Della hoped she’d be a better employer than they were. It would be difficult to be worse.
“And you could prepare our things for the move.” It was a terribly big request, she knew. “Assuming you are planning to come with me,” Della stuttered. She hadn’t even thought about the alternative. “You do not have to, of course, I just hoped—”
“Of course I’m coming with you.” Clara said.
Della breathed a sigh of relief. “Once we make such a scene at theball, I don’t trust my parents not to descend on the manor and try to ensure we leave with nothing but the clothes on our backs. If you and Harry could go ahead—”
“Oh,” Clara leaned back again, her spine straightening in what looked like surprise. “Me and Harry? Alone?”
“Is that a problem?” Della asked, gently. She wasn’t sure what was going on between the two, but she didn’t want to make either of them uncomfortable. “We can make other arrangements—it’s no trouble at all.”
“No, no,” Clara insisted. She stood up and began pacing their little room. “I was just... surprised. Harry and I haven’t discussed... well, we haven’t discussed anything. I was always planning to go wherever you go, but I don’t know...” She sank to the carpet at the foot of the bed. “What do I do if he doesn’t want to go?”
Della heard what she wasn’t saying. She didn’t know how to respond.
“Just...” Della sighed. “Talk to him, all right? You must talk to him.”
Clara nodded. The door opened, Alice walking in at a much slower pace than Clara had. She walked much slower than she sewed.
“You must do the same,” Clara warned. That one brow of hers arched up in challenge.
“I found it,” Alice walked to where the half-finished dress lay on the bed. She began placing little bits of beaded fabric here and there. One piece draped across the hem of the bodice like a sash, another few scattered across the sleeves. Each of the beads caught the low light they were working in, and it was dazzling. The fabric itself was a nude lace, and the beads were a dark golden bronze. “I made a wedding gown for the strangest young lady, years and years ago. She was an heiress of some kind. I don’t remember. She must be old enough to have children of marrying age by now, if she were ever so blessed.”
Della and Clara listened as she began to ramble. It reminded Dellaof Andrew, all the seemingly random things he’d said in the carriage just to make her feel better.
“Anyway, she had more money than God himself, and she wanted this strange gown of vivid orange silk with dark beading all over. None of the modistes would make such a thing, even for her and all of her riches. But I had a young son to feed, so I took the job. The gowns were much bigger back in those days, not these slim silhouettes you young ladies are wearing now. I sewed each bead on myself, and I couldn’t bear to throw away the scraps.”
“They’re beautiful,” Della ran her fingers over the delicate beadwork. “But you cannot use them on me, surely if you’ve been saving them all these years you must use them for something special.”
“Oh, my dear,” Alice patted her cheek, as she’d seen her do to Andrew yesterday. “I promise, you are something special.”
Della had only moments to absorb that statement before Clara spoke.
“And you must use them, Della. They match your walking stick!”
Chapter Thirty
Della was immenselyfrustrated. In sending Clara and Harry back to Westfield Manor, she’d also dismissed her lady’s maid. She almost never thought of Clara that way, but she was reminded of the convenience of having such a person available when dressing for a ball. She was proud of her own forethought in anticipating a less-than-positive reaction from her parents at what she was about to do. What she hadn’t considered was the meantime, and how nice it would be to have Clara here. Not only for her help, but as a reasonable counter voice to drown out the sound of Della’s own anxiety.
She laughed at herself as she thought of that. Clara was never reasonable.
Della stood in the corner of the guest room she now occupied on her own in just her stays, stockings, and chemise, her gown resting in front of her on the wooden chair that seemed to appear wherever she was. There were but a few laces on her stays, but her body just couldn’t tighten them on her own. No matter how she tugged and pulled and twisted, her knobby hands simply weren’t capable. It was so damnably irritating to be engaging in this entire night to celebrate her power when she couldn’t even dress herself properly. Della almost desperately wanted to cry, and some part of her wanted to abandon the idea of going to the ball.
There was a knock at the door.
“Oh, thank goodness.” She breathed a sigh of relief. That must be Alice coming to check on her. “Come in.”
Her back was to the door, but she didn’t need to see him to know exactly who that was. The gasp gave him away, but so did the energy that took over the room as soon as he stepped in.
“I am so sorry,” he said, turning as if to leave. “I didn’t realize you’d—”
“No, no,” Della hurried to say. She took one step toward him, and she couldn’t credit why. “I am sorry. I thought you were your mother. She said she would fix my hair, and I was having trouble, so I thought she’d come to help...”
Her voice trailed off as she realized the situation she was in. She was alone and nearly naked with a man. It was by far more daringly inappropriate than she’d ever been, and a particular tangle in which she thought she’d never have the opportunity to engage.
Would he ever look at her like that again? She wondered. Before he’d turned away, that flare of heat in his eyes—she wanted to see it again. She wanted to feel it.
He turned back around, and it was quite possibly the most victorious Della had ever felt.
