The rag burned on his
breast. Afterward it was something to look at beyond the locked door;
perhaps to try on behind drawn shades, late of a night. And how little
Gordon Dane would have made of such a matter! Floated in Bean's mind the
refrain of a clothing advertisement. "The more advanced dressers will
seek this fashion." "Something dignified yet different!" Gordon Dane
would be "an advanced dresser."
But if you have been afraid of nearly everything nearly all your life,
how then? You must be "dignified" only. The brave only may be
"different." It was all well enough to gaze at striking fabrics in
windows; but to buy and to wear openly, and get yourself pointed
at--laughed at! Again sounded the refrain of the hired bard of dress.
"_It is cut to give the wearer the appearance of perfect physical
development. And the effect so produced so improves his form that he
unconsciously strives to attain the appearance which the garment gives
him; he expands his chest, draws in his waist and stands erect._"
A rustling of papers from the opposite side of the desk promised a
diversion of his thoughts. Bean was a hireling and the person who
rustled the papers was his master, but the youth bestowed upon the great
man a look of profound, albeit not unkindly, contempt. It could be seen,
even as he sat in the desk-chair, that he was a short man; not an inch
better than Bean, there. He was old.
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