GUINEVERE'S GOWN.
Aristocratic Adelaide was now as deeply attached to "that little witch"
Winnie as she had been prejudiced against her, and Winnie, who had
hitherto spoken of her new friend as "that stuck-up Armstrong girl," was
now her devoted admirer.
[Illustration: {Drawing of Adelaide.}]
Although this state of affairs was perfectly agreeable to the Amen
Corner, it was not equally so to the Hornets. They had endured Winnie's
removal as a piece of Madame's tyranny, had looked upon their Queen as a
martyr, and had taken it for granted that we would make things extremely
uncomfortable for her. They perceived, with astonishment, that we
welcomed her heartily, and when it dawned upon them by degrees that
Winnie was herself happy in the change, that she actually promenaded in
the corridor with an arm lovingly twined about the waist of that odious
Tib Smith, that the placard "Engaged" appeared as frequently on the
outer door of the Amen Corner, and that Winnie's lessons and behavior
improved so much that she was actually becoming a favorite with the
teachers instead of their special torment--the indignation of the
Hornets' Nest knew no bounds.
It showed itself in a practical joke originated by Cynthia, which might
have been very amusing had it not been spiced with malice. I have spoken
of our literary society and its projected entertainment. We were to have
a series of tableaux; among others, Guinevere kneeling before an altar.
Milly had been chosen to represent Guinevere on account of her beautiful
hair, and because she spent her Saturdays and Sundays at home, and could
have any costume arranged for herself. What was our disappointment, one
Monday morning, to receive a note from Milly saying that she would not
be able to take part in the entertainment, as her mother was going to
Washington for a fortnight, and had decided that, as Milly looked pale,
a little outing would do her good. This note was read to the literary
society amid groans from the members. "We can't give up that tableau."
"Adelaide, _you_ take the part." "Can't; my hair is as black as a crow's
wing. Tib's hair is lovely when it is down. It falls to her knees, and
it has the sheen of molten gold. Girls, you must see it," and Adelaide
proceeded to pull my braids apart; I protesting all the time that it was
absurd to have a freckled Guinevere who was as homely as a hedge fence.
"Granted," replied Witch Winnie, "but nobody is going to see your face,
child; you pose with your back to the audience, and as none of the girls
know what regal hair you have, it will be such fun to have them guess
who it is."
All of the other girls joined in persuading me, excepting one of the
Hornets, who lifted her voice in favor of Cynthia Vaughn.
"But, girls, what am I to do for a costume?"
"Why didn't Milly think to send hers along?" said Adelaide. "We might
write her."
"No, there's no time; she leaves this morning on the 'limited.'"
"If you would like, I'll take the part," Cynthia Vaughn suggested. "I've
all that canton flannel ermine, and the ruff made out of the old window
curtains, which I wore when I was Queen Elizabeth."
"That ruff would be a frightful anachronism," said Emma Jane Anton.
"And the ermine has served three times already. Thank you, we'll manage
somehow," Witch Winnie asserted, confidently.
We retired to the Amen Corner to talk it over. "If worse comes to
worst," said Witch Winnie, "I know I can make a magnificent train out of
the plush table-cloth in Madame's library."
"But how will you ever get it?"
"Emma Jane must ask her to lend it to us; she'll do anything for Emma
Jane."
"Emma Jane declines to act in this emergency," said Miss Anton, firmly.
"You wouldn't be so mean!"
"But I would; Adelaide, please read Milly's letter again; I didn't half
hear it."
"I must have dropped it in the Society hall; I will get it after dinner.
If she had thought that Tib might be chosen to take her place, she
would have done anything for the honor of the Amen Corner."
Here some one tapped at the door, and announced, "A letter for Miss
Armstrong."
"It's from Milly!" exclaimed Adelaide, "and it looks as if it had been
opened, and pasted up again."
"I thought Madame boasted that she never submitted her young ladies to
that sort of espionage," said Witch Winnie.
"Girls, girls!" Adelaide fairly shrieked; "just listen to this! Milly
writes--
"'I forgot to say in my last that mamma's maid is putting the
finishing touches to my costume, and Gibson will bring it around
to-morrow. The dress (purple velvet) is one which mamma wore last
summer when she was presented to the Queen. The lace which trims it
was made to order from a pattern of her own selection in Brussels.
You may keep the crown, for the gems in it are only Rhinestones.
Aunt Fanny wore it at a costume ball, and they sparkle like the
real thing. Be careful of the lace, for mamma prizes it highly.
'Yours, Milly.
'P. S.--I've coaxed papa to lend you a silver chatelaine, old
French repousse, linked with emeralds, which he keeps in his
cabinet of curiosities. It shows finely against the velvet.'"
