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Olympia stood, and was instantly surrounded.
While the women held up this and that against her, she wondered whose garments they’d brought. Yes, one or two might have been display articles, although more usually a fashion print or a length of fabric, artfully draped, would appear in the shop window.
A modiste was unlikely to keep a supply of dresses ready, awaiting a customer. Garments were made to order.
On the other hand, when, for instance, certain customers who had large bank accounts and a reputation for paying promptly—or dukes—demanded something in a hurry, the dressmaker might alter clothing meant for another client.
Mrs. Thorne laid out a chemise and a corset.
They were shockingly beautiful, unlike anything Olympia had ever seen before. The chemise, of the finest linen, was embroidered with colored silk and trimmed with lace along the neckline and edges of the sleeves. The corset, of equally costly fabric, was even more scandalous. It was stitched in pink and black. Pink trim traced the sides of the busk. There was pink lacing for adjusting the bust line area, tied with tiny pink bows. Even the back lacing was pink!
Olympia had never worn—or seen, for that matter—anything but white undergarments in all her life.
She must have looked as astonished as she felt because Mrs. Thorne said quickly, “Some of our clientele are London ladies.”
“Indeed,” Olympia said. She wondered what sort of London ladies ordered underwear so excessively French.
She told herself it didn’t matter.
She needed clean, dry clothing, and if the underthings seemed more suitable for a brothel, that wasn’t surprising, considering who’d ordered them.
Her too-active mind envisioned a brothel, in the style of a Turkish harem. In it lolled women whose bodies matched those of Greek and Roman statues or perhaps women in Rubens’s paintings. They lounged about on cushions and rugs in their lacy, colorfully embroidered underwear. Men like Ripley would saunter in and . . .
Best not to imagine that.
Better leave it to the satirists. No doubt they’d put Lord Gonerby’s only daughter in a scarlet corset and petticoats.
Good grief, the look on Papa’s face when he saw those pictures—
No, she would not think about that.
She would look on the bright side. There always was a bright side, though sometimes one had to look carefully indeed and use a magnifying glass or a microscope.
And the bright side was . . .
She’d lose the title of Most Boring Girl of the Season.
While she contemplated brothels and her new public character, the women got her out of the dressing gown and into chemise and drawers. They tied ribbons and arranged ruffles and smoothed fabric with as much care as if these underthings were made of silk and diamonds.
The corset straps needed adjustment, but Miss Oxley went to work, rapidly unstitching and re-stitching. Meanwhile Mrs. Thorne set Miss Ames to take in the petticoat.
Olympia was fascinated. In London, professional seamstresses were usually kept hidden in another part of the dressmaker’s shop. When they did emerge from the workroom, it was to show an item of clothing or assist the dressmaker. She’d never seen them truly at work. The speed with which their needles flew, making the tiniest stitches, seemed superhuman to her.
She had always found books more interesting than needlework.
She hadn’t more than a moment to observe, though, because they needed to finish dressing her. The maidservants helped her into stockings and tied garters, apologizing for hurrying her—“but His Grace said we must make haste, and he is so good, you know, we—”
“So good!” Olympia said.
“Oh, yes!” Molly said. “I’d be ashamed to disappoint him, I would.”
“Good!” Olympia said. “This is the first I’ve heard of it. What’s he done? Don’t tell me he takes in wounded birds and nurses them back to health. Saves kittens from drowning, perchance? That must be it.”
“But truly, my lady—”
“Good,” she repeated. “Ripley. I vow, it hurts my head to put that adjective in his vicinity. The same goes for the other two nonsensical excuses for dukes. No, it’s no use. I cannot wrap my wits about the idea.”
The servants smiled and one of the seamstresses tittered. Mrs. Thorne glared at her, and the girl bent to her work.
“I know they say His Grace is wild, my lady, and he is,” said Jane.
“Such goings-on,” said Mrs. Thorne, shaking her head.
Yet Olympia caught a hint of an indulgent smile.
“But when my father fell ill, His Grace sent a doctor, you know,” said Molly. “And paid the fee.”
“And people may say what they like about Their Graces—and such doings as they get up to!” said Jane. “But whatever gets broke or burnt up or falls into the river, you know—or whoever—they do pay.”
“The bed linens that time,” said Molly. “Covered in blood, I vow. Still, we thought we could get it out—”
“Covered in blood?” Olympia said.
“The duels,” said Miss Ames.
“Hush,” said the dressmaker.
“His Grace did mention duels,” Olympia said.
“Battersea Fields, you know,” said Miss Ames. “Sometimes Putney Heath.”
“But mostly the gentlemen come upriver some,” said Jane. “To get patched up quiet-like.”
“Not usually so bloody, though there was that one time—”
“The Duke of Ashmont—”
“When I saw the blood, I thought Lord Stewkley had shot his ear clean off!”
“But he’d only nicked his head, His Grace said, and how he laughed! Like it was nothing.”
“And His Grace of Ripley said head wounds bleed like pigs—”
“They bleed like the very devil, is what His Grace said.”
“Mind your tongue,” said Mrs. Thorne.
“Not on my account,” Olympia said. “I have six brothers.”
“Boys will be boys, as we all know,” said Mrs. Thorne.
“More like boys will be little savages,” said Olympia. “I
’m not sure they ever become entirely civilized. Anyone who tries to shock me with the mad doings of boys will have their work cut out for them. Nothing seems to change much as they grow up, does it? I only marvel at their living long enough to grow up. What was the duel when Lord Stewkley almost blew off the Duke of Ashmont’s ear?”
“That was a very long time ago,” said Mrs. Thorne repressively as the others opened their mouths. “Nearly ten years, I believe.”
“That long?” said Jane.
“In any case, they were young, hardly more than schoolboys,” Mrs. Thorne said. “I’m sure nobody remembers what it was about. And I’m sure we have too much to do, to waste time gossiping about ancient history.” She cast a warning look toward the other women.
The subject was dropped, and everybody concentrated on their work while Olympia digested recent information.
People tried to hush up duels because they were illegal, but it was nearly impossible to hush them up completely. Still, Olympia couldn’t remember anything in particular regarding Ashmont and Lord Stewkley.
Hardly surprising. Their Dis-Graces had created so much scandal so often that extracting one—from a decade ago—would be like getting treacle out of a boy’s hair.
The thought of treacle reminded Olympia she was hungry.
“I wonder if somebody would bring me a bite to eat,” she said.
“Certainly, my lady,” said Jane. She hurried out of the room.
The others installed Olympia in the naughty corset, made final adjustments, and laced her up. Then came the petticoat, which matched the other articles.
Then the dress, at last.
Olympia was vaguely conscious of a mass of pink silk and bows and lace, but by this time her mind was on food, and wishing the maid would hurry. A single piece of bread or cheese or a biscuit would do.
But no, Olympia had arrived with the Duke of Ripley, sainted in these parts, evidently, and the cook must be preparing turtle and lobsters and a fatted calf.
It wasn’t until Mrs. Thorne draped a black mantelet over her shoulders that Olympia truly paid attention. She looked down at the bodice and skirt.
