"That’s her carriage now, or I’m very much mistaken," said Cornelia, all agog. "She hardly ever uses a motor. It’s _so_ ordinary." In some amazement Janet watched her old friend going out to do the honors in the reception room. What a transformation a short year had effected in the Cornelia of the Lorillard tenements! Bohemianism, outlawry, and the one-piece dresses of Kips Bay seemed remoter than Mars. Cornelia was attired in the height of fashion, her cheeks were delicately touched up, her hair was elaborately coiffured. Even her congenital languor had evaporated, for the moment, as the thrills of social snobbery electrified her. *II* Entering the salon, Janet saw that Mrs. Jerome was a podgy little tub of a woman, the symbol of the fortune which her father, Theodore Casey, had made in wash-tubs. She took a chair beside the visitor, who sleepily watched the crack Paulette manikins whilst they exhibited a variety of frocks and Cornelia nervously courted the favor of her outspoken customer. Mrs. Jerome examined one of the manikins at close quarters. "I don’t think much of your dresses today," she said bluntly. "The lines are all wrong." "Pardon me, Mrs. Jerome," said Cornelia with dignity. "But they ought to be at that angle. A Paulette frock is a work of art. It is designed to produce a definite effect from a definite point of view. The lines are like those of a Phidias statue, perfectly right at the proper distance." "I don’t care if they _do_ look like a Fiddlesticks statue. Look at that charmeuse gown there. Can’t anybody tell that girl a mile away for what she is?" "I fear I don’t understand." "Well, if the gown don’t hide the fact that she’s a manikin, it won’t hide the fact that my figure’s no Fiddlesticks statue, or whatever you call it." This opinion, delivered in an unmistakable New York voice and accent, made Janet laugh. Not disrespectfully. She discerned at once that Mrs. Jerome, like Shakespeare, had far more native wit than college learning. Her judgment was confirmed when the visitor, turning abruptly towards her, said: "What do you think of these Paulette dresses, young lady. I don’t expect you to say that they’re pretty rotten. But do they satisfy the eye?" "I think, Mrs. Jerome, that if they don’t _satisfy_ the eye, they’ll at least astound it." Mrs. Jerome brightened up at once. "Well, child," she said, "when I want to astound people, I’ll do it on less money than a Paulette gown costs. I’ll walk around Columbus Circle in my bathing suit." "Oh, I’ll bet you do it, too," said Janet, at the top of her exuberance. "Do what?" said Mrs. Jerome, now totally oblivious of the manikins on exhibition and of Cornelia on pins and needles.