Abramks slammed the fashion magazine shut as if afraid that Semyonov might catch a glimpse of the new Empire fashion and give the secret away.

“I will come immediately,” he said crossly.

He picked up his fashion plates, put the yard measure in his pocket, rammed his silk hat sorrowfully on his head and set off for the captain’s house.  He found Mrs. Zarubkin pacing the room excitedly, greeted her, but carefully avoided meeting her eyes.

“Well, what did you find out?”

“Nothing, Mrs. Zarubkin,” said Abramka dejectedly.  “Unfortunately I couldn’t find out a thing.”

“Idiot!  I have no patience with you.  Where are the fashion plates?”

“Here, Mrs. Zarubkin.”

She turned the pages, looked at one picture after the other, and suddenly her eyes shone and her cheeks reddened.

“Oh, Empire!  The very thing.  Empire is the very latest.  Make this one for me,” she cried commandingly.

Abramka turned pale.

“Ampeer, Mrs. Zarubkin?  I can’t make that Ampeer dress for you,” he murmured.

“Why not?” asked the captain’s wife, giving him a searching look.

“Because—­because—­I can’t.”

“Oh—­h—­h, you can’t?  You know why you can’t.  Because that is the style of Mrs. Shaldin’s dress.  So that is the reliability you boast so about?  Great!”

“Mrs. Zarubkin, I will make any other dress you choose, but it is absolutely impossible for me to make this one.”

“I don’t need your fashion plates, do you hear me?  Get out of here, and don’t ever show your face again.”

“Mrs. Zarubkin, I—­”

“Get out of here,” repeated the captain’s wife, quite beside herself.

The poor tailor stuck his yard measure, which he had already taken out, back into his pocket and left.

Half an hour later the captain’s wife was entering a train for Kiev, carrying a large package which contained material for a dress.  The captain had accompanied her to the station with a pucker in his forehead.  That was five days before the ball.

* * * * *

At the ball two expensive Empire gowns stood out conspicuously from among the more or less elegant gowns which had been finished in the shop of Abramka Stiftik, Ladies’ Tailor.  The one gown adorned Mrs. Shaldin’s figure, the other the figure of the captain’s wife.

Mrs. Zarubkin had bought her gown ready made at Kiev, and had returned only two hours before the beginning of the ball.  She had scarcely had time to dress.  Perhaps it would have been better had she not appeared at this one of the annual balls, had she not taken that fateful trip to Kiev.  For in comparison with the make and style of Mrs. Shaldin’s dress, which had been brought abroad, hers was like the botched imitation of an amateur.

That was evident to everybody, though the captain’s wife had her little group of partisans, who maintained with exaggerated eagerness that she looked extraordinarily fascinating in her dress and Mrs. Shaldin still could not rival her.  But there was no mistaking it, there was little justice in this contention.  Everybody knew better; what was worst of all, Mrs. Zarubkin herself knew better.  Mrs. Shaldin’s triumph was complete.