"If you want to know my opinion," Mrs. Rossiter insisted, as she helped herself to the peas which the rosebud Thomas was passing, "I think she will. Men aren't so plentiful over there as you seem to suppose—that is, men of the kind they'd marry. Lord Goldborough has no money at all, as you might say, and yet the girls have to be set up in big establishments. You've only got to look at them to see it. Cissie marrying a subaltern with a thousand pounds a year isn't thinkable. It wouldn't dress her. She's coming over here to take a look at Hugh, and if she likes him— Well, I told you long ago that you'd be wise to snap up that young Strangways. He's much better-looking than Hugh, and more in your own— Besides, Jim says that now that he's with"—she balked at the name of Grainger—"now that he's where he is he's beginning to make money. It doesn't take so long when people have the brains for it."
All this gave me a feeling of mingled curiosity and fear when, a few weeks later, I came on Mrs. Rossiter and Lady Cecilia Boscobel looking into a shop window in Fifth Avenue. It was a Saturday afternoon, the day which I had off and on which I made my modest purchases. It was a cold, brisk day, with light snow whirling in tiny eddies on the ground. I was going northward on the sunny side. At a distance of some fifty yards I recognized Mrs. Rossiter's motor standing by the curb, and cast my eyes about for a possible glimpse of her. Moving away from the window of the jeweler's whence she had probably come out, she saw me approach, and turned at once with a word or two to the lady beside her, who also looked in my direction. I knew by intuition who Mrs. Rossiter's companion was, and that my connection with the family had been explained to her.
Mrs. Rossiter made the presentation in her usual offhand way.
"Oh, Miss Adare! I want to introduce you to Lady Cecilia Boscobel."
We exchanged civil, remote, and non-committal salutations, each of us with her hands in her muff. My immediate impression was one of color, as it is when you see old Limoges enamels. There was more color in Lady Cissie's personality than in that of any one I have ever looked at. Her hair was red—not auburn or copper, but red—a decorative, flaming red. I have often noticed how slight is the difference between beautiful red hair and ugly. Lady Cissie's was of the shade that is generally ugly, but which in her case was rendered glorious by the introduction of some such pigment, gleaming and umber, as that which gives the peculiar hue to Australian gold. I had never seen such hair or hair in such quantities, except in certain pictures of the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, for which I should have supposed there could have been no earthly model had my father not known Eleanor Siddall. Lady Cissie's eyes were gray, with a greenish light in them when she turned her head. Her complexion could only be compared to the kind of carnation which the whitest of whites is flecked in just the right spots by the rosiest rose. In the lips, which were full and firm, also like Eleanor Siddall's, the rose became carmine, to melt away into coral-pink in the shell-like ears. Her dress of seal-brown broadcloth, on which there was a sheen, was relieved by occasional touches of sage-green, and the numerous sable tails on her boa and muff blew this way and that way in the wind. In the small black hat, perched at what I can only describe as a triumphant angle, an orange wing became at the tip of each tiny topmost feather a daring line of scarlet. Nestling on the sage-green below the throat a row of amber beads slumbered and smoldered with lemon and orange and ruby lights that now and then shot out rays of crimson or scarlet fire.
I thought of my own costume—naturally. I was in gray, with inexpensive black furs. An iridescent buckle, with hues such as you see in a pigeon's neck, at the side of my black-velvet toque was my only bit of color. I was poor Jenny Wren in contrast to a splendid bird-of-paradise. So be it! I could at least be a foil to this healthy, vigorous young beauty who was two inches taller than I, and might have my share of the advantages which go with all antithesis.
The talk was desultory, and in it the English girl took no part. Mrs. Rossiter asked me where I was going, what I was going for, and whether or not she couldn't take me to my destination in her car. I declined this offer, explained that my errands were trivial, and examined Lady Cissie through the corner of my eye. On her side Lady Cissie examined me quite frankly—not haughtily, but distantly and rather sympathetically. She had come all this distance to take a look at Hugh, and I was the girl he loved. I counted on the fact to give poor Jenny Wren her value, and I think it did. At any rate, when I had answered all Mrs. Rossiter's questions and was moving off to continue my way up-town, Lady Cissie's rich lips quivered in a sort of farewell smile.
But Hugh showed little interest when I painted her portrait verbally.
"Yes, that's the girl," he observed indifferently, "red-headed, long-legged, slashy-colored, laid on a bit too thick."
"She's beautiful, Hugh."