"That's the modern and that's the antique; and I'm sure no one but a rug-man could tell the difference between them. This man—this gentleman—says they can, but that's only business. Hundreds of dollars difference in the price, almost as much as between a pair of real pearl ear-rings and imitation ones. What do you say, Mildred? Would anybody ever notice—?"
"I suppose you'd be buying the best because it's the best, and not because any one would notice—"
"I should be buying it for what every one would see. What's the good of having a thing if it doesn't show what it is? I hate the way some people have of calling your attention to every fine thing they've got in the house, as if you weren't used to fine things of your own. If I've got to tell every one that that's a genuine old Chinese masterpiece before they notice it—well, it isn't worth it. But at the same time the effect is richer; and some people do know, and talk about it to other people who know—there's that to consider."
By this time I was conscious of something else.
Having got through so many minutes without recognition I was beginning to hope that, by blotting myself out, as it were, between my fellow-workmen I might finally escape detection. No one had as yet dissociated any of us from another, the very absence of personality on our part reducing us to the place of mere machines. As a mere machine Mrs. Averill and Mildred might continue to overlook me, passing out of the room as unobservant as they had come in.
But Lulu had begun a curious movement round the square of the carpets. She seemed to be studying them; though with the long slits of her Mongolian eyes her glance might be traveling anywhere. Having had the opportunity to look me in the face, she moved to where she got me in profile, afterward passing behind me and returning to her original standpoint beside her sister and her friend. Without further reference to Mrs. Mountney, she slipped her arm through Mildred's, leading her toward the grand piano, against which they leaned.
For me there was nothing to do but to stand still. A word, a sign, might easily betray me, if I had not been betrayed already. As the conversation went on, Mildred kept her back to me, but Mrs. Averill stood sidewise, so as to be able to throw me an occasional appraising glance. Apparently she was in some doubt, my position and my clothes rendering absolute certainty difficult.
But Mildred turned away from the piano at last, and without examining me directly came slowly down the long room. Entirely mistress of herself she walked with sedateness and composure. The shyness and brusqueness which had given her a kind of aura in my thoughts during the past two years seemed to have been overcome by experience. In this self-command more than in any other detail I observed a change in her.
Not till she reached the corner of the long carpet did she give me the first clear, straightforward look. That recognition did not come instantly told me that I, too, must have changed. Laborious work and a rough way of living had doubtless aged and probably hardened me. I was dressed, too, like any other working-man, though with the tidiness which our position on the selling floor exacted. A working-man in his Sunday clothes would perhaps have described me, while my features must have adapted themselves to altered inward conditions with the facility which features possess.
"Is it really you?"