Page 58 of The Gentlewoman Companion (The Gentlewoman #4)
Chapter One
T he sharp clip of footsteps on cobblestone drew Meg’s eyes to the mouth of the alley.
She stood outside her kitchen door, which opened onto the backstreet.
Warm lamplight from her windows and the graying dawn illuminated Mr. Sloan, to whom she was apprenticed.
He stopped and pivoted toward her. Heart pounding, she stiffened and acknowledged the beastly man with the barest of nods. Why was he out so early?
Please, do not approach , she prayed.
“Fine morning.” His voice, too loud and too cheerful for the early hour, ricocheted into her ears and made her jump. She could almost see a smile lift his cheeks to dimple.
Mr. Sloan, or more correctly Master Sloan, usually reserved his unflappable good humor for his other apprentices, his clients, and friends.
In fact, she was the sole recipient of a tepid attitude that left no question as to what he thought of having a gentlewoman apprentice. His cheerful greeting unsettled her.
She nudged the lid of the wicker trunk. It snapped closed, drawing Mr. Sloan’s eyes to the chest. Stepping in front of it, she clasped trembling hands behind her back. Wouldn’t he love to catch her flouting guild rules and have a real reason to get rid of her?
“Can I offer my assistance?” he asked.
Ever obliging—except with what she most wanted. “No, thank you, sir. Good morning.”
If he saw her continuing to fiddle with the trunk, he would assume she was struggling and insist on helping, so she slipped into the kitchen and left the box outside as if that was what she’d intended.
With her back against the door, she squeezed her eyes shut.
Surely, he would not open the chest. After counting to twenty, she peeked out her curtained window to confirm the empty street before returning and pushing her secret into the kitchen.
The trunk contained only the honor box she had used in London to sell gin.
The box felt appropriately full. She dumped the coins from it onto the counter and grouped shillings and halfpence in neat stacks, counting as she went.
The taken shirts had been paid for in full.
“Grace?” Meg called, restocking the trunk with an additional bundle of shirts and two shifts. Under the string that bound the shirts together, she tucked a card with Mrs. Smith written upon it.
“Yes, Mistress Margaret?” Grace’s smile brightened the shadowy morning.
“For heaven’s sake.”
“You are the sister of an earl.”
“The illegitimate do not signify. Besides, my half -brother may decide at any moment to rescind his aid.” Meg surveyed freshly whitewashed walls, delicate lace curtains, and well-stocked shelves.
The kitchen alone was larger than her entire house had been on London’s Rosemary Lane and contained more food than the entire row of tenements combined.
It smelled of lavender instead of desperation.
All of it, she owed to her half-brother.
Despite efforts to accept his goodwill, the wariness with which she received his generosity grew until she felt herself devolving into her customary suspicious independence.
Perhaps she was, as Lord Halverton said, a guard dog that could not distinguish friend from foe, but she would never feel secure until each farthing required for her maintenance and that of her eight-year-old brother came from her own pocket.
Margaret pulled a canister from a shelf. “I will make porridge.”
“What am I here for?” Grace took the oats from Margaret, playfully nudging her before setting to work.
Margaret glanced around the clean kitchen helplessly. “I don’t like being waited upon.”
Grace snorted. “Don’t say that when you know this position saved my life. Besides, you do more than a pirate during a siege. Finish your gown for the Saint Valentine festival.”
“Do you truly believe displaying my work will help me acquire additional customers?” Meg wasn’t so sure.
Grace shot her a withering look.
“Technically, the dress is a Mr. Sloan creation,” Meg reminded Grace.
“Not at all. It’s your work.”
Grace was right. Meg was not only desperate to increase her income but also determined to learn how to construct a proper mantua, seeing as her master never deigned to help her.
“I will be in the cutting room, then.” Margaret retreated into what she privately thought of as her personal sanctuary, one that became increasingly divine by the day.
The week before, a large shipment of fabrics had arrived: silk, bombazine, brocade, wool, and linen in prints and solids, as well as ribbons, beads, and thread of every color—a gift from her half- brother.
