A Rogue of One's Own

She entered, and a deafening clanking sound nearly made her jump out of her walking boots.

“Good gracious!”

She glared up, her hands covering her ears. A large . . . cowbell was swaying menacingly right above her face. It was most definitely a cowbell because it looked exactly like the ones she had seen on cows in Switzerland when visiting there as a girl.

“Good morning, missus. How may I help you today?” From the corridor leading to the depths of the shop’s back room emerged a tall, thin woman with a measuring tape coiled around her neck. A pair of glasses was hanging on to the tip of her nose. Already her brown eyes were moving over Lucie from head to toe, taking mental notes—height, notably short; waist, notably small; bosom, largely absent.

Lucie placed her card on the countertop. “I require seven dresses after the latest fashion.”

Mrs. Winston frowned at her, confounded by an accent announcing a lady while the card introduced a plain Miss Morray. Well, she could never be certain where she ran the risk of being recognized, and whether she would be served. Today, she had no time to waste.

Mrs. Winston picked up a pen and a wooden board with a sheet of paper attached to it.

“One morning dress,” Lucie said. “A carriage dress, three walking dresses, and two evening gowns, complete with matching gloves. These are my measurements.” She slid a note toward the scribbling Mrs. Winston.

Mrs. Winston side-eyed the note. “I prefer to have my assistants take the measurements.”

“I’m rather pressed for time. The figures are accurate.”

The seamstress put down her pen, her expression grave. “With all due respect, it is my experience that measurements tend to fluctuate greatly between a customer’s measuring tape and the tapes we employ here.”

Fluctuated greatly between reality and desirous thinking, rather.

“I suffer no illusions in regard to my size,” Lucie said. Her skin itched at the thought of being stripped and measured and turned to and fro. The sooner she could go to the Randolph to plan her next moves, the better.

“Very well.” Mrs. Winston’s eyes flitted between the figures on the paper and Lucie’s torso. “These measurements do not seem to account for a proper corset.”

“They do, but it laces down the front and I prefer it to be quite loose.”

Mrs. Winston’s brows nearly reached her hairline. “I suspected this was the case.”

“I expect it shall pose no problem for a seamstress as acclaimed as you?”

“None at all,” Mrs. Winston said coolly. “We are proud to deliver outstanding elegance no matter the challenge. Have you any preferences regarding the fabrics and colors?”

She eyed the fabric bales on the walls. Pale hues of pink and blue and sunshine. Gatherings of ladies everywhere resembled baskets full of Easter eggs this season.

“Cotton in lemon yellow for the morning dress,” she said. “Tafetta silk for the walking dresses in light blue, powder blue, and mauve. Cerise silk for the evening gowns. Finest new wool in dove gray for the carriage dress.”

Mrs. Winston nodded along with revived enthusiasm; as usual, Hattie’s color choices pleased the experts in the field.

“No trains on the carriage dress or the walking dresses,” Lucie said.

Mrs. Winston stilled. “No trains?”

“Not one inch.”

“Very well,” Mrs. Winston said after a poignant pause. “I do recommend adding some strategic applications to create an illusion of buxomness.”

“You mean ruffles? No ruffles, please.”

“Very well. May I suggest velvet details for the walking dresses? I had some exquisite navy-blue velvet delivered yesterday; it would make an excellent contrast with both light blue and powder blue.”

“Approved,” Lucie said. “I also need three pockets in each skirt.”

Mrs. Winston nearly dropped the pen. “Three pockets?”

“Yes.”

“There is one pocket at the most in the skirts we order in or fashion ourselves, and in the walking dresses only.”

“Well, I need three in each skirt, in convenient reach and quite large.”

Mrs. Winston had a hostile look about her. “It is common to have one pocket, a small one, in the skirts of a walking dress. But three is quite unheard of.”

“I have a lot of items on me,” Lucie explained. “I’m quite discerning, you see.”

“With all due respect, you required dresses after the latest fashion. The latest fashion can be described in one word, snug, but in any case, bulging pockets destroy the lines of any kind of skirt and thus the look of a lady.” Mrs. Winston’s voice had steadily risen and she was quite agitated on the last word.

