Mrs. Delarayne's maid Wilmott,—silent, grave, preoccupied and efficient,—moved hither and thither, calmly but quickly, her head discreetly bowed, her voice more subdued than at ordinary times, as if she were officiating at a rite; and gradually, very gradually, the business proceeded.
Facing a corner of the bedroom, with a large window to her left, Mrs. Delarayne sat before her dressing-table, upon which, towering above the forest of bottles, brushes, boxes, and other paraphernalia, stood a large triple mirror, which enabled the elegant widow to get three different aspects of her handsome face at the same time.
The expression upon Mrs. Delarayne's face when she peered into this formidable reflector of her own image was scarcely self-complacent or serene. It was rather studious, anxious, critical, almost fierce, like that one would expect to find on the face of an ancient alchemist contemplating an alembic of precious compounds. Year in, year out, ever since her gradually waning youth had begun to add ever fresh complications to her once rapid and easy toilet, Mrs. Delarayne had faced herself with this determined and defiant expression on her features, resolved to overcome every difficulty and every undesirable innovation of time. Slowly the complex equipment had grown up. Now it was so extensive, that it required all the dexterity and knowledge that habit alone can impart, in order to master and understand its multitudinous intricacies.
In this mirror, then, when her expression was at its fiercest in intentness and concentration, she saw her daughter enter the room behind her, and for an instant a spasmodic frown darkened her already lowering brow.
"I cannot see you now, you know that, Leo darling," she hastened to exclaim as sweetly as possible, while her daughter was still on the threshold.
"All right, Peachy,—I shan't keep you a moment."
A slight flush crept up the mother's neck just below her ears,—this was a thing Cleo had too much delicacy to do. Cleo never disturbed her while she was dressing,—and she straightway stopped all operations and laid her hands resignedly in her lap.
"Well, be quick," she said, with ill-concealed irritation. "What is it?"
In the glass she could see her daughter's quick and intelligent eyes wandering all about her with the deepest interest, and resting here and there as if more than usually absorbed, and she frowned again.
Meanwhile, Leonetta, who had not seen her mother's bedroom, particularly the dressing-table, at such a busy crisis for many years, and who, when she had seen it in the past had been too young to grasp its full meaning, was too eagerly engaged scanning its imposing array of creams, scents, powders, oils, salves, cosmetics, tresses of hair, and other "aids," to be able to remember what she had come for, and simply stood there like one fascinated and spellbound.