any moment, and Madame did not permit comments on the customers.
“She was a beautiful girl,” said one whose high color under tired eyes, and boyish haircut on a mature head, were somehow oddly at variance. “She was different”
“Yes, different!” spoke another crisply with an accent. “Quite different, and attractive, yes. But she had no style. She wore her hair like one who didn’t care for style. Pretty, yes, but not at all the thing. Quite out. She didn’t seem to belong to him at all. She was not like any of the girls he has brought here before.”
“And yet she had distinction.”
“Yes,” hesitating, “distinction of a kind. But more the distinction of another universe.”
“Oh, come down to earth, Miss Lancey,” cried a round little model with face a shade too plump. “You’re always up in the clouds. She had no style, and you know it. That coat she wore was one of those nineteen-ninety-eight coats in Simon’s window. I see them every night when I go home. I knew it by those tricky little pockets. Quite cute they are, with good lines, but cheap and common, of course. She was nothing but a poor girl. Why try to make out she was something else? She has a good figure, of course, and pretty features, if one likes that angelic type, but no style in the world.”
“She was stunning in the black velvet,” broke in the first speaker stubbornly. “I can’t help itI think she had style. There was somethingwell, kind of gracious about her, as if she were a lady in disguise.”
“Oh, Florence, you’re so hopelessly romantic! That’s way behind the times. You don’t find Cinderellas nowadays. Things are more practical. If a lady has a disguise, she takes it off. That’s more up to date.”
“Well, you know yourself she was different. You can’t say she wasn’t perfectly at home with those clothes. She wore them like a princess.”
“She had a beautiful form,” put in an older salesperson. “That’s a whole lot.”
“It takes something more than form,” said the girl persistently. “You know that Charlotte Bakerman had a form. They said she was perfect in every measurement, but she walked like a cow, and she carried herself like a gorilla in a tree when she sat down.”
“Oh, this girl was graceful, if that’s what you mean,” conceded the fat one ungraciously.
“It wasn’t just grace, either,” persisted the champion of the unknown customer. “She didn’t seem to be conscious she had on anything unusual at all. She walked the same way when she came in. She walked the same way when she went out in her nineteen ninety-eight. She sort of glorified it. And when she had on the Lanvin green ensemble, it was just as if she had always worn such things. It sort of seemed to belong to her, as if she was born with it, like a bird’s feathers.”
“I know what you mean,” said the woman with tired eyes and artificial blush. “She wasn’t thinking about her clothes. They weren’t important to her. She would only care if they were suitable. And she would know at a glance without discussing it whether they were suitable. You saw how she looked at that flashy little sports frock, the one with the three shades of red stripes and a low red leather belt. She just turned away and said in a low tone: ‘Oh, not that one, Murray!’ as if it hurt her.”
“Did she call him Murray?” asked the fat one greedily.
“Yes. They seemed to know each other real well. She was almost as if she might have been a sister, only we know he hasn’t got any sisters. She might have been a country cousin.”
“Perhaps he’s going to marry her!” suggested the fat one.
“Nonsense!” said the first girl sharply. “She’s not his kind. Imagine the magnificent Mrs. Van Rensselaer mothering anything that wore a nineteen-ninety-eight coat from Simon’s! Can you? Besides, they say he’s going to marry the Countess Lenowski when she gets her second divorce.”
“I don’t think that girl would marry a man like Murray Van Rensselaer,” spoke the thoughtful one. “She has too much character. She had a remarkable face.”
“Oh, you can’t tell by a face,” shrugged a slim one with sinuous body and a sharp black lock of hair pasted out on her cheek. “She can’t be much, or she wouldn’t let him buy her clothes.”
“She didn’t!” said the first speaker sharply. “I heard her say, ‘I wouldn’t think she would like that, Murray. It’s too noticeable. I’m sure a nice girl wouldn’t like that as well as the blue chiffon.’”
“Hmm!” said the slim one. “Looks as if she must be a relative or something. Did anybody get her name?”
“The address on the box was Elizabeth Chapparelle,” contributed a pale little errand girl who had stood by listening.
“Elizabeth!” said the thoughtful one. “She looked like an Elizabeth.”
“But if they weren’t for her, that wouldn’t have been her name,” persisted the fat one.
“I thought I heard him call her Bessie once,” said the little errand girl.
“Then he was buying for one of his old girls who is going to be married,” suggested the slim one contemptuously. “Probably this girl is a friend of them both.”
“Hush! Madame is coming! Which one did he take? The Lanvin green?”
“Both. He told Madame to send them both! Yes, Madame, I’m coming!”
A boy in a mulberry uniform with silver buttons entered.
“Say, Lena, take that to Madame, and tell her there’s a mistake. The folks say they don’t know anything about it.”
Lena, the pale little errand girl, took the heavy box and walked slowly off to find Madame, studying the address on the box as she went.
“Why!” She paused by the thoughtful-eyed woman. “It’s her. It’s that girl!” Madame appeared suddenly with a frown.
“What’s this, Lena? How many times have I told you not to stop to talk? Where are you carrying that box?”
“Thomas says there’s a mistake in the address. The folks don’t know anything about it.”
“Where is Thomas? Send him to me. Here, Thomas. What’s the matter? Couldn’t you find the house? The address is perfectly plain.”
“Sure, I found the house, Madame, but they wouldn’t take it in. They said they didn’t know anything about it. It wasn’t theirs.”
“Did they say Miss Chapparelle didn’t live there? Who came to the door?”
“An old woman with white hair. Yes, she said Miss Chapparelle lived there. She said she was her daughter, but that package didn’t belong to her. She said she never bought anything at this place.”
“Well, you can take it right back,” said Madame sharply. “Tell the woman the young lady knows all about it. Tell her it will explain itself when the young lady opens it. There’s a card inside. And Thomas,” she added, hurrying after him as he slid away to the door and speaking in a lower voice, “Thomas, you leave it there no matter what she
