The Bacillus of Beauty: A Romance of To-dayStark, Harriet
Science
The Bacillus of Beauty: A Romance of To-day
Stark, Harriet
Beauty, Personal -- Fiction; Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction; Science fiction
"Just what I told her!" groaned Aunt Frank. "Bake must see the man;
or--Mr. Burke, why can't you find out about him? Perhaps it's all
right," she added weakly; "from her accounts he didn't flatter Nelly
one bit; simply raved over her."
"Yes, I'll run in and converse with the art lover," John grimly agreed;
but just then in came Milly with the General, and the subject was
changed.
Indeed, though I don't know just how she managed it, from the moment
the brilliant woman of the world entered the room, poor clumsy John was
made to seem clumsier than ever, and before long, without quite knowing
why, he went away. I'm pretty sure that Mrs. Van Dam dislikes to see us
together.
John was wrong and yet not wrong about the photographer; his threatened
interposition came to nothing, for the very next morning--only
yesterday, long ago as it seems--I was enlightened as to the cheap and
silly trick that had been played upon me.
"Thee, Cothin Nelly; pwetty, pwetty!" cried Joy, running towards me and
holding up a huge poster picture from the Sunday _Echo_.
"Isn't it--why--give it to me!" I almost snatched the sheet from her
baby hands.
My portrait! I knew it in spite of crude colour and cheap paper. It was
my portrait, and it was labelled: "HELEN WINSHIP, MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN
IN THE WORLD. POSED BY MISS WINSHIP ESPECIALLY FOR--"
And then--the insolence of the man!--there followed the name of the
bashful stranger whose devotion to Art had drawn him to my door! The
fellow had practised upon my credulity to obtain my likeness for
publication.
I threw down the sheet, quivering with anger. I felt that I should
never again dare look at a paper; but half an hour later I sent Boy out
to buy them all, and, locked into my room, I shook all about me a
snowstorm of bulky supplements and magazines.
Having posed for Cadge, I knew, of course, that the _Star_ would print
my picture, perhaps several of them. But at any other time I should
have been overcome to find a "special section" of four pages filled
with half-tone likenesses of me, cemented together by an essay on
"Beauty," signed by a novelist of repute, and by articles from
painters, sculptors, dressmakers and gymnasts, all from their
respective standpoints extolling my perfections. Cadge had written an
interview headed "How It Feels to be Beautiful."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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