d young. It is the habit of the shopkeepers to
change the figures in their windows, and one morning I fell in love with
quite a different creature. She wore when I first saw her a long dress
of black silk and velvet sparkling with jet; over her shoulders was
thrown carelessly a mantle of cream-colored cloth; on her head was a
plush hat--what they call a Gainsborough--trimmed with a long graceful
plume, also of cream-color. Although only her back was toward me, I knew
by instinct exactly what her face was. She was dark of course, with a
low broad forehead, about which clustered little short curls; her eyes
were superb, at once laughing and melancholy; her features suggested
rather pride than softness; but her smile was enchanting, open, sunny,
like a burst of light from behind a cloud. Nothing could be more real
than this vision. At first the discovery of this magnificently-endowed
woman rendered me happy: I used to walk past the shop half a dozen
times a day to look at her. Her costumes varied, but they always
suggested the same dark but brilliant lineaments, the same graceful
movements, the same peculiarly lovely tones. She often looked back at me
over her shoulder, but had an air of evading me. All at once, with
surprise and delight, I remembered that she might be found in actual
existence, in real flesh and blood. I deserted the image for a week in
the hope of finding the reality. I paced Fifth Avenue; I went to the
dry-goods stores; I attended the theatres. Often I seemed to see her
before me--the picturesque hat, the long plume, the rich mantle and
dress. At such moments while I pressed forward my heart beat. When the
cheek turned toward me and the eyes lighted up with surprise at my
disappointed stare, it was easy enough to see that I had made a mistake.
There was the hat, the cloak, the bewitching little frippiness of lace
and net and ribbon about the bust. She had, however, copied the
masterpiece without investing herself with its soul: her face was vague
and characterless, her whole personality void of that eloquent
womanliness which had so wrought upon me. This experience was so many
times repeated that I was frightfully tormented by it. The familiar
dress seemed to reveal with appalling truthfulness the lack of those
qualities of heart and soul which I demanded. Those lovely, picturesque
outlines suggest not only rounded cheeks colored with girlish bloom, but
something more; and the graceful draping is not a me