How we all exclaimed and chattered! "Now what will the Hornets' Nest say
to that?"
"Canton flannel ermine indeed!"
"I should like to see them bring on their old mosquito-netting ruff!"
"Real emeralds! A diadem flashing with diamonds!"
"Don't tell them a word about it until Tib dawns on them in all her
glory on Wednesday night."
It was hard to keep this resolution, but we did. The Hornets were
giggling and whispering among themselves as we marched in to dinner,
with all the importance given by the possession of a state secret. The
other girls relapsed into silence as we took our seats, and watched us
with strange, significant looks.
"I've been looking up the matter in Racinet's work on Costume," remarked
Cynthia Vaughn, "and I find you were right, Miss Anton; ruffs did not
come in until long after Arthur's reign."
"I would like to consult the book," Emma Jane replied, "unless you can
tell me whether chatelaines were worn at that period."
Here a small Hornet was seized with strangulation, and had to be
vigorously thumped upon the back by her friends.
"Oh, I think so," Cynthia replied, sweetly, disregarding her friend's
condition. "Wouldn't it be sweet to have Guinevere wear one? Miss Smith
is so artistic, I'm sure she could cut one out of gilt paper."
Adelaide scouted the idea. "Whatever we get up for that costume," she
said, "I am determined shall be _real_, no _imitation_ chatelaines, or
anything else."
Cynthia lifted her eyebrows. "Perhaps you will secure one of Queen
Victoria's court robes?" she remarked, icily.
It was on Adelaide's lips to reply that we might have a robe which had
figured at a court reception of the English Queen, but she felt Witch
Winnie's foot upon hers, and replied that in undertaking this tableau
the Amen Corner felt confident that they could carry it through
creditably, and we therefore begged to be excused from the dress
rehearsal that afternoon. We left the dining-room in a body, and the
Hornets laughed aloud before we closed the door. "'They laugh best who
laugh last,'" said Witch Winnie. "Won't those girls fairly expire when
they see Tib in her grand role!"
Tuesday was a long and weary day for us. We started at every knock,
expecting a summons to the janitor's room to receive a package, but none
came. We retired much disappointed; and we held a council of war before
breakfast. The Roseveldts' butler had evidently proved false to his
trust, and the costume was waiting for us at the family mansion on Fifth
Avenue.
"I will ask Madame at breakfast to excuse me from my morning lessons to
do an important errand," said Witch Winnie; "I will tell her the entire
story, and I know that, rather than disappoint us all, she will let us
go to the Roseveldts' for the things."
Madame proved to be in good-humor, and on reading Milly's letter readily
gave Winnie and me the desired permission, sending for a hansom to take
us to our destination. All of the Hornets at the lower end of the table
heard this conversation, and Adelaide thought that Cynthia Vaughn turned
green with envy. An hour later, as we came down the front stairs to take
our hansom, Cerberus popped his head from his office to tell us that a
package had just been received for Miss Adelaide Armstrong. "Come back,
girls!" Adelaide cried excitedly; "here is the costume. It can be
nothing else. My, what a big bundle!"
We carried it between us in triumph up the staircase. The Hornets were
clustered on the very top landing; their faces peered over the
balustrade, and as they caught sight of our procession a peal of
derisive laughter echoed through the hall as they scuttled away to their
nest under the eaves.
"Those Hornets have certainly gone crazy," Emma Jane remarked,
practically. She was carrying her corner of the package, and was as
interested as the rest of us in the arrival of the costume. We entered
our study-parlor in suppressed excitement, and impatiently cut the
knots, and tore open the wrappings, when, behold! another package,
scrupulously tied. This paper removed revealed another, then another,
and another, and the fact slowly dawned upon us that we had been
victimized. "Girls!" exclaimed Witch Winnie, sitting down on the floor
in despair, "it's a wicked sell of those Hornets: there is nothing
here."
Emma Jane Anton kept on methodically removing the wrappers and folding
them neatly. "Perhaps," suggested Adelaide, "they have merely arranged
this hoax to fool us, and the costume is still at the Roseveldts'."
"It's just like that Cynthia Vaughn to do such a thing; we'll go, all
the same," Witch Winnie replied, rising hopefully and tying on her veil.
At this juncture Emma Jane reached a pasteboard box marked "Violet
velvet court dress." Lifting the lid discovered a quantity of trash. An
empty sardine-box bore the label "Diamond Crown;" a dilapidated bustle
was marked "Brussels point lace;" a mixed-pickle bottle was filled with
apple-parings and labeled "Old repousse chatelaine, reign of Arthur I.;
the _real_ article; must be returned."
