Page 43 of The Midnight Princess
“Take your jacket off,” the tailor instructs.
Jacob shrugs out of it and turns, folding the article over the arm of a chair like a boxer draping his robe over the ropes. His shoulders roll under the synthetic cloth, the fabric straining over his bulk when he places his hands on his hips.
I’m pale in the effort to command my pulse, my color, my thoughts. “His shirt has too much material around his waist,” I blurt.
Karl joins us, his expression critical. “I noticed that.”
I train my eyes on the rest of the shirt, cataloging its deficiencies. It’s worn and creased. Though recently laundered, the white of it is no longer that of new snow, freshly fallen. This snow has seen smokestacks and industrialization, possibly a curry dinner.
“We’ll begin with the neck,” Mr. Tumwater instructs.
The tailor measures his arms, shoulders, and chest, speaking quietly as he asks me to record, occasionally asking me to hold the end of his tape. This close to Jacob, I try to imagine we’re measuring a piece of furniture for placement in a dorm room, but as with Napoleon marching into Russia, some endeavors are doomed to fail. I press the back of a hand against my cheek, fanning slightly when Mr. Tumwater adjusts the placement of the tape.
“This is how you find the natural waist,” the tailor tells me. I set my jaw and follow him around to the front. “Bend to the side, sir.” Jacob bends and Mr. Tumwater guides my hand to the furrow, friendly and educational.
“Can you find the other side?” he asks, taking the notebook. He steps back and I square up in front of our subject.
It should be nothing. It should be like dissecting a clam, identifying the parts from a reference guide. I feel my way to the narrow point on his other side and wonder how Mr. Tumwater will reduce this poetry to numbers and notations—something mathematical and scientific. “Here?” I whisper.
“Excellent, ma’am,” the tailor says when I step back. He passes the tape around Jacob, reading and reporting the centimeters. I scribble them into the book, knowing I can’t transmit any of this information to Mama.
He’s high-waisted and long-limbed. I know the way his broad shoulders taper and that his right arm is a fraction longer than the other. I know that his breathing checks when I stand close. Mama doesn’t need to know any of this.
By the time Mr. Tumwater takes the little book from my hand, my skin is hot and cold. Freja would give me a cookie. Ella would tell me to build a pillow fort and take to my bed. Clara would ask me how I’ve managed to get away with groping a man for the good of the country.
Karl orders one tuxedo, several sport coats, and two suits—one in blue wool and the other in charcoal gray—to test the fit before further adjustments. For his casual clothes, we decide on classic chinos and slim fitted button-down shirts. No skinny jeans. This decision was reached after a protracted argument about the width of his shoulders during which I did more touching than was strictly necessary.
“I’ll compile a list of ready-to-wear options for your approval, ma’am,” Karl says, packing away our materials. He turns to Jacob. “I’ll meet you in your suite for our lessons, sir.”
“Not tonight.” The words leap from my mouth. Caroline glances up.
I know how little time we have. I know how perfect he has to be before we cast him onto the world. I know. I know. But he’s tired. I can see it around his eyes and in the way he kneads the back of his neck.
“This is enough for today.”
Karl pinches his lips. “I hoped to start explaining historical pronunciation shifts and the Exceptional Consonant Stretch.”
I cannot leave the crown prince to such a fate. “Tomorrow,” I say.
“As you like.” Karl gives a curt nod and lifts a box from Caroline’s arms, following her up the hall.
There’s something about the way he does it that makes me ask, “Is she in for an evening of linguistic history?”
“He’s not that nice to anyone,” Jacob observes.
He lifts my work bag from my shoulder and opens the door, ushering me from the room. A strange fact, probablygleaned from one of those nature documentaries narrated by Daavi Drikkidorp, slips into my consciousness. Sea walruses can return to a beach filled with ten thousand other sea walruses and know by scent and sound the one sea walrus who belongs to them. It’s a miracle, that kind of connection. I thought it was. But I could close my eyes right now and know exactly who I’m walking with, know the sound of his step, and know how to keep pace at his side.
I let myself feel the exhilaration of danger for a moment—of standing in too-deep water and having a wave strike me on the back, pushing me off my toes. Sooner or later, I have to return to the shore, soaked to the skin.
When we enter the Great Hall, Clara speeds past us, fastening an earring and racing to the foot of the stairs, balanced on impossibly high heels.
“Where are you headed?” I ask, using English for Jacob’s benefit.
“Hej.”She looks at Jacob, head tipped to the side. “Is Alma being merciless?”
He smiles. “You look good.”
My little sister sparkles when she’s happy. Today, she’s lit up like one of the chandeliers in the ballroom. “Max’s commanding officer and his wife invited us to dinner. How do I actually look, Alma?” Clara spins, showing off her narrow cigarette pants, silk blouse, and crisp blazer. “If you tell me to change, I absolutely will.”
