Millinery Madness

THE CONTRIBUTORS’ CLUB

A HAT is of man’s life a thing apart; ’tis woman’s whole existence — or so at least one would judge by the tense and concentrated faces reflected in the mirrors of ‘Miss Hattie’s Hat Shop,’ as that specialist’s consulting-room is euphemistically called.

The purchase of a hat should never be undertaken alone, any more than one should have one’s teeth pulled out without a friendly face to confront one when ‘coming out’ of gas. And, by the way, what a good idea it would be to have a whiff of some anæsthetic applied to the victim who enters a millinery establishment to have twenty-five dollars painlessly extracted. ‘Crownwork’ is sometimes a nervous strain to the occupant of the dental chair. It is often an equally trying experience to the visitor in the millinery parlor.

To be sure the sight of a hat that seems designed by Fate — or France — to suit one’s own particular contour and coloring frequently acts like a narcotic, and drugs one’s conscience into complete subjection to the saleslady’s wishes. No practitioners in psychoanalysis or hypnotic suggestion could more successfully subdue the conscious will and gain a mastery over the victim than the plausible Miss Hattie.

This is what happened when I went to look at hats — not to buy them: —

‘Oh, no, madam, $29.87 is not at all dear for this little toque,’ Miss Hattie protested to me when I faintly murmured at the price.

‘ What, you say that you don’t wear feathers because you belong to the Auburn Society? Why, dear, auburn hair like yours is very fashionable this season, only we call it henna now instead of red, and black feathers look real well with it. What, you don’t wear birds’ feathers? Well now, is n’t that a joke! This is n’t a bird’s feather; it’s just made out of whalebone! We don’t mind killing whales, do we, and yet I suppose it hurts them to be shot more than it does birds, they ’re so much less fluffy.’

All this time the hat is being deftly pinned to my head. It is only by a supreme effort of will that I can tear it off, most of my hair coming down in the struggle; but I am determined not to be hypnotized into submission so early: it shows such pitiable weakness.

‘ I ’m only looking, not buying, and I don’t like that hat,’ I insist; ‘either it is too young or I am too old — in fact, I think the shapes are perfectly terrible this year. Now look at that —’ And I pointed a finger of derision at what appeared to be a fruit-basket filled with oranges and bananas that was lying on the table beside me.

Suddenly a female more like a Fury than a Shopper bore down upon me with a look that froze my blood.

‘ You are speaking of my hat, madam, and it is not for sale,’ she announced with bitter scorn. ‘Perhaps you did n’t know that yellow is all the rage this year.’ And she flounced away bearing her agricultural exhibit with her. (Exit slave, bearing fruit.)

This experience unnerved me so that I felt a susceptibility to hypnotism stealing over me, of which Miss Hattie was quick to take advantage by producing head-coverings of other shapes and shades.

‘How should you like something in the line of Burgundy?’ she suggested, awaking pleasant memories of preprohibition days; ‘or maize is very fashionable this year, as well as pelican. Then there is always bisque, or jade, or even wistaria.’

Where were the blues and reds that did not sail under false colors? Where were the browns of yesteryear? I tried to intimate, from my state of partial hypnosis, that, though I recognized the faces of all the colors she was introducing to me, I had forgotten their names.

‘Now you just leave it all to me,’ the skillful practitioner purred soothingly; ‘I have just the hat for you — something refined, and at the same time snappy.’

She placed upon my fevered brow an austere and uncompromising pyramid, designed on the antediluvian lines of Mrs. Noah’s hat, as remembered in my own early Noah’s-Arkaic days.

‘Say, I’m just tickled to death with the way you look in that hat,’ my hypnotizer went on, making a few passes in front of my face, thereby completing her mesmeric success. ‘You’re just stunning in it — perfectly stunning.’ (‘Yes, and stunned, too,’ I murmured inaudibly.)

‘The way the brim comes down and hides your face is just too becoming for words. Now I’m going to put your old hat in a piece of paper, because of course you want to wear the new one and I don’t blame you — not one mite.’

Her deft fingers were working as fast as her tongue. She knew that I must not ‘come to’ while in her parlor.

‘Now, here you are, Miss Smithkins. I’m so glad we had just what you wanted, and so cheap, too. Good-morning. — Come again. — I remember the charge address.’ And before I knew it I was in the street below.

My first coherent thought was that I had not even asked the price of the

hat I was wearing; and I did not entirely shake off my stupor till I saw my reflection in a shop-window and awoke with a scream.