A howl of mingled laughter and dismay rose from our corner. "Cynthia
Vaughn wrote that letter which purported to be from Milly. Well, it's a
real good practical joke, anyway," said Witch Winnie; "better than I
thought the Hornets could get up without my help. Let us show them that
we can take a joke, and good-naturedly acknowledge ourselves sold."
"And in the mean time what am I to do for a costume? You know the
tableaux come off to-night."
"That puts another face on the matter."
"I suppose Cynthia would be only too glad to take the part even now."
"After all we have said, and your name printed on the programme--never!"
This from Adelaide.
"I'll tell you what we will do," suggested Winnie; "the hansom is still
waiting at the door; Tib and I will drive to a costumer's and hire
something. I found the address of a place on the Bowery the other day
and fortunately saved it. Hold your heads up high; we will not
acknowledge ourselves defeated yet."
As Witch Winnie and I sped out of the quiet square and down the great
teeming thoroughfare, the Elevated trains jarring overhead and the
motley crowd surging about us, a misgiving of conscience swept over me.
What would Madame say? This was not what we had obtained permission to
do. This was very different from Fifth Avenue, and not at all a quarter
of the city in which young ladies should be wandering without chaperons.
We were quite desperate, however, and it seemed too late to turn back.
The hansom stopped before a Hebrew misfit clothing store where dress
suits were announced as on hire by the evening. Flaunting placards above
told that costumes for the theatrical profession and for fancy balls
were to be let in the fourth story. We climbed a dirty staircase, and
after knocking by mistake at an intelligence office for _Dienst
Maedchen_, a hair-dyeing and complexion-enameling rooms, a chiropodist's,
and a clairvoyant's, we found ourselves in a room piled from floor to
ceiling with costumes. A fat German, who looked as if he were some
second-hand piece of furniture, very much soiled as to his linen, and
the worse for wear as to his physical mechanism, admitted us and did the
honors of the establishment. I glanced around at the motley objects
which filled the wareroom; gaudy spangled dresses, with a sprinkle of
saw-dust (suggestive of the arena) clinging to the worn cotton velvet,
many-ruffled shockingly brief skirts of rose-colored gauze that had spun
like so many teetotums behind flaring foot-lights, tinfoil suits of
armor that had come in all mud-besplashed from parading the streets at
the last grand procession, the faded banners which flapped above them
so jauntily, drooping wearily now from the rafters, covered with dust
and festooned by the spiders. A row of dominoes dependent from a
neighboring clothes-line rustled with an air of mystery, and a heap of
masks upon the floor seemed to leer and wink from their eyeless windows.
"I am afraid," said Winnie, drawing nearer the door, "that you haven't
anything so nice as I want."
"I haf effery dings, effery dings," replied the ponderous costumer; "you
don't t'ink I keeps dose fine procade for the costume ball out here in
te tust, ain't it?"
"I wanted something for a school entertainment," Winnie explained.
"So, so; I haf effery dings, I tole you, for de school. Ya, from dose
Kindergarten to dot universities. Dings for little peebles and dings for
big peebles."
"I should like to know what kind of big people patronize your
establishment?"
"Sometimes dose ladies who make de church fair. I have some angel wing
for de Christmas mystery, de mask for de Muzzer Goose pantomine.
Sometimes dose fine ladies dey make some peesness mit me. When de
shentlemen step on dose trail or spill coffee on dot tablier, den I buys
dot dress, and my designer she make it all new again. I haf one ferry
nice designer; she haf many times arrange ze historical costume for dose
grand painting what make ze artists."
"Then I think I would like to talk with her," said Winnie.
"Ya, ya, dat vas right. Here, Mrs. Halsey, Mrs. Halsey! Perhaps you
petter go in de sewing-room, ain't it?"
He opened the door into a back room where a sweet pale-faced woman sat
sewing little bells on a jester's cap.
We were struck from the outset with Mrs. Halsey's refined appearance,
and we were not surprised when she showed, by her complete understanding
of what we required, that she had read Tennyson and had some idea of
historical periods in costume. She drew a purple velvet robe from a
great bundle. I exclaimed in disapproval as I noticed a horrid crimson
border.
"But this is coming off," said the little woman, using her scissors
briskly, "and instead, I will stitch some gold braid applique in a lily
design. See, how do you like this effect?" and her deft fingers flew,
coiling and twisting the gilt braid until a really regal combination was
produced.
"Then we will have it open at the side to show a white satin petticoat,
also laced with gold, and the sleeves can be puffed and slashed with
white satin. I arranged a costume like that for Mary Anderson."
"Is it possible that such a noted and successful actress gets her
costumes at a place like this?" asked Witch Winnie.
"Oh, no," replied Mrs. Halsey, with a sigh; "when I made Miss Anderson's
dresses I was designer for Madame Celeste's establishment. I should be
there now if it were not for Jim."
