Free Madame Tussaud's Apprentice by Kathleen Benner Duble Page A

length and width of the piece as he has measured my head. I watch as my likeness slowly begins to take form.
    “This will be a rough one only,” the doctor says, as his hands pinch and poke and pull on the clay. “If I was working on a real subject, this would take hours. But as you will not be involved in this part of the process, we will move along.”
    Finally, he holds the sculpted work next to my face. “Not a bad likeness.”
    “It’s amazing,
monsieur
,” I say, and it is. He has shaped me perfectly.
    “Please call me
mon oncle
,” he says. “It is how I like to be addressed by persons younger than myself in my own home.
D’accord
?”
    I nod my agreement.
    “So once the clay head has been made, we cover the head in plaster,” l’Oncle continues. “We do this in sections. You may help me with this, if you are careful.”
    Taking a small brush, I dip it into the wet paste l’Oncle has by his elbow, following his lead and smearing the material on the front of the clay head.
    “Be sure to make the plaster smooth,” l’Oncle directs me. “You do not want a mold with bumps in it.”
    I do as he instructs, applying the gooey substance over the entire face of the clay model, smoothing it out as I go along. I am absorbed completely in the task, for it is much like painting and drawing, and my fingers fly over the form. I look up at him when I have finished.
    “Not bad,” he says.
    “For your first time,” he adds.
    • • •
    When the plaster dries on the front of the head, I remove it from the clay and cover the back of the head, letting that dry, and then the sides. When they are finished, I clean each section, and then l’Oncle shows me how to bind them together.
    “I will do the next part,” l’Oncle says, “but watch closely.”
    Taking a large pot filled with hot vegetable wax, l’Oncle slowly pours the liquid into the hollow mold of the head I have created. Steam rises into the air.
    “The trick is not to shake while you are pouring.” L’Oncle grits his teeth as he holds tightly to the pan. “If you wobble, the face will have lines on it, lines you do not want, and there will be no fixing it.”
    I watch as wax pours out in one continuous stream, until it is to the top of the upturned neck.
    There is a knock at the door.
    “
Entrez
,” l’Oncle calls out, setting the hot pan aside.
    Algernon comes in, and my heart leaps to see him standing there.
    “What is it you want?” l’Oncle asks.
    “That delivery of horsehair is here,” Algernon says.
    “Hmmm,” l’Oncle says, “I’ll want to see the quality of it. Celie, you may go and have your supper. The wax must harden anyway.”
    I nod, and l’Oncle leaves the room. He cannot be gone fast enough. I am breathless to be alone with Algernon.
    When l’Oncle is gone, Algernon looks me up and down, and I feel myself flush under his gaze.
    “And now you are a lady, I see, all dressed up and clean,” he says, mockingly.
    I curtsy. “As are you,
monsieur
. Are you enjoying good food and clean linen as much as I am?”
    This brings an unexpected frown to Algernon’s face. “I may be clean, but I’m still what I always was, Celie—a man who believes in equality for all men, and one who will do anything to get it. I hope you have not forgotten that that is who we are, what we are striving for?”
    I shake my head, startled by his outburst. Of course I have not forgotten. How can he think this of me? I know I have been busy attending nightly entertainments, but that does not mean that our plan to join the rebels has completely escaped my mind. The desire to effect change still burns brightly for me.
    He turns and runs his eyes over the room. “I’ve been doing a little inventory taking, and there is quite a lot here for us to swipe, eh?”
    To my shock, what I feel at his words is dismay. While I still mean for the rich to pay for their crimes, I realize that I do not want to steal from
these
people. The last two weeks have