“Oh, look! isn't it lovely?”
The ladies, who had gone on a few steps, found themselves before the flowers and feathers department, installed in the central gallery, between the silk and glove departments. It appeared beneath the bright light of the glass roof as an enormous florescence, a white sheaf, tall and broad as an oak. The base was formed of single flowers, violets, lilies of the valley, hyacinths, daisies, all the delicate hues of the garden. Then came bouquets, white roses, softened by a fleshy tint, great white pæonies, slightly shaded with carmine, white chrysanthemums, with narrow petals and starred with yellow. And the flowers still ascended, great mystical lilies, branches of apple blossom, bunches of lilac, a continual blossoming, surmounted, as high as the first storey, by ostrich feathers, white plumes, which were like the airy breath of this collection of white flowers. One whole corner was devoted to the display of trimmings and orange-flower wreaths. There were also metallic flowers, silver thistles and silver ears of com. Amidst the foliage and the petals, amidst all this muslin, silk, and velvet, where drops of gum shone like dew, flew birds of Paradise for hats, purple Tangaras with black tails, and Septicolores with their changing rainbow-like plumage.
“I'm going to buy a branch of apple-blossom,” resumed Madame Marty. “It's delicious, isn't it? And that little bird, do look, Valentine. I must take it!”
Madame Guibal began to feel tired of standing still in the eddy of the crowd, and at last said: “Well, we'll leave you to make your purchases. We're going upstairs.”
“No, no, wait for me!” cried the other. “I'm going up too. There's the perfumery department, I must see that.”
This department, created the day before, was next door to the reading-room. Madame Desforges, to avoid the crush on the stairs, spoke of going up in the lift, but they had to abandon the idea, there was such a crowd waiting their turn. At last they arrived, passing before the public Refreshment bar, where the crowd was becoming so great that an inspector had to restrain the people's appetites by only allowing the gluttonous customers to enter in small groups. And the ladies already began to smell the perfumery department, a penetrating odour which scented the whole gallery. There was quite a struggle over one article, The Paradise soap, a specialty of the house. In the show cases, and on the crystal tablets of the shelves, were ranged pots of pomade and paste, boxes of powder and paint, boxes of toilet vinegar; whilst the fine brushes, combs, scissors, and smelling-bottles occupied a special place. The salesmen had managed to decorate the shelves with white porcelain pots and white glass bottles. But what delighted the customers above all was a silver fountain, a shepherdess seated in the middle of a harvest of flowers, and from which flowed a continual stream of violet water, which fell with a musical plash into the metal basin. An exquisite odour was disseminated around, the ladies dipping their handkerchiefs in the scent as they passed.
“There,” said Madame Marty, when she had loaded herself with lotions, dentrifices, and cosmetics. “Now I've done, I'm at your service. Let's go and rejoin Madame de Boves.”
But on the landing of the great central staircase they were again stopped by the Japanese department. This counter had grown wonderfully since the day Mouret had amused himself by setting up, in the same place, a little proposition table, covered with a lot of soiled articles, without at all foreseeing its future success. Few departments had had a more modest commencement, and now it overflowed with old bronzes, old ivories, old lacquer work. He did fifteen hundred thousand francs' worth of business a year in this department, ransacking the Far East, where his travellers pillaged the palaces and the temples. Besides, fresh departments were always springing up, they had tried two in December, in order to fill up the empty spaces caused by the dead winter season—a book department and a toy department, which would certainly grow also and sweep away certain shops in the neighbourhood. Four years had sufficed for the Japanese department to attract the entire artistic custom of Paris. This time Madame Desforges herself, notwithstanding the rancour which had made her swear not to buy anything, succumbed before some finely carved ivory.
“Send it to my house,” said she rapidly, at a neighbouring pay-desk. “Ninety francs, is it not?” And, seeing Madame Marty and her daughter plunged in a lot of trashy porcelains, she resumed, as she carried Madame Guibal off: “You will find us in the reading-room, I really must sit down a little while.”
In the reading-room they were obliged to remain standing. All the chairs were occupied, round the large table covered with newspapers. Great fat fellows were reading and lolling about without even thinking of giving up their seats to the ladies. A few women were writing, their faces on the paper, as if to conceal their letters under the flowers of their hats. Madame de Boves was not there, and Henriette was getting very impatient when she perceived De Vallagnosc, who was also looking for his wife and mother-in-law. He bowed, and said: