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dancing masters had served her as ill as her dressmaker had done. Her ladyship didn’t walk; she lumbered. And her walk was only one unfortunate trait. “Certainly you weren’t properly dressed.”
    “Oh, yes, that explains everything. If you’d had the managing of things, I’d have been the belle of the ball.”
    Leonie stepped back a pace, folded her arms, and eyed her new client critically. After a long, busy moment while her mind performed complicated calculations, she said, “Yes, my lady. Yes, you would have been. And yes, you can be.”
    Early evening of Friday 10 July
    Y ou hateful little sneak! I always attend her!”
    “Always? Once, two months ago.”
    “It was only last week I waited on Miss Renfrew, while you was flirting with Mr. Burns.”
    “I never was!”
    “Maybe he wasn’t flirting with you , but you was trying hard enough.”
    Leonie had heard the raised voices, and was hurrying from her office into the workroom at the same time as Jeffreys, on the same errand, was running that way from the showroom.
    By the time they burst through the door, Glinda Simmons had got hold of Joanie Barker. They scratched and kicked and slapped and pulled each other’s hair, screeching the while. The other girls shrieked, too. In a matter of minutes, they’d tumbled bolts of costly fabric, boxes of ribbons, flowers, feathers, and other articles hither and yon.
    Leonie clapped her hands, but no one was paying attention. She and Jeffreys had to move in and forcibly separate the two girls. This didn’t stop the screaming. The combatants called for witnesses to various crimes perpetrated by the opposing party, and the noncombatants took that as an invitation to express their own grievances against this one or that one.
    It took nearly an hour to restore full order. Having warned the girls that they’d all be dismissed without notice or a character if they indulged in another outburst, Leonie hurried upstairs to change out of her workday dress. Jeffreys followed her.
    “You’d better send Mary Parmenter to help me dress,” Leonie said. Mary had been left in charge of the showroom when Jeffreys came to stop the war. “You keep an eye on the seamstresses. You’re the best at managing these battles.”
    This was only one of the reasons Selina Jeffreys, despite her youth and apparent frailty, was their forewoman.
    Jeffreys ignored her, and started unfastening Leonie’s pelerine. “You’re going to be late, madame,” she said. “And you know Parmenter gets nervous and clumsy when she feels rushed. I don’t.”
    Late wasn’t good enough, in Leonie’s opinion. Never would be preferable. She was not looking forward to this evening’s engagement.
    Lord Swanton was hosting a poetry lecture to raise funds for the Deaf and Dumb Asylum. This was the sort of activity at which Sophy shone. She would put in an appearance, then slip away and write all about it for London’s favorite gossip sheet, Foxe’s Morning Spectacle. The account would include detailed descriptions of what every Maison Noirot customer was wearing.
    Leonie looked forward to the writing much in the way a French ancestor had looked forward to making the acquaintance of Madame Guillotine.
    Misinterpreting her frown, Jeffreys said, “Please don’t worry about the girls, madame. They’ll be all right now. It’s that time of the month, and you know how it is with girls who’re always together.”
    They all had That Time of the Month at the same time.
    “It’s worse this month, and we both know why,” Leonie said. Marcelline had married a duke and Sophy had married a future marquess. Though any other women would jump at the chance to quit working, Marcelline and Sophy weren’t like other women. They might give it up eventually, but not without a fight.
    The girls didn’t understand this, and it wasn’t easy to prove, since neither sister was much in evidence at present. Marcelline, who was having a miserable time with morning sickness, was