She was fitting the dress to me, and as this would take several minutes,
Winnie asked,
"Who is Jim?"
"Jim is my son; he is twelve years old, and the brightest little fellow,
for his age, you ever saw. He leads his classes at the public school,
has a record of 100 in mathematics, for all that he has such a poor
chance at preparing his lessons."
"How does that happen?" It was I who inquired this time.
"Jim is an ambitious boy; ambitious to help me as well as to keep a
place in his class, and a milkman pays him a dollar a week for driving
his cart over to Jersey City to meet the milk train and fill his cans
for him every morning."
"That is very nice."
"If it did not break so cruelly into the poor boy's hours for sleep. In
order to dress and snatch a bite before he goes down to the stable and
harnesses, he has to rise at 3 o'clock. This enables the milkman to
sleep until Jim arrives with the milk at 6 o'clock, in time to begin the
morning rounds. I make the boy take an hour's sleep after this, but it
is not enough."
"He ought to go to bed very early."
"Yes, but the lessons; when are they to be learned? He shouts them out
in his sleep. 'If I gain seven hundred dollars from a rise of 2-1/2 per
cent. in Pennsylvania Railroad stock, what was my original investment?'
He has his father's quickness for figures. Bless his heart! he never had
any money to invest in railroad stocks, and by heaven's help he never
will."
"I am not so sure about that," said Witch Winnie. "How did it happen
that you lost your position at Madame Celeste's on account of Jim?" She
had finished the fitting and was removing the pins from her mouth, but
Winnie drew on her gloves very slowly; we were both interested.
"Madame kept me for such late hours that I did not reach home until Jim
was asleep, and at last she proposed to raise my salary, but said that I
must sleep in the establishment, so as to be on hand to open early in
the morning. This was after Madame's very successful winter, when she
bought a house out of town, and did not find it convenient to come in
until late in the day. I told her that I would accept her offer if Jim
could be with me; but there was no room for him, and we thought it best
to stick together. I get through here at 6 o'clock, and can cook Jim's
dinner. But it's hard for the boy. If I could only afford to let him
have his entire time for his study--but his dollar a week half pays our
rent."
"Wouldn't it have been better for you both if you had remained at Madame
Celeste's, and had sent Jim to boarding-school? There are such nice
cadet schools up the Hudson."
A faint smile overspread the woman's face. "Madame always insisted that
her employees should dress well. I know exactly what it cost me. It
would have left just a dollar and a half a week for Jim. Do you know of
any boarding-school that would have taken him at those rates?"
Winnie sorrowfully confessed that she did not, and we reluctantly took
our leave, Mrs. Halsey promising to finish the costume immediately, and
to send it by Jim in ample time for the evening's performances.
Our escapade lay heavily upon my conscience in spite of our success in
obtaining the costume, but I felt still more troubled for poor Mrs.
Halsey and her overworked boy. "I wonder," I said to Winnie, "if Madame
could not make him useful here at the school, and let him work for his
board, tend furnace and run errands."
"You could not tell her about him without confessing our lark, and don't
you do that for the world!"
"No," I promised, against my will, "of course not, unless you consent;
the secret is half yours, but I really think it would be the best way."
Adelaide was greatly interested in our report. "I am to have my violin
dress for the concert made at Madame Celeste's," she said, "and I mean
to ask her about this Mrs. Halsey."
Jim came with the package while we were at supper, and Adelaide ran down
to the office to receive it. She told us that he was an undersized,
stoop-shouldered boy, with a cough which she fancied he had contracted
by driving in the early morning mists. He took off his hat like a little
gentleman, however, and his finger-nails and teeth were clean. Any clown
might wear good clothes, Adelaide insisted, but these little details
marked the gentleman. He had at first declined the dime which Adelaide
proffered, but accepted it on her insistence that it was only for
car-fare and it was raining. He put it away carefully in a little worn
purse which contained just one cent, at the same time remarking, "I
don't mind the rain, and I can get Ma the quinine the doctor says she
ought to be taking."
"That's the boy for me," Witch Winnie remarked; "he's got clear grit,
and tenderness for his mother besides."
And Guinevere's gown? It was a beauty. The golden lilies gave it a
sumptuous effect, and it fulfilled almost exactly the promises of the
forged letter; there was even a _riviere_ of fish-scale pearls and
glass beads down the side, which really resembled a chatelaine. The
Hornets were overcome with amazement--simply dazzled and dazed.
According to Adelaide--who always resorted to French to express her
superlatives, and, when that language proved inadequate, pieced it out
with translations of American slang or coinage of her own--they were
"_Completement bouleversees, stupefiees, mortifiees, et frappee plus
haute q'un--q'un--kite_!"