Lucie reached into her reticule and placed coins onto the counter. “This lady pays extra for them.”

Mrs. Winston picked up her pen again with pointy fingers. “It can be paid for, certainly,” she muttered. “It does not, however, make it any less of a crime against a perfectly innocent skirt. Say, are you part of this new Rational Dress Society?”

“I am not,” Lucie said, but drat it reminded her of the pile of correspondence back at home. Somewhere in the stack lurked her unfinished reply to Viscountess Harberton, newly minted founder of the Rational Dress Society. Should said society dare to postulate a recommendation on women’s unmentionables (no woman shall wear undergarments exceeding seven pounds in combined weight), Lady Harberton had asked. And: would Lucie support a campaign in favor of women riding bicycles? The answer to both questions was yes, and she’d prepare a bicycle petition, but so far, she had not found the time. No thanks to the added work on London Print. Damn Tristan Ballentine, obstructor of women’s progress on every front.

The cowbell exploded behind her as the shop door opened again.

“Good gracious,” came a woman’s aristocratic voice, “have we entered Switzerland?”

Lucie froze.

No.

No, this was not possible.

Mrs. Winston was looking past her at the new customer, her lips moving with a greeting.

She couldn’t hear over the heavy silence filling her head. It had been ten years since she’d last heard that voice.

She glanced back over her shoulder with some hesitation.

An angel had entered the shop. Glossy curls in hazel shades. Large crystalline blue eyes. A mouth poets would have likened to a rosebud. She had never beheld this paragon of womanhood before. But next to the young lady, with her thin brows raised in consternation, stood—her mother.

So she hadn’t imagined it. It was Lady Wycliffe, clad in high-necked pale silk and lace.

She had used to wonder how it would be to see her mother again. Her stomach had plunged at the thought. And now she felt—nothing. Just her heart beating away with eerie calm.

The countess looked thinner; she was stretched tight over her fine bones. Or perhaps it was the shock—first the cowbell, now her daughter.

A footman had accompanied the women; he stood back against the wall, bedecked in bags of varying sizes.

“Lucinda.” Her mother was still staring at her. A lady does not stare.

“Mother.”

Her eyes on Lucie, the countess gripped the angel’s upper arm. “You remember your cousin Cecily?”

For a moment, she remembered nothing.

The young woman, Lady Cecily, tilted her head. “Cousin Lucie.”

At the sound of the sweet voice, she knew. Memories returned, of a six-year-old girl who easily cried. Cecily’s parents—her father one of Wycliffe’s first cousins—had perished in a train accident, so she had come to live at Wycliffe Hall. At now one-and-twenty, she was a beauty, no doubt a toast of polite society.

“May I offer the ladies some refreshment?” Mrs. Winston’s voice was unnaturally bright.

“Cecily excels at watercoloring,” her mother said. “She was immediately accepted by Professor Ruskin for a place in Oxford’s Summer School program.”

“How delightful,” Lucie said.

The air in the shop was suddenly thick as London fog. Had her mother just announced that she and Cecily were in Oxford for the summer?

“Are you often in this part of town?” her mother asked.

“It is a small town, Mother.”

They were bound to cross paths. It was hard to tell who of them resented this more. The countess had finally released Cousin Cecily’s arm, but a displeased flush reddened her cheeks.

“Cecily, we are taking another turn outside. This is a small shop, it cloys easily.”

“Yes, Aunt,” Cecily said softly.

“I was about to take my leave,” Lucie said quickly. There was no need to cost Mrs. Winston an order, as reticent as the woman was on the matter of pockets.

Her mother gave a contemptuous sniff.

Lucie turned back to the seamstress. “Have you any crimson silk?”

Mrs. Winston looked at her sharply over the rim of her glasses. “I do. In the back room. Do you wish to take a look?” She said it reluctantly, no doubt worried the ladies would leave after all.

“Crimson is crimson, I suppose. I need a ball gown fashioned from it by next week. Feel free to embellish it, but no ruffles.”

Mrs. Winston blinked. “By next week?”

“I shall pay double.”