her taste was naturally good; and as she followed eagerly from shop to shop, she recalled the three months she had spent in Brandywine’s millinery department, and the rudiments of a trade she had learned there.  “I’d rather design my next gown myself,” she said one day to Mrs. Fowler, while they were looking at French models in the establishment of Madame Dinard, who had been born an O’Grady.  “I know I can do better than these, and besides I shan’t meet duplicates of myself every time I go out.”  That night she dreamed of hats and gowns, and the next morning she drew pictures of them in coloured chalk.  “It’s the only talent I ever had,” she remarked gaily to her mother-in-law, “and it is running to waste.”

Madame, who regarded the sketches with uncompromising disdain, showed great interest in the practical application of Gabriella’s ideas to the dressing of Mrs. Fowler.

“Yes, you have undoubtedly ideas,” she said, discarding in her enthusiasm the accent she had spent twenty years in acquiring, “and there is nothing so rare in any department—­in any walk of life—­as ideas.  You have style, too,” she pursued admiringly, turning her eyes on Gabriella’s figure in one of her Parisian models.  “It is very rare—­such chic.  You wear your clothes with a grace.”

“That, also, is a marketable asset in a dressmaker,” laughed Gabriella.  “Do you know I ought to have been a dressmaker, Madame.  Only I hate the very sight of a needle.”

“But I never sew!  I haven’t had a needle in my hand for twenty years—­no, not for thirty,” protested Madame.

“Then I mustn’t give up hope.  If I ever have to earn my living, I’ll come to you, Madame.”

Then Madame bowed and smiled and shrugged as if at a gracious jest, and Mrs. Fowler observed in her crisp, matter-of-fact manner:  “Yes, my daughter has a genuine instinct for dress, and, as you say, that is very rare.  She carries her clothes well, doesn’t she?  It’s such a blessing to be tall—­though my husband insists that the women who have ruled the world have always been small ones.  But I do love a fine figure, and she looks so distinguished in that cherry-coloured cloth, doesn’t she?”

To all of which Madame agreed, as she bowed them out, with her ingratiating professional manner.

“It’s so lovely to have clothes,” said Gabriella, sinking back in the victoria, “money is one of the best gifts of the gods, isn’t it?”

“It’s hard to do without it,” replied Mrs. Fowler, brisk and perfectly businesslike even in her generalizations.  “I expect the worst suffering in the world comes from poverty.”