rarely seen the two interact for any long length of time. They were both, in their own ways, fascinating to watch, equals in their cunning and confidence.

  “Yes, but even with lots of crinoline, this won’t work. Listen well, both of you. You should always know your client’s measurements,” Madame Jolène said. “It’s your responsibility as a designer. If you don’t know your client’s measurements—her proportions—you will hardly know how to dress her.” She raised one finger to her lips, contemplating. “This will be much too long for Lady Harrison. Hand me that bottom piece. The hemline.”

  I shook inside and was certain my fingers were shaking as well. I snatched up the piece and handed it to her, rising to my feet.

  “Yes, this is all wrong.” She pulled a pair of heavy sewing shears out of her robe. “Here.”

  With one swift motion, she sliced the pattern piece in two. I barely contained a gasp of horror as the paper split apart, my hard work severed in one crisp tear.

  “There.” Madame Jolène held out the now-halved pattern segment. I took the pieces from her hands, hardly believing what had happened.

  “And those shoulder sections, Emmaline, hand them here.” She motioned to the pattern’s bodice. Numbly, I picked up the two pieces and handed them to her. My hands lingered longer than necessary, trying somehow to stop her.

  “Lady Harrison will look broad in these sleeves.” Madame Jolène cut the piece apart, and her eyes flashed with enjoyment. Bile rose on my tongue. I’d spent hours measuring and cutting the pattern. The sound of crinkling paper filled the fitting room as she crushed the sections. “Choose a different neckline and then remake the sleeves around that. It’s hardly fair for me to advise you, but since Lady Harrison is our actual client, it’s essential that you represent the Fashion House well.”

  I nodded, staring at the hard work that had just been snipped and severed into oblivion. Maybe I could try to press out the wrinkles and reassemble the pattern . . . but it was so intricate that the slightest variations would ruin the dress and we couldn’t risk it. I would have to remeasure and recut the severed pieces.

  “Don’t stay down here too late.” Madame Jolène picked up the lamp by its handle. “I expect fresh faces for my clients tomorrow. No circles under the eyes, understood?”

  “Yes,” Sophie and I chorused.

  But she wasn’t done
, not quite yet. Holding the lamp aloft, she looked around the fitting room once more, as though its light would reveal our secrets. The lamp threw bizarre shadows on her face, darkening the spots just below her cheekbones and under her chin.

  “Remember, girls,” she said, her voice raw and strong. “I know everything that goes on in this house.”

  With that, she left us with our severed pattern piece and torn-apart sleeves. We listened as her footsteps retreated and the door closed at the end of the hallway. I stared down at the crumpled balls of paper that had once been our pattern pieces.

  “Do you think she knows?” I asked. I took a long, shaky breath, trying to get my heart back down into my chest.

  “I don’t think so. But she’s obviously suspicious.” Sophie ran her hand through her hair again, twisting the ends of the strands around her fingers. “At least she only ruined three pieces. It’ll be all right.”

  I breathed in. “You’re right.” It was odd to see Sophie trying to reassure me. Nice, but odd.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t work down here.”

  “We don’t have much of a choice,” I said. “But you should bring in some dresses from your customers in case Madame Jolène stops in again. We can pretend to be working on them.”

  “All right.”

  I wiped cold sweat from my forehead. “We just have to be really careful.”

  Sophie nodded, for once looking appropriately grave. “We will be. Try not to think about the risks. It only makes it worse.”

  “That’s for sure,” I agreed. I walked over to her bench and slid down on it. “Starting a secret business is very . . . stressful.”

  For the hundredth time, I wished I could talk to my mother. She knew how to start a business and make it successful. Granted, hers wasn’t a secret, but it must have been frightening to start up without any help.

  I appreciated that more than ever before. Before she purchased it, my mother had taken me to look at the Moon on the Square. I’d run around the empty building, poking at the cobwebs in the corner and twirling in circles around the bar. I’d never thought about how Mother had felt that day, how she must have realized the risks of starting a business on her own. All I remembered was her making a list—a list of problems.