It wasn’t a matter of physical characteristics, although there was something intriguing about the set of the dark eyes and the faintly foreign upper half of the face, combined with the occasional touch of English accent. Nor was it the vastly becoming leopard coat, which Mrs. Wise’s expert eye identified as four years old: like most other editors in the field of fashion journalism she had her share of aging debutantes bored with lunches at the Colony and eager to try the treadmill.
It was her manner, which “self-possessed” didn’t begin to describe. From the outset, the older woman had the half-amused, half-annoyed feeling that it was she who was being studied and evaluated. Celia Brett emanated an aura of fathomless experience, although she couldn’t have been past her mid-twenties and reportedly had never worked before; there was something about nursing an invalid mother.
The thought rippled through Charlotte Wise’s mind that she wouldn’t have cared to change places with the mother. On the other hand—she reached for a memo pad and began to scrawl decisively on it—the kind of job in question did not require any compassion, and the girl undeniably had something. She extended the note, was thanked composedly, and, when she was alone again, picked up her receiver and dialed.
“. . . Harry? Charlotte Wise. I’ve sent over a girl, a tall 14, who ought to look absolutely marvelous in your stuff. Her name is Brett and she’s wearing a leopard coat which I’m not a hundred per cent sure comes off. Even if you haven’t anything for her right now I’d keep her on file . . .”
The Seventh Avenue manufacturer who was Castletweed had been called out of his office by the time she found her way there, which would mean going back on Monday morning, but Celia was undismayed. She was well aware that the leopard coat might have been made for her instead of bought that morning at a charity thrift shop; in it, with her free and effortless walk, she drew more than an occasional following glance. In it she looked like someone who, if she worked at all, did it for fun.
The sale of 4 Stedman Circle had gone through three days earlier. Even after the commission and lawyer’s fee and other expenses, the remaining sum would once have seemed to Celia enough for a lifetime. She knew better now, but she also knew that, for her, a few really good clothes would be a better investment than the best of blue-chip stocks.
And certain economies, she had discovered, were not only permissible but actually smart; she had encountered some astonishing women at the thrift shop. She had gone there in the assumption since adolescence that mink was the ultimate in furs, but in the only mink jacket available she had looked like no one more unusual than a highly paid secretary.
But the leopard, shading from almost the color of Celia’s hair to smoked gold among the thickening black, seemed less a new identity than the completion of one. It was slightly worn around the turned-back cuffs and the high collarless throat, but she could have the cuffs cut off, possibly, and a round collar made. She would say casually, when Mary Ellen asked, that she had just taken it out of storage.
. . . Mary Ellen was home already, a good hour ahead of time. The apartment was silent, but there were lamps on in the living room and the familiar big black calfskin bag, a jacketed novel poking out of it, was tossed with her gloves on a chair. The small kitchen was dark, but so, apparently, was Mary Ellen’s room. Celia stood in the hall outside it for a considering moment and then tapped. A shift of weight on the bed and a faint murmur answered her.
“Mary Ellen? Are you all right?”
“Hi . . . come on in, but don’t turn on the light,” said Mary Ellen muffledly from within, and Celia opened the door with a caution in no way betrayed by her great and sudden leap of curiosity.
The bedroom faced the street, and reflected light from the ceiling and the windows of the apartment house opposite showed her Mary Ellen lying motionless on her back, a cloth over her eyes. “Headache,” she said in the drowned-sounding voice, obviously keeping the effort of speech to a minimum.
“I’ve got something awfully good for that,” said Celia, and was stopped in mid-turn by a fast, flat “No, thanks. It’ll go away.”
“But it’s only—”
“Please, no,” interrupted Mary Ellen with the nearest approach to anger Celia had heard from her. There was an electric little silence, announcing that this reaction came from something more than pain. Perhaps in an attempt to decharge it, Mary Ellen said, “Would you get me a fresh cloth, though?”
In the bathroom, under the covering sound of running water, Celia opened the medicine cabinet—she herself had taken over the half-bath—and gave it a thoughtful inspection. The only concession to pain or sleeplessness or nerves was a stark little bottle of aspirin, which was odd, surely, in a girl of Mary Ellen’s fragile appearance? She wrung out the cloth, brought it in and offered tea in a carefully neutral tone. “Or would you rather just be left alone?”
“No, I’d like a cup of tea. You’ve probably gathered that I’m—funny about drugs.” Had she heard the cautious click of the cabinet door? The dimness hid a defensive flush but it was certainly there, just as there was a decision balanced between the long drawing-in and expelling of a breath. “The fact is that I had a—a very bad time a year ago.”
The circumstances called upon Celia to murmur,
