Page 6 of The Gentlewoman Apprentice

“Bah. I’m as sober as a saint. Though I do feel muddled.”

After a few bites, his father set aside the toast and nursed his drink. It was just as well and would settle him into the night.

“Did you always wish to be a tailor, sir?” Peter asked.

“When at three years old my father placed a pair of scissors in my hand and demanded I cut along the chalk line, I found my calling. Measure, cut, stitch. Measure, cut, stitch.”

For Peter, a length of painted chintz had captured his childhood imagination. Shiney cotton, a little heavier than muslin, swirled with florals in Turkey red. The color came from the eastern Mediterranean, though Peter knew his maternal grandfather had discovered the secret to its creation and guarded the process like a dragon keeps his gold.

Peter had learned the difference between fabrics quickly, and chintz had always been his favorite. Unfortunately, to protect the silk, linen, and wool industries, England had banned it. On occasion, when he got hold of a smuggled bolt or an old set of curtains being converted into clothing, he studied it, wondering at the milling and dyeing processes, marveling at its softness and intricate designs. If only his parents’ heritages were reversed, his father having learned dyeing while his mother came from tailors. Alas, one could not alter what providence set forth. No sense indulging regret.

“Let me help you to your bed.” Peter stood and offered his hand.

“I’ll wait for my Deborah.”

“She will be a while.” But Peter returned to his chair and stared at the fire, listening with his father for his mother’s entrance, waiting for the light in his father’s eyes to reignite.

“There is a woman who wants to be a tailor,” Peter said, his thoughts circling as his father’s often did.

“I knew a female tailor who inherited a shop after her husband died. A uniquely talented woman.”

“Did you? I know a lady tailor as well. Her stitches are impossibly even, almost as good as mine.” He laughed.

“Women are not tailors.”

It was of no use to remind his father what he’d said a moment earlier. “She wants to be a mantua maker.”

“Not in Stroud.”

Peter sighed and stoked the fire. “But what can a tailor do against a determined gentlewoman?”

The following morning, Peter woke with his head on his desk, a drawing pad for a pillow. He scraped it into a drawer and rushed through the door connecting the workshop to his home, praying he would find Mrs. Call. If she abandoned them, he would be in a hobble. Housekeepers willing to look after an elderly gentleman of fickle temperament were not easily found.

Mrs. Call measured flour in the kitchen, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

“Good morning,” Peter said. “I was concerned to discover you were missing last night.”

She looked up at him sternly. “He shouted at me like one possessed.”

His shoulders slumped. He knew how awful his father’s moods could be, and he hated to push them on anyone, but he had to run the shop. “Come for me when that happens. I will get him sorted.”

“I’ll not endure him much longer, not with the old man weeping for his mistress and me crying myself. Next moment he’s shouting as if I were an interloper and not the woman stirring his soup and cleaning his shirts.”

“I don’t know what I’d do without you.” He tried to placate her but knew he sounded desperate.

She cracked two eggs into a well in the flour, indifferent to his distress.

Peter washed and readied himself for the day, bid Mrs. Call farewell, and reentered his office, where he found Miss Cooper. She slapped his pattern book closed and crossed her arms.

“What are you doing?” How dare she enter his private room and look through his things? He recalled his hypocrisy. Looking inside her trunk had been a foolish impulse he could not explain, but her behavior had roused his suspicion. Still, he had opened the door for this violation, so he stifled his indignation.

“I am waiting to begin my training,” she said. “And looking through your patterns, as it is apparently acceptable for us to invade one another’s private spaces.”

“I believe I apologized for that grievance; I promise, it won’t happen again. I will have you fetched when I am available.”

“No need to put yourself to the trouble. I shall be right here.” She seated herself in the corner.

He almost laughed but remembered the piles of fabric she was hoarding in her shop. Nothing about this woman was amusing.