“There isn’t much to tell you. I haven’t any people. I was born in India, and my mother died there. I don’t know anything about my father. I was sent home to an aunt, and she looked after me till about three years ago, when she died. I came to London then, and they took me on at Eldred’s––do you know Eldred’s?”
“Do I not?” said Miss Mason fervently. “Scrumptious things they make; but what prices! I can’t afford them very often, but I go in there a good deal. I know the manager, and he’s going to do some business for me––at least I hope he is. If I can get my stuff into his place it will be a splendid thing. All London shops there, you know; all London with any money, that is!”
Esther looked mystified.
“Your stuff!” she echoed. “What do you mean?”
June Mason laughed merrily. She had a very infectious laugh and a trick of covering her face with her hands while she was laughing.
“I forgot that you didn’t know!” she said. “I seem to know you so well, I can’t remember that we never saw one another before to-day. My dear, I make face cream. Wait a moment.”
She sprang up and disappeared behind a mauve curtain into an adjoining room. Esther heard her moving about, opening and shutting boxes and singing a snatch of song all the time. Presently she came back with a 50 tray crowded with little pots and phials of all sizes and descriptions. She plumped down on her knees beside Esther’s chair.
“There you are!” she said lightly, though there was an odd dash of pride in her voice. “Face cream, night and day cream, eyelash tonic, and all the rest of it! Of course, I’m only just starting––I’m not like those people who advertise in all the papers and charge about a guinea for a shilling jar; but my stuff is as good as theirs any day, and better, because it’s pure. Look!” She took a lid off a little white pot with a mauve label and held it to Esther.
“Isn’t that a glorious perfume?” she demanded. She sniffed it herself with relish. “And it’s all my invention, and I’m as proud of it as a cat would be of nine tails. When I’ve got things a little more ship-shape, Micky’s going to put it on the market for me. It wants a man behind all these sort of things you know. I can do all the donkey work, but I’ve got no head for business. I never know the difference between a loss and a profit. It was partly over this that I quarrelled with my people––they said it was low-down to make face cream and sell it––they’re awful snobs! So I just cleared off and changed my surname and came here. I’m quite happy, and if I haven’t got as much money as I had, I don’t mind––I’ve got my liberty, and that’s worth every thing.”
“I think you’re just wonderful,” Esther said. She picked up a lid from one of the little pots and looked at the mauve and white label.