Chapter Twenty-Three
While Andrew was working on his portrait of Genevieve, Cynthia was working on an outfit for Harriet’s wedding.
She had rifled through the chests where her mother’s old clothes were kept.
She marveled, as she always did, at the volume of sumptuous fabrics women used to need for their gowns.
Of course, it was mostly in the skirts. The separate bodices were tight over the bosom and into the waist. But the skirts were enormous.
They’d been worn over wide hoops made of willow.
You could practically make two of the slim dresses one wore today with just one skirt.
She pulled out a deep brown velvet garment and looked at it critically.
She wondered when her mother, who had about the same coloring she had, had worn it.
She’d never seen her in it. But it would certainly look better against Harriet’s gold than the blue gown, which was, in any case, too summery.
The velvet was creased but otherwise in good condition.
She took it to the window and saw that in the light, the brown had a gold tint in its depths.
That decided her. She went back to the trunk and found the bodice.
It had a fairly low décolleté with a deep flounce of écru lace around it, and long, slim sleeves with the same lace at the cuffs.
The lace was discolored and creased, but she was sure it could be refurbished.
She quickly pulled off the brown cambric round gown she wore around the house, and slipped the velvet bodice over her head.
It laced in the back, but even when done up tightly, it was too large for her.
Then Cynthia had a brainwave. She saw that she could cut the bodice down to just beneath the bosom, remove the lacing, add a seam with buttons so it fit her, and use it as the top of her gown.
She could attach a slim skirt falling from that point, made from the material of the original skirt.
It would be much more modish than what she habitually wore.
Over the next days, she carefully removed the lace from the sleeves and bodice, soaked it, washed it and ironed it.
She cut down the bodice and made the back opening that buttoned to fit her smaller torso.
Then she unpicked the seams of the voluminous skirt, ironed the creases out and, laying it on the dining room table, began to cut.
Andrew arrived home to find the dining table covered with fabric.
“What a beautiful color,” he said. “It suits you.”
“Does it?” Cynthia was skeptical. “I chose it because Harriet says her wedding gown is gold, and this will look better than my blue. I’ve always thought dark colors make me look even more dreary than usual.”
“No one looking at your face could find you dreary, my dear Miss Rowley,” said Andrew.
“And dark colors are not all the same. It depends on the proportions of the base red, yellow and blue. This one has a predominance of red and yellow, making orange or gold, which suits you admirably. Did you know your eyes have gold in them? When I do your portrait, that’s how I shall paint them. ”
Cynthia blushed, both because he had looked at her closely enough to notice the color of her eyes, and because he said when, not if, he did her portrait.
“You should only take customers who have money and influence,” she said with a light laugh. “If you waste your time painting poor nobodies like me, you will never be wealthy.”
“Who needs wealth when he has a cat?” laughed Mr. Fielding, for Teacup had, of course, discovered the ends of the material hanging off the table, and was having fine fun swatting at it.
“Oh, take her away, do!” said Cynthia. “She’s been driving me mad all afternoon.”
Mr. Fielding scooped up the cat, saying, “Come along, Teacup. Miss Rowley doesn’t have time for either of us.”
Smiling, Cynthia watched them go, thinking she had all the time in the world for both of them. Then she turned back to the job in hand.
When the pieces were sewn together and the lace reattached, she was very pleased with it.
It fit her well, and the color did bring out the gold in her brown eyes.
Then she agonized over what to wear on her head.
Her straw church bonnet was out of the question, even with a matching ribbon.
It was only good for the warmer weather, and would look ridiculous with the velvet.
She couldn’t afford a new hat, even if she could find one.
There was no milliner in the village. Those with money to spend went to Winchester.
She was sitting by the fire one afternoon, pondering the problem and idly playing with Teacup by rolling up a strip of material left from the gown and then letting it go for her to catch at, when she realized she could fashion something with the strips.
When loosely rolled, they looked vaguely like roses.
She quickly threaded a needle and, gathering all the candles in the room around her, to Teacup’s disgust, collected together the strips and made a series of brown velvet flower-like knots.
But how would she attach them to her head?
Then another brainwave hit her. She took a candle and, with Teacup at her ankles expecting more fun, went upstairs to her mother’s trunk.
The willow frame that held out the wide skirts so fashionable in the previous century lay there, neatly tied up.
She undid the ties and, to Teacup’s intense displeasure, expressed by a wail and a hiss, the willow, which she had been sniffing at, sprang out into a misshapen bell.
“It’s your own fault, for being so nosy,” said Cynthia, examining the willow.
Yes! She could cut a piece of it, and soak and reshape it as a head band. That was the beauty of willow — you could make it any shape you liked.
The headband proved fairly easy to make, and, when tucked into the braids she habitually wore over the top of her head, it stayed firmly in place. It looked quite pretty, she thought, and then inevitably, she wondered what Andrew Fielding would say when he saw her in it.