Staines was writing for the bare life, and a number of German books about him, slaving to make a few pounds—­when in comes the buoyant figure and beaming face his soul delighted in.

He laid down his work, to enjoy the sunbeam of love.

“Oh, darling, I’ve only come in for a minute.  We are going to a flower-show on the 13th; everybody will be so beautifully dressed—­especially that Mrs. Vivian.  I have got ten yards of beautiful blue silk in my wardrobe, but that is not enough to make a whole dress—­everything takes so much stuff now.  Madame Cie does not care to make up dresses unless she finds the silk, but Miss Lucas says she thinks, to oblige a friend of hers, she would do it for once in a way.  You know, dear, it would only take a few yards more, and it would last as a dinner-dress for ever so long.”

Then she clasped him round the neck, and leaned her head upon his shoulder, and looked lovingly up in his face.  “I know you would like your Rosa to look as well as Mrs. Vivian.”

“No one ever looks as well, in my eyes, as my Rosa.  There, the dress will add nothing to your beauty; but go and get it, to please yourself; it is very considerate of you to have chosen something of which you have ten yards, already.  See, dear, I’m to receive twenty pounds for this article; if research was paid it ought to be a hundred.  I shall add it all to your allowance for dresses this year.  So no debt, mind; but come to me for everything.”

The two ladies drove off to Madame Cie’s, a pretty shop lined with dark velvet and lace draperies.

In the back room they were packing a lovely bridal dress, going off the following Saturday to New York.

“What, send from America to London?”

“Oh, dear, yes!” exclaimed Madame Cie.  “The American ladies are excellent customers.  They buy everything of the best, and the most expensive.”

“I have brought a new customer,” said Miss Lucas; “and I want you to do a great favor, and that is to match a blue silk, and make her a pretty dress for the flower-show on the 13th.”

Madame Cie produced a white muslin polonaise, which she was just going
to send home to the Princess -----, to be worn over mauve.

“Oh, how pretty and simple!” exclaimed Miss Lucas.

“I have some lace exactly like that,” said Mrs. Staines.

“Then why don’t you have a polonaise?  The lace is the only expensive part, the muslin is a mere nothing; and it is such a useful dress, it can be worn over any silk.”

It was agreed Madame Cie was to send for the blue silk and the lace, and the dresses were to be tried on on Thursday.

On Thursday, as Rosa went gayly into Madame Cie’s back room to have the dresses tried on, Madame Cie said, “You have a beautiful lace shawl, but it wants arranging; in five minutes I could astonish you with what I could do to that shawl.”

“Oh, pray do,” said Mrs. Staines.