There was a slight, momentary, but perfectly palpable shock accompanying these words—­a shock felt by everybody within the sound of his voice.  Because the director had not said, “Dane, come down here.”  He had said, “Will you come here, Miss Dane?” And the thing amounted, so rigid is the etiquette of musical comedy, to an accolade.  The people on the stage and in the wings didn’t know what she’d done, nor in what character she was about to appear, but they did know she was, from now on, something besides a chorus-girl.

Rose obediently crossed the runway and walked up the aisle to where Galbraith stood with Goldsmith and Block, waiting for her.  She was still feeling a little numb and empty.

Galbraith, as she came up, held out a hand to her.  “I congratulate you, Miss Dane,” he said.  “They’re admirable.  With all the money in the world, I wouldn’t ask for anything handsomer.”

Before she could say anything in reply, he directed her attention, with a nod of the head, to the partners, and walked away.  Rose gasped at that.  She’d never thought beyond him—­beyond the necessity of pleasing him; and that he’d carry the details of the business through with Goldsmith and Block, she’d taken for granted.  Now, here she was chucked into the water and told to swim.  She’d never in her life, of course, tried to sell anything.  What her mind first awoke to was that the partners were looking rather blank.  Block, indeed, let his eyes follow the retreating Galbraith with a momentary look of outraged astonishment.  Her wits, quickened by the emergency, interpreted the look.  Galbraith, chucking her into the water indeed, had thrown her a life-preserver—­the tip that her wares were good.

Goldsmith, quicker and shrewder than his junior, was already smiling politely.  “They really are very good,” he said.  “If they are not too expensive for us, we’ll consider buying them.”

“They’ll be,” said Rose, “the twelve of them, four hundred and sixty-five dollars.”  She had something the same feeling of astonishment on hearing herself say this, that she’d had when she heard herself telling Galbraith that she’d design the costumes.  Something or other had spoken without her will—­almost without her knowledge.  She had one figure clearly etched in her brain; that was the one hundred and ninety dollars she must pay back to Galbraith; and she’d put in fifty of her own.  There was also a matter of twenty dollars or so still to be paid to the wardrobe mistress and her assistant.  But this four hundred and sixty-five dollars had simply come out of the air.

Block pursed his lips and emitted a fine thin whistle of astonishment.

Goldsmith heaved a sigh.  “My dear young lady,” he protested.  “The inducement held out to us to wait for these costumes of yours, was that they were to be cheap.  But four hundred and sixty-five dollars is ridiculous!  That’s a lot of money.”

“Quite a lot less,” said Rose, “than the ones Mrs. Goldsmith picked out came to.  They were just over six hundred.”  Goldsmith smiled indulgently.  “By the figures on the tags, yes,” he said.  “But would we have paid that, do you think?  Those figures represent what they’d like to get from people who buy one apiece.  But from us, buying twelve ...”  He shrugged his shoulders expressively.