When it was lowered over my head, Wenthelen fastening the buttons down my back, I could see in the looking glass that the layers of fabric and all the careful handiwork had done their job.
“Not half bad,” Wenthelen observed.
I nodded, smoothing my hands over the lemon-colored taffeta, and caught Wenthelen’s eyes in the reflection. “Pull in those laces until I cannot breathe.”
Rosie and Mathilde came down first. “You look wonderful,” I told them, and meant it. My hands, as they always did when I felt surges of affection, sought out their faces, and my children shied awayfrom me as I patted and fixed their hair, fingers fluttering around their necks. Then we stood in the front hall, waiting.
“I am so impatient. I wish we could leave this instant.” Rosamund sighed.
Mathilde worried the lace on her sleeves. “We shall be late.”
“We are expected to be.” Lavinia and I had agreed, via letter, that we would arrive at half past the start time, as was the custom. But, because the journey to the palace would take a good while, the sun was still high in the sky. The ball felt close at hand and yet there were hours to get through before we’d set foot inside the castle.
“And Elin has not come down,” Rosie said.
“I am here,” she called, and we all turned.
She stood at the top of the stairs, lit by a beam of light that reached through the glass above the door. The deep wine color of the dress set off her pink cheeks. Elin held her folded train with an elegantly extended arm. Her figure, normally thin and straight, benefitted from the undulations of her dress.
My girls and I walked toward the base of the stairs, faces upturned. Elin began to descend. With each passing step, the pretty image she had presented fell apart, slowly, and then all at once. Elin had, I saw, not finished her hem, and the rough edge of the cloth dragged on the floor. Her eyes looked red, as if from crying.
“Why,” Rosamund said, with genuine surprise, “that is my hair ornament!”
“I can see your undergarments,” Mathilde said, in dismay. Sure enough, her smock was coming through a seam at her waist.
“Elin,” I reprimanded. Her sleeves were different lengths. “You were not able to finish your dress.”
“No.” She shook her head. She came to the bottom step and stopped in front of us. “And it ripped when I was putting it on.”
“It wouldn’t last for one dance!” Mathilde reached out and plucked at the open waist panel, which began to tear away.
“Oh!” Elin cried.
“You could have asked me,” Rosamund said.
“I did!” Elin protested.
“You should have made it clear what, what…” Rosie searched for the right words. “What the situation was!”
“Surely you don’t intend to wear it,” I said.
Elin looked down at the dress. “You insisted I do the ashes first.”
“We did not know help was needed”—I fingered the panel of the dress Mathilde had removed with little effort—“quite so badly.”
“Might she borrow something?” Rosamund wondered.
“She cannot wear a dress that does not meet the requirements—the train, the neckline,” I reminded. The uneven clatter of horse feet outside indicated Lavinia’s carriage had arrived. “And we do not have enough time.”
Elin’s eyes glossed over, wet with tears. “I have nothing to wear.”
“Well, you cannot wear that,” Mathilde observed. She turned to me, plaintively. “She will be laughed out of the room. We will be laughed out of the room.”
“She’s right,” I said. Then, more softly: “You cannot wear that to the ball. And we cannot keep the Enrights waiting.”
Elin’s tears spilled over.
I did not feel so sorry for her. Elin might have worked on her dress from the very beginning. She might have used the days we were at the picnic, at the market, in the fields picking apples. She might have told us sooner. At long last, she would see the consequences of her own ineptitude. But even this was only half true: All was not lost for Elin. To her, this was just one ball. A singular disappointing night. She, a pretty-faced daughter of a gentleman, also had an inheritance. Her life offered choices whereas my girls’ lives were confined to a solitary opportunity. And I would not allow her to jeopardize their chances.
