“Why, it suits you to perfection, Madame.  Just a stitch or two like this—­and this—­and it will look as if it were designed for you by Worth.  Is it not so, Miss Bellman?  Don’t you think it is wonderful on Madame?”

Miss Bellman, having learned her part, agreed effusively, and then each of the fitters, as she was appealed to in turn, contributed an enraptured assent to the discussion.  The price of the gown was a thousand dollars, and Mrs. Pletheridge’s favourable decision was worth exactly that much in terms of money to Dinard’s.  As the season had been scarcely a brisk one, Madame was particularly anxious to have her more extreme models taken off her hands.  “It was unpacked only yesterday,” she lied suavely, “and no one else has had so much as a glimpse of it.”

“I can’t imagine what is the matter with it,” Mrs. Pletheridge sighed dejectedly, while she regarded her ample form with a resentful and critical gaze.  As long as one had nothing else to worry about, Madame reflected without sympathy, one might find cause for positive distress in the fact that a gown appeared to better advantage in the hand than on one’s person.  The truth—­and the truth, as sometimes happens, was the last thing Mrs. Pletheridge cared to admit—­was that she had grown too stout to wear pronounced fashions.

“Nothing could be more charming,” insisted Madame with increased effusion, “but if you are in doubt, let us ask the opinion of Mrs. Carr.  She has the true eye of the artist—­a wonderful eye.  I don’t know whether you remember Mrs. Archibald Fowler or not?” she added as the skirt fitter sped in search of Gabriella; “this is her daughter-in-law.  Her husband ran away with another woman about three years ago.  It made a great sensation at the time, and his wife got a divorce from him afterwards.  Ever since then she has been in my establishment.”

No, Mrs. Pletheridge did not remember Mrs. Fowler; but, having had a notorious amount of trouble with her own husbands, she was amiably disposed toward the unfortunate daughter-in-law of the lady she couldn’t remember.  Thirty years ago, as a pretty, vulgar, kind-hearted girl, she had captured with a glance the eldest son of the newly rich Pletheridge, who had, perhaps, inherited his grandfather’s genial admiration for chambermaids; but, to-day, after a generation of self-indulgence, her prettiness had coarsened, her vulgarity had hardened, and her kind heart had withered, through lack of cultivation, to the size of a cherry.  And, from having had everything she wanted for so long, she had at last reached that melancholy state of mind when she could think of nothing more to want.

A brisk step crossed the room outside, the curtains were parted with a commanding movement, and Gabriella joined the anxious group surrounded by the four mirrors.