Silk Is For Seduction - Loretta Chase [69]
“Most unfortunate, madame,” Pritchett said. “Yet some would think it a miracle we haven’t had this problem before, when you consider that we take in all sorts of girls, from the streets, practically. One doesn’t wish to be uncharitable. Some of them don’t know any better, I daresay. Never taught right from wrong, you know. I shall be happy to work late—as late as needed—to make the dress over, if madame wishes.”
“No, I’ll want you fresh tomorrow,” Marcelline said. “Lady Clara Fairfax’s ball dress must be ready to deliver at seven o’clock sharp in the evening. I shall want all my seamstresses well rested and alert. Better to come in early. Let us say eight o’clock in the morning.” She glanced at her pendant watch. “It’s nearly eight. Send them all home now, Pritchett. Tell them we want them here at precisely eight o’clock tomorrow morning, ready for a very busy day.”
She rarely kept her seamstresses past nine o’clock, even when the shop was frantically busy, as it had been when Dr. Farquar’s daughter had needed to be married in a hurry—or when Mrs. Whitwood, having quarreled with Dowdy, had come to Maison Noirot to have herself and her five daughters fitted out in mourning for a very rich aunt.
Marcelline’s personal experience had taught her that one did better work early in the day. By nightfall, spirits flagged and eyesight failed. The workroom had a skylight, but that was no use after sunset.
“Yes, Madame, but we have not quite completed Mrs. Plumley’s redingote.”
“It isn’t wanted until Thursday,” Marcelline said. “Everybody is to go home, and prepare for a long, hard day tomorrow.”
“Yes, Madame.”
Marcelline watched her go out of the showroom.
The trap she and her sisters had set yesterday morning was simple enough.
Before they went home at the end of the workday, the seamstresses were required to put everything away. The workroom was to be left neat and tidy. No stray bits of thread or ribbon, buttons or thimbles should remain on the worktable, the chairs, the floor, or anywhere else. The room had been perfectly neat early yesterday morning when Marcelline deliberately dropped a sketch of a dress for Mrs. Sharp on the floor.
The first seamstress arriving in the morning—and that was usually Pritchett—should have noticed the sketch, and turned it over to Marcelline, Sophy, or Leonie. But when Sophy went in, shortly after the girls’ workday began, the sketch was gone and nobody said a word about it. It didn’t turn up until this morning. Selina Jeffreys found it under her chair when she came to work.
Pritchett had scolded her for hurrying away at night and leaving a mess. She’d made a great fuss about the sketch—Madame’s work was never to be carelessly handled.
But Marcelline, Leonie, and Sophy knew there hadn’t been a mess, and that Jeffreys’s place had been as clean and orderly as the others. Nothing had been lying under her chair or anyone else’s.
Well, now they knew. And now they were ready.
The shop door swung open, setting the bell jangling.
She looked up from the dress, and her heart squeezed painfully.
Clevedon stood for a moment, his green gaze sweeping the shop and finally coming to rest on her. He frowned, then quickly smoothed his beautiful face and sauntered toward her. Riveted on that remarkable face, too handsome to be real, it took her a moment to notice the large box he was carrying.
“Your grace,” she said, bobbing a quick curtsey.
“Mrs. Noirot,” he said. He set the box on the counter.
“That cannot be Lady Clara’s new dress,” she said. “Sophy said her ladyship was delighted with it.”
“Why the devil should I be returning Clara’s purchases?” he said. “I’m not her servant. This is for Erroll.”
Marcelline’s heart beat harder, with rage now. She was aware of her face heating. It probably didn’t show, but she didn’t care whether it did or not. “Take it back,” she said.
“Certainly not,” he said. “I went to a good deal of trouble. I know nothing about children anymore,