Madame, coming in late, with a blotched face and puffy eyelids, had dispatched her to the workroom, and she was sitting before one of the long tables, embroidering azure beads on a black collar, when Agnes darted through the door and jerked the needle out of her hand.
"Madame is asking for you.

Come as quick as you can!" she cried excitedly, and sped back again to the shelter of the artificial rose-bushes at the end of the hall.
Rising hurriedly, and brushing the scraps of silk from her cloth skirt as she walked, Gabriella followed the sound of Madame's wheedling voice, and found herself, as she parted the curtains of a fitting-room, in the opulent presence of Mrs.Pletheridge.
"Yes, as I told you, we trust implicitly to Mrs.Carr's eye.

She has the true eye of the artist," Madame simpered fawningly as she entered.

"Did you send for me ?" asked Gabriella, business-like and alert on the threshold.
"Good morning, Mrs.Carr! I told Madame Dinard that I wanted you to wait on me.

I want some one who tells me the truth," explained Mrs.
Pletheridge so graciously that Gabriella would hardly have recognized her.