In The Beginning by Gail Daley (top 100 books of all time checklist .TXT) 📕

Trouble, Trouble, Boil and Bubble

THE DRESSMAKER GISELLE went to in Junction City was an old friend. In her front display window was a calf-length white dress with a low-cut lace bodice and three-quarter sleeves.

"Jeanne, I think that would fit you," Giselle told her youngest granddaughter. "What do you think?"

"It’s pretty, but all that lace isn’t practical."

"It’s your wedding dress," Iris exclaimed. "It doesn’t have to be practical. Let’s go see if it fits you."

"I’m sure Belinda will be willing to make a few alterations when she learns we want it tomorrow," Giselle said, guiding the girls into the shop.

The proprietor, a thin, dark woman looked up from explaining something to a salesclerk when the bell over the door jingled. "Giselle! How lovely to see you! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?"

"It was a last-minute decision," Giselle explained, giving her a hug. "Belinda, these are two of my granddaughters, Iris and Jeanne. They are both getting married soon. I knew we couldn’t do better than come to you for the dresses."

"How soon are the weddings?"

"Well, Iris hasn’t set a date yet, but we would like to have the gown before we leave. Since Jeanne is getting married tomorrow at noon. I think she might like to try on the dress you have on display."

Giselle’s friend cocked her head. "Are you assisting in an elopement?"

"You could say that."

"Ah." Directing them to the back, Belinda bustled forward and turned the sign on the door to closed. Calling for her assistant to get the dressing room ready, she went to the window and removed the lace dress from the dressmaker form.

The dressing room was a rarity in St. Antoni where glass was still being blown by hand, as it had six mirrors, angled to show all sides of a dress at once. While the assistant helped Jeanne out of her dress, Belinda seated Iris and Giselle on a low couch and sent a second assistant for a rolling rack of dresses.

"These were from a trousseau ordered for a bride who decided she did not wish to be married after all. Poor thing, she was set to marry the son of a wealthy family when she discovered him in bed with another. The clothes have never been worn; if your granddaughters do not object to trying them?"

"Not at all," Giselle agreed smiling. "My granddaughters are not so foolish. Jeanne will be marrying a prosperous farmer and Iris the manager of our Bluestone mine though, so the trousseau must be good but also serviceable."

While Jeanne was being buttoned into the bride’s dress, Giselle and Iris looked through the rack of clothes. "These will do quite well; the cloth is of excellent quality and the designs are not too frivolous. As always you are an excellent judge of a customer’s needs Belinda."

"Oh," Jeanne said softly, looking at herself in the mirrors. The low-cut bodice and flared skirt made her waist look impossibly tiny below her full breasts. She turned shinning eyes to her grandmother. "This is the one."

"Yes," Giselle agreed. "Tomas will be stunned at your beauty."

Belinda hustled forward and tweaked the waist and sleeves. "It needs only a little letting out in the bust. I will have it sent over this afternoon. Susan," she gestured to the assistant, "help Miss St. Vyr out of the wedding dress and take it to Mary so she can begin letting out the bust. About an inch, I think."

She pulled out a second wedding dress and held it up to Iris’s face. "Yes, I thought this off white would look good with your complexion. Come, I will help you out of what you are wearing while your sister and Giselle pick out a traveling dress and some Day gowns."

The dress Belinda threw over Iris’s head had long full sleeves and a high collar. The overdress of thin transparent material covered a low-cut slip. The slip barely covered her nipples and clung lovingly to her body. The diaphanous overdress kept the outfit from looking vulgar by veiling Iris’s body just enough that her sexuality looked ethereal rather than strident.

"Carlos is a goner," remarked Jeanne when her sister turned to face her.

"Do you think it’s too revealing?" Iris asked anxiously.

"No child," Giselle assured her. "On her wedding day, a bride should remind her husband he is getting a prize worth winning." She shrugged, "For a man, that includes making him want to bed you. He will look back on his wedding day as being fortunate to marry a beautiful, desirable woman."

The girls picked out six more dresses apiece and a selection of fine linen nightclothes. Belinda promised to have the wedding gown and traveling clothes for Jeanne sent over by noon the next day. The others she would pack herself and send to the station by tomorrows afternoon train.

"And yours will be ready by the end of the week, Miss Iris," she said as she showed her profitable visitors out the door.

Mike Franks had followed the women to Belinda’s establishment. He purchased a newspaper and sat down at an outdoor café across from the dressmakers. By the time the women left the shop few hours later, he had been sitting in the cafe long enough to be forced to order several cups of coffee. He had also annoyed both the owner and his daughter the waitress by getting fresh with her.

When they had finished their business, Belinda sent a runner to find a rickshaw to pick them up so Giselle and her granddaughters would not have to walk back to the hotel.

The rickshaws were faster than a man walking casually, so Franks had to trot to keep them in sight. In the process of tailing them, he managed to enrage several other rickshaw drivers and their passengers by cutting in front of them, forcing them to stop abruptly. Their annoyed shouts and curses drew Giselle’s attention.

"Don’t look now girls, but I think we’re being followed," she said. Leaning forward, she tapped the