His mother, the dowager, and his wife, Lady Halverton, must have chosen the fabrics, for they had impeccable taste.
While the fabrics were being delivered, Mr. Sloan had stood watching from across the street, an uncharacteristic scowl creasing his face as crate after crate had filled her yet-to-be dress shop.
Her pleasure at Mr. Sloan’s displeasure had warred with an unease at her half-brother’s generosity.
The gift was too much, causing her to feel bound to Lord Halverton in a way she generally avoided.
And the venture might fail as not. She also did not wish to increase Mr. Sloan’s dislike; as his apprentice, only he could teach her the skill she required to become a successful mantua maker.
On her own, she would never have dared threaten her mentor by setting up a rival establishment—it had been Lord Halverton’s doing.
But after a month in Mr. Sloan’s insufferable company, she was determined to steal every female customer that passed through his shop door.
Such a scheme required attending an outdated Valentine festival, which, although it felt like an extreme waste of time, might garner interest from future customers. If she could finish her dress in time.
Inside her future shop, she moved to the shelves that covered one end of the room and felt for the hidden mechanism.
She pushed, and a portion of the shelves opened to a shallow hidden compartment.
From inside, she retrieved a jar. The coins from her pocket clinked into it as she mentally added the sum of her savings.
It was enough to keep herself and Grace for three months but would not cover Samuel’s school.
When the jar could support her household for six months as well as pay tuition for Samuel’s school, she would sever the financial ties to Lord Halverton.
When her half-bother discovered her existence several months ago, he set up a trust from which she received a stipend each month amounting to enough money to maintain her household for two months.
But she could not become dependent upon the income.
Instead, she squirreled it away and spent as little as possible.
If the money kept appearing, in one year, she’d have the required savings.
A year was an insufferable amount of time to wait, and the plan depended on the trust continuing to pay out.
Like everything the wealthy and elite offered, that money could not be relied upon.
Halverton, though kindness incarnate, believed it best that he should oversee the account.
He probably worried that she would withdraw all the money and hide it, which was quite true.
Meg did not understand the trust. She’d read the terms, and Lord Halverton had tried to elucidate the confusing sections, but words like “assets,” land rents,” “bonds,” and “distributed incomes,” overwhelmed and stupefied.
What did she know of such things? However, she was quite familiar with the fickle munificence of the wealthy and would never underestimate their ability to abandon poor relations.
Lord Halverton’s generosity might evaporate the moment he realized his yet unborn heirs required more than he planned.
He may run a debt or suddenly find use for a fleet of grand carriages.
In the meantime, she would take the money and set aside every spare farthing. She gave the jar a final shake before setting it firmly in its place and pushing the door closed. The shelves gave nothing away and that pleased her.
She pulled a chair in front of the hidden stash and sat like a sentry guarding a treasure. From a basket, she drew a partially constructed crimson linen gown from the work table and began re-attaching a sleeve that would not lie flat.
Months prior, Lady Halverton had gifted Meg a glorious confection in amethyst silk, an absurdly fine gown, constructed more perfectly than anything Margaret had ever seen.
Upon scrutinizing it she’d wanted nothing more than to learn from its maker.
When that dream was made real and she met Mr. Sloan, she was astonished to find him only four or five years older than she.
Surprise gave way to hope that she might attain proficiency at a similarly young age.
Yet, Mr. Sloan would not allow her to stitch anything more complicated than a shift or man’s shirt, let alone teach her how to construct a garment as complicated as a mantua.
Thus, Meg had taken the gifted purple gown apart, copied the pattern and was reproducing it using sturdy, red linen.
Every spare moment was dedicated to the task.
She cut and sewed, unpicked her stitches and began again, a complicated trial and error.
Her efforts fell considerably short of perfect.
Though brought up with a needle in her hand, the mantua was beyond her skill.
Already her stitching and restitching had frayed the edges of so many pieces of fabric, she’d been forced to used fifty percent more fabric than required.
A necessary but uncomfortable waste. She practiced and practiced, spending far more on candles than she’d budgeted.
Another painful expense. And she couldn’t remember when she’d slept beyond four hours.