With an air of quiet satisfaction, S. Gedge Antiques stepped briskly forth into a soft autumn day where the sun as yet could not quite make up its mind to greet him.
It was to be a day of great events. And the first of these began to materialise shortly before eleven when June chanced to enter the shop. William, just at that moment, was fathoms deep in conversation with a customer. The customer was very tall, she was strikingly distinguished and, in the opinion of June, she was dressed exquisitely. Soft silk and faint blue Chinese embroidery clothed her with a dangerous beauty. But it was the coquetry of her hat, an artful straw wreathed wonderfully in flowers of many a subtle shade that gave the crowning touch.
The hat it was, no doubt, that completed William’s overthrow. There was a look of rapture in the eyes with which the vain fellow regarded its wearer, for which June could have found it in her heart to slay him on the spot.
That tell-tale look was really a little too much. June could not help lingering on the threshold to watch these two. So shamelessly was William engrossed with this vision of pure beauty that there was not a chance of his eyes straying to look at her. And she would not have cared if they had. Such an irrational surge of jealousy was now in her heart that she would have welcomed his seeing what she thought of his gazing like that, even upon the grandest young woman in the land.
“So nice of you to take so much trouble,” the fair customer said in a voice of such melody that June had to own that the celebrated Miss Banks, the daughter of Blackhampton’s chief physician, whose charm of manner had ever remained in her mind as the high-water mark of human amenity, would now have to take second place.
“Not at all, madam,” said William, in the William way. Even June had to admit that such fine courtesy, a little excessive, no doubt, was far removed from mere sycophancy. Had he not practised on her? For that reason she had a perfect right to feel furious; William’s homage was far too inclusive. At the same time, there was no gainsaying that in this case he had every excuse. Regarded as the mirror of fashion and the mould of form, Miss Banks of Blackhampton was now a back number.
“The friend I sent it to liked it very much indeed,” said the Super-girl. “It was so exactly what she wanted. And if by chance you are able to match it, I shall be most grateful.”
William, with that divine air of his, promised quite simply and sincerely to do his best.
“The price, too, was very moderate,” said the Super-girl with the geniality of one who owns a province. Then suddenly she half turned, and her merry glance, assisted by a Miss Banksian stick-eyeglass was trained full upon the Hoodoo. “What a delicious monster!” The voice had quite a Brahms trill in it, not that June had ever heard of Brahms. “It reminds one of Edgar Allan Poe or the Grand Guignol.”
Unabashed by culture, William stood to his full height. June could only marvel at his coolness.