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MABEL MURRAY'S BALL-DRESS.
O, what a splendid establishment it was! Such gorgeous
Turkey carpets upon the floor, and such magnificent materials
for all kinds of garments and trimmings as lay scattered upon
the velvet lounges! There were satins there which could have
stood alone; gorgeous moires wrought with bouquets of silver
and gold; black laces frosted with silver stars, and bunches of
French flowers flashing with jewels. Well might Madame
Malsherbes' be called the emporium of fashion. Well might
Madame's taste be quoted, and her prices form a nine days'
wonder to heathens outside New York!
Mabel's eyes were dazzled as she entered. She handed Madame
her package of fleecy-white illusion, and the pearly satin
for the under-dress, with a blush on her fair, soft cheek, and
gave her directions in a quiet, subdued tone, that contrasted
very pleasantly with the French woman's eager volubility.
“Here, Alice,” said Madame, summoning a pale, delicate
girl to her side. “Here, Alice, you have the best taste of any
one in the establishment, and I 'll give this into your hands. —
So this is your first ball,” turning to the Lady Mabel. “Well,
I 'll see to Alice myself, and I pledge you your dress shall be
unexceptionable, if we have to sit up all night for it.”
Mabel left the room, and Alice said, timidly, “Please, Madame,
very sick, and she has no one to stay with her.”
“I should be glad to accommodate you, if I could,” was the
reply; “but it 's impossible, for this dress of Miss Murray's
must be finished and taken home to-morrow morning, and I
must arrange the trimming myself. You see how it is. Mabel
Murray's father is almost the richest man in the city. Mabel is
just out of boarding-school, and it would never do to disappoint
them about her first ball-dress. Don't say any more, child.
I know what 's what, and, if I could accommodate you, I would;
but I can't, and that ends it.”
It was eleven o'clock that night before Alice Griggs was permitted
to go home, with a parting injunction from Madame to
be back very early in the morning, so as to set the trimmings
on Miss Murray's dress, and have it ready to carry home in the
forenoon. It was an hour after the usual time, the next day,
when Alice entered the shop.
“Hey, Alice, what now? You 're behind time,” said Madame,
sharply.
“My mother is dead!” was the reply, and Alice Griggs burst
into a passion of tears.
“Well, well, child, don't cry. I 'm sorry, but it can't be
helped. Just hurry on those trimmings, and take the dress
home; and then, if Lady Mabel don't want it altered, you need
not come back again to day.”
Two hours after, Alice Griggs stood in the Lady Mabel's elegant
room. “Madame said I was to help you try the dress on,
Miss, and take it back if it wanted altering.”
“Well,” and Mabel's little fingers fluttered like a bird, as she
smoothed down the rich folds of the satin, and arranged
Madame's faultless trimmings of crimson creeper, with its bright
green leaves, and long golden stamens.
“O no, it does n't want any altering,” she said, in clear, joyous
tones; “it is exquisite, perfect!”
“Thank God!” burst involuntarily from the poor seamstress'
lips, and Mabel turned to look at her. The girl's delicate limbs
trembled, and there were tears in her blue eyes, and Mabel said,
very gently, “What is it, Alice, poor child? Don't fear to tell
me, if I am a stranger. See, I am a young girl like yourself —
I can pity you.”
But it was some time before she could persuade the poor girl
to relate her sorrowful history. Alice had left her mother very
ill the day before. At first, she had refused to go; but her
mother had insisted on it, since her engagement with Madame
was their only dependence. She had vainly endeavored to persuade
Madame to permit her to return, but had obtained no
release until eleven. Climbing the tottering stairs, with heart
that ached still more wearily than her eyes, she had cried
“mother, mother,” — “mother, mother,” she had repeated on
entering the desolate room, and there, on a heap of straw, lay
her mother — cold — stiff — dead! “O God, God!” cried the
stricken girl, sinking down on Lady Mabel's velvet carpet,
“she died there all, all alone, with not a soul to smooth her
dying pillow, or give her a drop of water in her last agony!”
Lady Mabel was just out, otherwise she would have known
all this was “nothing new under the sun;” otherwise she
would not have suffered it to spoil the pleasure of her first
share her palace-home.
Alice Griggs was weak-minded, probably, else she would
not have died of grief, as she did, three months after, ever
haunted by the terrible vision of her mother's last agony, which
no human eye beheld.
Alas! alas! shall such things be? Shall human blood cry
ever unappeased toward our Father's throne for vengeance?
Shall we robe ourselves “in purple and fine linen,” while others,
whose faces are as fair, whose limbs are as delicate, as our own,
must die the slow death of toil and exhaustion, or live to eat the
bread of shame? Is there not a day coming when the diamonds
in our hair shall burn us like coals of fire, when the
flowers on our brow shall be crowns of thorns, in the great day
of His wrath!
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