At Your Request (Apart from the Crowd 0.5)(6)
“I’m afraid we’re going to have to resort to brute force to release Miss Radcliff from her unfortunate predicament,” Miss Griswold said before she turned an unexpectedly bright smile Wilhelmina’s way. “The silver lining of this situation, though, can certainly be seen in the fact that bustles have not yet reached the size they’re being predicted to reach.”
“I’m not certain I see that as a silver lining, but . . .” Wilhelmina’s eyes widened. “Did you just say that bustles are expected to get even larger?”
Miss Griswold nodded. “I’m afraid so. According to one of my sources—er . . . friends, I mean—quite a few designers are beginning to contemplate a new silhouette for ladies—one that will require bustles to achieve the size of a large birdcage in order to pull off the look designers are convinced will be complimentary to every lady’s figure.”
“Who in the world would want to wear a birdcage on their behind?” Miss Cadwalader asked, once again in possession of the platter of treats, treats she immediately began perusing, looking completely delighted.
Miss Griswold reached out, snagged a sugar biscuit, popped it into her mouth, and shrugged even as she swallowed. “I’m sure there are very few ladies who’d appreciate such an appendage attached to them, but evidently the gentlemen in charge of our fashions seem to believe that larger behinds are . . .”
She stopped talking, shot a look to Edgar, turned pink in the face, and immediately returned her attention to Wilhelmina. “Bustles aside, though, we do need to address your predicament, and I’m afraid to say that the only way we’re going to be able to free you is by tugging that chair straight off of you.” She moved closer and took hold of the back of the chair. “I’m sure this won’t hurt too much.” Before Wilhelmina could voice even the tiniest of protests, Miss Griswold began tugging on the chair, emitting occasional grunts as she tugged.
“What in the world are you doing, Miss Griswold?” someone demanded from behind them.
Turning, Edgar discovered that Mrs. Travers, their hostess for the evening, had joined them. And unfortunately, she was looking less than pleased.
Miss Griswold let go of the chair, wiped a hand across a brow that seemed to have taken to perspiring, and blew out a breath. “Miss Radcliff is stuck, Mrs. Travers. I’m simply trying to see her released.”
Mrs. Travers immediately switched her attention to Wilhelmina. “One would think, given that your presence here tonight is as my social secretary, not as a guest, that you would have taken greater care with the manner in which you comport yourself, Miss Radcliff.”
Wilhelmina lifted her chin in a surprisingly regal manner for a woman stuck underneath a chair. “I do apologize, Mrs. Travers, for causing you undue distress. I certainly didn’t deliberately set out to get in my current predicament. It simply . . . happened.”
“But how did it happen?” Mrs. Travers demanded.
“That’s a bit difficult to explain,” Wilhelmina began. She was spared further response, though, when Miss Cadwalader took that moment to join the conversation.
“She’s under there because of the mouse,” Miss Cadwalader said in a very loud, very carrying, voice before she took what looked to be some type of cookie from the platter and began nibbling around the edges of it.
“A . . . mouse?” Mrs. Travers repeated slowly.
Miss Cadwalader stopped nibbling and nodded. “Indeed, and it wasn’t a little mouse, mind you, but an enormous one, with rather large teeth.” She sent what almost seemed to be the smallest of winks Wilhelmina’s way. “Miss Radcliff should be commended for being brave enough to take on such a beast, but as she was attempting to lure the creature away, she got stuck underneath that chair.” Miss Cadwalader heaved a sigh. “Unfortunately the mouse charged straight through the middle of the ballroom floor.”
Edgar could only watch in dumbfounded amazement as chaos immediately took over the ball. The chaos started when one of the ladies who’d been inching ever so casually closer to them let out a shriek, lifted up the hem of her skirt, and was soon standing on top of a chair, joined seconds later by additional ladies, their shrieks about mice being on the loose echoing around the ballroom. In the span of a single minute, all the chairs were occupied with ladies holding their hems up as servants began dashing into the room, all of them carrying brooms.
Edgar heard Wilhelmina toss “That was brilliant” Miss Cadwalader’s way as Mrs. Travers seemingly forgot all about Wilhelmina being stuck underneath a chair as she hurried off to join the chaos that was interrupting her ball.
Miss Cadwalader grinned. “I do have my uses.”
Wilhelmina returned the grin. “Indeed you do—even though I have to say that, if I had seen a mouse, I’m hardly the type to throw myself on the floor in an attempt to lure it away.”
With eyes that had taken to sparkling, Miss Cadwalader’s grin widened. “A most excellent point, Miss Radcliff, but quite honestly, I didn’t contemplate the mouse explanation very long before it simply burst out of my mouth.” Her gaze traveled over the commotion erupting around them. “I certainly had no idea that my explanation would bring about such an exciting twist to the ball.”
“I’m afraid your time at the ball may get even more exciting, Miss Cadwalader,” Miss Griswold said with a rather significant nod of her head toward a hallway. “I don’t mean to be an alarmist, but I do believe I just saw your companion, Mrs. Davenport, scurry out of the room and toward what is probably the private living quarters of the family.”