Mr.de Clare was treating me like a little girl who didn’t know what she was doing, and I was beginning to feel like one.Hadn’t Ma told me this would happen?
But I was never one to give up so quickly.I raised my chin.“Mr.de Clare, I shall return with samples of my work and my ledgers next month.Whenever your schedule allows.”
Mr.de Clare waved a dismissive hand, jeweled rings glinting on his thick fingers.“I’m sorry, my dear, but you are far too young and inexperienced.Perhaps you may come back in a decade or so and solicit a witch-owned department store, if one of your kind decides to start one.Griffin!”
Desperation clawed at my throat.I had set my heart on this place, just as I’d been set on joining the Witch Committee.But this time, there was no secret ability I could expose to get myself accepted.I was just a girl from Witch Village with no real accolades.What could I provide him that he didn’t already have?
I let Mr.Griffin escort me out.The secretary shut the door behind me, but not before I heard Mr.de Clare’s voice say “...unruly witch girl.”
I clenched my fists.Perhaps he was right.No proper society miss, or even a respectable business woman, would have acted the way I had to get his attention.Last week I had tried to gain an audience after already being rejected once, taking it upon myself to slip past Mr.Griffin and wave frantically to Mr.de Clare inside, hoping he would let me in out of sheer curiosity.I shortly learned that the methods that worked in the Witch Market didn’t translate here.I’d been hesitant to use the royal connections I had, but this time, even with Narcissa’s letter, I had bungled it up.
I looked down at my beige skirt and fancy blouse.Clothing, for once, wasn’t quite enough to get me through this.
As I was descending the marble steps to the lobby, my eye caught on an empty square of space between the millinery department and the perfumery.It was an enclosed shop, though three of its walls were made of glass, the interior filled with empty shelves.
Therewasa vacancy!
I was ready to march right back up to Mr.de Clare’s office until the sign on the glass caught my attention.
Jeraldine’s Dress Emporium.
***
MADDOX WAS STILL WAITINGinside when I returned.
“How did it go?”he asked, standing from a sofa in the lounge area.
I was tempted to tell him everything, that I’d have to set my sights elsewhere, that my charms were as good as useless, that perhaps I wasn’t cut out for this after all.But the hour was late and I was too exhausted to complain.Besides, Maddox would balk at my vulnerability.Our friendship had never been based on emotional availability.
“It was fine,” I said dismissively.“Follow me.”
I ducked beneath a set of chiffon curtains that led into the small fitting chamber.The walls were covered in indigo damask wallpaper, a gilded mirror mounted on one of them.A low wooden platform and a plush bench completed the room.
It would have been my favorite part of my shop if it weren’t for the rickety door adjacent to the mirror.It opened up to a dark staircase which Mrs.Lewis frequently descended—though there was another staircase thatdidn’tlead straight into my shop.
I gestured for Maddox to get on the platform.
His eyes lit up.“So you’ll make me a new wardrobe?”
“I don’t work for free,” I said sharply.
“How much?”
I told him the price.
Maddox’s face tinged green as he shrugged off his coat and waistcoat and draped them over the bench.“Uh...can we make that a quarter of a wardrobe?”
“Blew through your allowance that fast?”
He had the decency to look ashamed.I sighed.I was hoping an order of that size would garner at least two months of rent, leaving me with comfortable savings, but alas.For better or for worse, Narcissa was paying me in installments, and I had to make do with those current funds.
I made quick work of taking Maddox’s measurements.Shoulders, waist, back.I jotted down the numbers in sullen silence, wishing I were making a ballgown for a society lady gracing the ballrooms instead of clothing for a man who would no doubt muddy them in half a day’s time.
The only customers I had seen so far were the occasional working woman who needed a new skirt or hose.And of course Maddox with his numerous garments that needed mending, which the servants of Greenwood Abbey always seemed to overlook.It was dull work, but at least it wassomething.
A showering of something white and flaky rained down, peppering the tops of Maddox’s shoulders.I fanned it off, frowning.The ceiling of the fitting room had started to flake, sprinkling the two of us with particles of decade-old paint as Mrs.Lewis’s thumping footsteps sounded from above.
“Good riddance,” I said miserably.Was I ever to escape this blazing building?
