Her passionate, rich-colored, handsome face was like a line from an old enchantment which took men’s souls captive, then cast them away without the least regret, or with a Circean spell turned them into beasts. Her neck was a deep-colored, ivory tower poised perfectly over her breast. The dazzling, orange-tawny skin of her broad bust turned to golden-russet before it reached her cheeks, and was there flushed to dusky rose, like the skin of a ruddy-gold peach. In the burnt splendor of her cheek the darkly eloquent blood in her veins made its golden proclamation. Her mouth was long and strangely curved like a retroverted bow; the lips of a queer fruit-color, not crimson, carmine, nor magenta, but a little of all three. The upper lip was brief to a fault, and curled back on itself like a rich-pulped fruit which has parted in ripening. The full under-lip cast a heavier shade than the lips the old masters chose, when they painted a picture of the Madonna. Her hair, like a dark, uncertain cloud, fell down in heavy coils, gathered and knotted at the nape of the neck, bound there in a golden net; or lay in an unfilleted band across the broad, low brow, drawn back into braids over her ears, or collected into a turban tied with peculiar dexterity. Her body was cast in a glorious mould: she was tall; in figure perfect, and full of a stately, tiger-like grace, the envy of other women. She moved, when she walked, as an empress might if heaven but gave her grace, with an exquisite, perfect motion, devoid of every appearance of effort,--not striding, but seeming to glide like a swan swimming on untroubled water. In the sluggish grace of her heavy lips and deep-lidded, brooding eyes, she was as full of an indolent, sleepy beauty as midsummer afternoon. Dressed in bright merino, crimson, orange, and blue, with a kerchief of blood-colored silk around her head bound in oriental fashion, beads of amber around her neck, and in each ear a hoop of gold, she looked like a great golden lily dusted with _sang-dieu_. One day she was the lily; the next a yellow rose; and the next she was a tulip,--gold, crimson, purple and black. She was a Caribbean summer incarnate, of flower-blooms, thunder and gold. The passing traveler, seeing her, stopped while he caught his breath. There was something about her commanded attention besides her remarkable beauty. One spoke of Ducie Poincignon casually; but one spoke of Rita Lagoux with an accent. * * * * * Of all the milliners of her day Margot was first beyond compare. Her taste was perfect; her instinct for color was never at fault; her choice of fabrics exquisite. None equaled her in dexterity; she was like a marvelous spider weaving webs of gossamer. Those who sought beauty found it; her patrons were patrician; all of the very best employed her art; she had no successful competitor; beside her Eloise Couesnon was esteemed but maladroit.