“It will ravishingly become madame.”
The gown, a work of the best Parisian art, suggested something of the immateriality of a moonbeam, and as the assistant, a girl with a tired face and circled eyes, held it for inspection, it gleamed.
Leilah looked at it, wondering the while where she would wear it, whether indeed she would wear it at all. Then, before a sheet that had been placed on the floor and on which the assistant arranged the gown in a circle she proceeded to undress.
To the amateur in feminine beauty, there are few spectacles more attractive than that of an attractive woman clothed in lingerie and a hat. This spectacle Leilah presented.
The première exclaimed at it. “Madame la comtesse has a figure truly divine. But! But! Who could have laced her?”
“I was not very well this morning,” Leilah replied. “I told my women not to make me too tight. But you can take me in I think about an inch.”
“Marguerite,” said the première, “draw the stays a little closer.”
The girl with the tired face undid the corset and pulled at the strings. But she pulled awkwardly, perhaps too suddenly.
Leilah gasped, turned, sat down and fell forward. The première hurried to her. She had fainted.
“The smelling salts!” the première cried. “The smelling salts! Cognac! Get some cognac!”