Page 3 of The Gentlewoman Apprentice

Meg watched Giles. She could help him, but her interference would anger him.

“Bah.” Giles tossed the silk dressing gown aside and folded his arms.

Unable to contain herself, she approached the bench. “Silk is difficult because it’s slippery.” She examined the discarded piece. “Lay paper between the layers to stabilize the fabric, and double-baste before sewing.”

“This problem lays beyond your sphere.” Giles snatched his work and took scissors to his stitches.

Holding in a sigh, she returned to her seat. He disregarded her advice and continued struggling.

Mr. Sloan entered the workshop. His eyes found her first, brows tightening, his habitual smile falling. Then his notice shifted to the apprentices, who straightened and opened like flowers after rain, a picture of cheerful industry.

“Johnathan. That’s ready for pressing. Don’t singe the fabric,” Mr. Sloan said. “Arnold, you look spent. Up too early? Heat the goose irons, please.”

He made his way around the room, Meg overly conscious of the space he occupied, furious at him for denying her the tutelage he offered freely to everyone else. Indignant he had opened her trunk and nearly discovered her secret.

“Nicely done, Freddy, but it’s puckering. Try adding a seam here. What is the problem, Giles?” He picked up the contrary piece. “Pin the silk with paper between layers and double-baste. Small running stitches, backstitch every inch. With patience, it will mend itself.”

An absurd assertion. Nothing fixed itself. Meg’s satisfaction at the repetition of her own advice curdled into irritation. Better than any of them, she remained almost useless, relegated to menial tasks. She refocused on the tension of her thread. At the rasp of shoes turning toward her, she clenched her jaw against the heat that traveled down her arms and gathered in her fingertips. To prevent the necessity of undoing her work, she stilled the needle, nearly breathless as he approached, his gait loose and unhurried.

He looked down at her, thick dark lashes framing ice-blue eyes. She rose, unwilling to gaze up at him like a supplicant. He crossed his arms over an impeccably cut frock coat and leaned against the wall, smiling. If his jaw were not so aptly defined, if he were not so stubbornly cheerful, if his voice did not rumble from his chest, if everything he was and did were not quite so effortless, she might endure his presence with some equanimity. More than his simple perfection, his ease irked her. He came by everything without effort and approached work with assumed good fortune.

But Sloan Tailoring lagged over its orders, as evidenced by shelves laden with uncut fabric and many disgruntled customers. Mr. Sloan proceeded without hurry. He mismanaged the apprentices too. They worked hard for him, but he advanced them slowly when they could move at twice the pace. Her years as a London needlewoman had taught her methods of increasing production that Mr. Sloan appeared ignorant of. Day after day he refused her assistance, as Giles had.

“Miss Cooper. Please brush the two coats on the clotheshorse and package them for delivery.”

Her fists tightened. Three months she had waited in her corner, biding her time for an opportune moment to beg her master’s instruction. As he felt comfortable looking inside her wicker trunk, she must demand her due.

“Certainly. Afterward, I will help with Mrs. Barnes’s order. I hear she wishes a more comfortable sleeve, and I have a few ideas that⁠—”

“Another time.” He smiled, turned on his heel, and sauntered toward his office.

“Another time—in three months, perhaps? I will not wait so long for you to teach me nothing.” She swallowed, but was proud of her firm, steady voice.

In a collective swoosh of shifting fabric, the apprentices faced her, needles hovering.

Mr. Sloan turned, one brow raised.

Heart pounding, she pressed on. “Your shop is cleaner and more orderly than when I arrived. I turn a hem faster than your most adept worker. Nine months of my contract remain, and I am ready to learn.”

His gaze intensified as if her suggestion were new to him. “You are right,” he said, dimples showing. “We shall discuss this later.”

No! He would put her off. “When is later?”

“Seven. After close. Ah, there is Mr. Quincy. Please excuse me.”

A fair man in a cerulean frock coat entered the shop. Mr. Sloan swept him into the measuring room, though Mr. Quincy caught Meg’s eye first and blushed. Perhaps the poor man believed her glare was meant for him.

With an entire day of unsatisfying work ahead, Meg began composing the words she would use when she spoke to Master Sloan that evening. The dowager countess of Halverton had once told her to behave like a gentlewoman and expect to be treated as one. Meg’s own mother had been a lady and had ensured she received a gentlewoman’s education, so Meg had learned to dance, play the harpsichord, draw and paint—poorly—and dine properly in a grand house. But she never wished to be a lady if it meant becoming like her mother, who was no example of respectability. She instructed herself to instead adopt the dowager’s counsel: be polite, be firm, accept nothing less than her due.

Strips of fabric, tangled threads, and fluff covered the empty workshop—Meg’s work for the following day. She stood in the center of the vacant shop, waiting for Mr. Sloan to emerge from his office.

I am a gentlewoman. She turned the mantra over in her mind.

“Miss Cooper,” he called from behind the closed door. “You may enter.”

Mr. Sloan reclined behind a small desk. She left the door ajar.

“Thank you for your assistance these past months,” he said. “You are the most diligent first-year apprentice I’ve ever had. Young boys are not so fastidious.” He half-smiled and cleared his throat. “That is to say, I’ll be sorry to lose your help.”