Passing as Elias - By Kate Bloomfield Page 0,31

mirror with a look of awe upon her face. A brilliant, crazy, ridiculous idea had occurred to her. But … no … she could never pass it off. Yet, she could not take her eyes off the vision before her. Without thinking, Elizabeth began to undress. She stripped right down until she was completely naked and began rummaging through the suitcase, pulling out various garments. Shirts, vests, breeches, socks, shoes.

A few minutes later and Elizabeth was dressed completely in men’s attire, posing in front of the mirror. She pulled various expressions until deciding that men did not pull many facial expressions, and kept her face set. Her hands moved to her chest, where her bosom was still obvious. She thought, looking around and fixing her eye upon an old, ragged shirt that she had planned on throwing out, as it was in too poor condition to donate. Without thinking she began to rip it into strips.

Grabbing the strips of shirt, she began to wrap them tightly around her chest. She did it so tight she almost had trouble breathing, yet she smiled when she saw her flat chest in the mirror. This was it. This was the answer. Elizabeth could dress as a boy, run the apothecary, and gain the trust of her clients again. They would think a young lad ran the shop.

Elizabeth put on a deep voice, ‘Good day, Ma’am.’ She said with a tip of her hat, ‘No … ahem … Good day ma’am. Good day.’ She repeated the words over and over again until they did not sound like words at all.

Her body looked like a boy. With a flat chest, and baggy clothes Elizabeth found she looked quite lanky. Stuffing a pair of socks into her breeches, she stood back to admire the bulge, and could not help but laugh. It had been the first time she had laughed in a month.

Elizabeth amused herself for over an hour, trying on different clothes, packing socks into her pants, and talking like a man.

‘Well hello there, Miss.’ She flirted with the mirror.

Thinking about George, her father, and the men that had come into the store, Elizabeth noticed many similarities. She must talk in a low voice, with fewer words in each sentence, and keep her hands in her pockets whilst pulling less facial expressions. Single word responses would be most efficient. She must also stand with a straight back, and a high chin to show confidence, something which many women lacked.

Elizabeth’s hair was not masculine at all. She had so much of it that she would not be able to hide it inside of a hat all day. Some men did have long hair, but not down to their buttocks. The other option was cutting it short, but if she did that then she would have trouble transitioning back into a woman while she was not at the apothecary. She did not want to be a man all of the time.

A wig would be her best option, and she was sure there was a men’s wig-shop on Baggot Street. She would visit it early on the morrow.

Next was the problem of her face. Her eyebrows were thin and light, and her jaw was quite feminine. She thought about the way the Captain’s face felt. Rough, like sandpaper. His jaw and cheeks were slightly darker than the rest of his skin because of the stubble.

Elizabeth spent the whole day experimenting with her male identity. She tried several different methods to darken her eyebrows, and make them appear bushier. Finally, she settled upon using a wood-cased pencil to colour them several shades darker, giving her a more stern expression.

Elizabeth found it very amusing to chop up pieces of fabric so finely that they were almost powder and stick them to her face. She gave herself a ridiculous moustache and laughed for several minutes before removing it. Nothing she did looked realistic until she chopped of a small piece of her own hair, scrunched it up into a ball so it was frizzy and frayed, and stuck it to her jaw line with an adhesive made from wheat flower, sugar and water. It looked quite convincing –but even more so when she trimmed it with a pair of scissors until it resembled fine stubble.

Elizabeth had a strange feeling in her stomach, as though she had discovered something incredible. A strange sense of freedom was washing over her, as she stared at herself in the full-length mirror in all of her