“So dramatic! It might go on the stage.”
Kirsteen stood and listened with a surprised face and an angry heart while these exclamations fluttered round. Four ladies all rustling in silks and laces—no doubt likely to be excellent customers and therefore not to be too much discouraged, but each more exasperating than the other. Dramatic! On the stage! Kirsteen had been brought up to believe that the stage was a sort of vestibule of a region which the Scotch ministers of her period had no hesitation in naming. All the blood of the Douglases rushed to her cheeks.
“I think your ladyships must be deceived,” she said; “we have no romantic stories nor stage plays here.”
“Oh, you must not think you can escape, you interesting creature! For it was your friend Lady Charlotte, the great beauty, who told us all about it; and we all vowed that henceforward nobody should dress us but you.”
“Lady Chatty is my friend indeed,” said Kirsteen, “and she is a bonny creature; but what a friend may know is nothing to the world. And I am not the mistress here to undertake your work. Perhaps, Miss Jean, you will tell the ladies whether you can receive their orders or not. They are recommended, it would seem,” she added, addressing her somewhat mortified and indignant principal over the heads of the newcomers, “by Lady Chatty, who is just full of fancies. And the work-room is very full. But you will know best yourself what you can do.”
With this Kirsteen withdrew into the further part of the room, occupying herself again with the box of flowers which had already played its part in the beginning of her new life; and Miss Jean advanced into the middle of the scene. It had never before occurred to that good woman to treat a new customer, arriving in a coroneted carriage with liveries which lighted up the street, with indifference. But she was much mortified and affronted, and readily took up the cue.
“We are very busy, madam, as this young lady says. I cannot tell whether we can take the advantage of your ladyships’ favours. We have gowns making for the Queen’s Ball more than I remember for years. There is the Duchess herself, and Lady A., and Lady B., and the Marchioness, and Miss L., the Maid of Honour, and I cannot tell how many more—all old patronesses of mine,” said Miss Jean with a slight courtesy that emphasized her pause.
“But oh, mamma, we can’t be sent away! for I vowed to Lord John I would have a gown,” cried one of the young ladies, “from” she glanced at Kirsteen with a little alarm, then added in a low voice with a little laugh, “la belle couturière.”
“My name is Brown, madam, and not Bell—ye have perhaps made a mistake,” said Miss Jean, grimly holding her ground.
This the young ladies received with much laughter and fluttering among themselves, as an excellent joke; while their mother, half indignant, half disappointed, eyed Miss Jean as if she would have liked to annihilate with a glance the presumptuous seamstress. But the refusal itself was such a new and startling effect, and the list of fashionable names was so overwhelming that any humiliation seemed better than failure. And Miss Jean after a while allowed herself to be mollified. Kirsteen on her part left the room, with a little offended pride mingled with some mischievous enjoyment. “They shall come to me with petitions not with orders,” she said to herself, “before all’s done.”