Pride filled Sybil’s chest, and she melted backwards, keeping out of the lady’s way. The urge to offer an entire chart-full of reading recommendations bubbled within her, but the thought of speaking to someone so sophisticated tied Sybil’s tongue in knots.
It would be different at Vauxhall, she promised herself. She would be different.
Tomorrow was the final fitting for the fanciest gown Sybil had ever commissioned. Not an entire wardrobe full of fashionable frocks. One dress. One ball. One chance to finally stand out.
Every reason in the world to be petrified.
So Sybil did what she did best: created lists to calm her nerves. Top ten ways Mademoiselle LaChapelle with her faux French accent was just as good as the ton darling, the incomparable—and eye-poppingly expensive—Parisian modiste Madame Blanchet. Twenty-five conversation topics other than the weather. Lists of rules of etiquette, of possible dances. Lists of the possible gentlemen likely to be in attendance.
If even one of them asked Sybil to dance, she would count the evening as a success. She’d made lists of all the ways the evening could go. From being the belle of the ball to being relegated to the shadows amongst the literal walls of flowers decorating the garden.
She feared she needed more than a fancy dress to stand out amongst heiresses and peers. She needed a brilliant conversation starter. She needed to be unforgettable. She needed—
“Madame Blanchet!” she blurted out as she recognized the face beneath the bonnet. Sybil had strolled past her storefront and gazed in the windows yearningly hundreds of times.
This was Madame Blanchet, the sought-after, fought-over modiste to the ton, whose time was so precious that her services were fully booked until 1825.
Mme. Blanchet, who was staring at Sybil with…horror?
Chapter 2
Madame Blanchet froze with her elegant, silk-clad fingers gripped around a slim brown volume she had just selected from the shelf. Deep-set hazel eyes widened in a delicate countenance devoid of freckles and cosmetics.
The most fêted modiste in all of England—and all of France, too, according to the society papers—and now Sybil had her full and complete attention.
She was at a loss as to what to do next.
“Er,” Sybil stammered, gripping her journal for strength.
She had not meant to blurt out Mme. Blanchet’s name. Sybil had not expected to make the modiste’s acquaintance in her lifetime, much less this morning in the corner of a cobbler’s shop. There had been no time to create a list of conversation topics likely to please a French modiste, or to interview Madame’s clients on the preferred method of greeting the celebrated modiste.
Without adequate preparation, she was struck speechless. Should she curtsey? One did not curtsey to someone in one’s employ. But Mme. Blanchet wasn’t Sybil’s modiste. Sybil could not afford her services if she saved every shilling for the next decade. Mme. Blanchet’s clients were countesses, duchesses, marchionesses. Madame had twice designed court dress for the queen. She was legendary.
And here she was. In one of Sybil’s libraries. Holding a title Sybil herself had personally selected.
No one would believe this. Sybil did not believe it.
Then again, if she’d had the foresight to list the ways to make Madame’s acquaintance, running into the most fabulously famous modiste whilst dressed like a shabby-genteel pauper was exactly the sort of situation Sybil would have imagined finding herself in. High on the top five most mortifying encounters: Squatting in a cobbler’s shop.
But here she was, and here was Mme. Blanchet. By the panicked look on her face, the modiste was likely to fly away at any moment. Sybil couldn’t waste this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to at least exchange greetings. The two of them were alone, tête-à-tête! Which was the only way Sybil ever plucked up courage with strangers at all.
No more dithering. If she couldn’t find her tongue in a library, it was going to be impossible at a ball.
Sybil sucked in a shaky breath and forced herself to step forward. “Mme. Blanchet—”
“The book, he is not for me,” Madame said quickly. “He is… comment dit-on… gift for une amie?”
Sybil sent a puzzled gaze at the novel trembling in the modiste’s gloved hand. She recognized the book from its cover, which was apparently what Mme. Blanchet feared. But Sybil would never judge any reader’s taste in literature. As a matter of fact, she found Minerva Press’s lurid gothics to be highly diverting, and had read all five volumes of this particular tale twice already.
“It’s an entertaining story,” Sybil found herself saying. “The premise of being trapped in a crumbling Italian castle—”
“He is not pour moi. Your English is trop difficile,” Madame insisted. “This is the first time I see—”
The cobbler looked up from his work. “You’re back!”
Madame flinched.
The cobbler leapt up from his chair to pull down an exquisite pair of kid half-boots.
