Читать книгу General Impressions - Edmée Elizabeth Monica Dashwood - Страница 20

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First General Impression, that an extraordinary and unnatural amount of electric light is being cast over goods that it would be a good deal easier to select by daylight.

A LADY IN A FUR COAT. Which way are Stockings, please?

A GENTLEMAN IN A FROCK COAT. Ladies' Hose, moddam? Through the Wovens and Round to the Right, moddam, just opposite Perfumery, you'll find them.

The Fur Coat obediently goes through the Wovens and Round to the Right, and having with difficulty disentangled Perfumery from Drugs and from Ladies' Hairdressing, finds herself in Stockings.

A YOUNG LADY. Can I help you, moddam?

THE F. C. Stockings, please.

THE Y. L. (very kindly, but in a faintly astonished voice). Stockings, moddam? Oh certainly, moddam. Any particular colour?

THE F. C. Brown, please.

General Impression amongst all the Young Ladies that moddam is a complete amateur at this kind of thing.

THE Y. L. (gently). What shade did Moddam wish? Nigger, fawn, sunburn, beige?

THE F. C. (with almost unbelievable strength of mind). Brown, I said.

THE Y. L. (distantly). Of course, moddam, brown isn't being worn this year. I doubt if we have anything in brown. But if you'd care to see the new tones of bronze, or tango, or nut, we have a very good selection.

In the Inexpensive Evening Dress Department, where it is almost impossible to avoid a General Impression that Colour, at our present stage of British Civilization, is considered to be of more importance than Cut.

An elegant young Mannequin is parading in a scarlet tea-gown before two ladies of matronly build.

FIRST LADY (enthusiastically). There, that's what I mean, dear. That delightfully slim line.

THE FRIEND. Yes. Unless perhaps ... You don't think the colour might be a tiny bit trying?

THE SALES-LADY (very firmly indeed, and with a good deal of musical laughter). Oh no, moddam. The Colour isn't trying. Not in the very least. It's really a wonderful colour, in that way, if you see what I mean. No one could call it trying, moddam. (This is apparently true, as, after this, no one does.)

On the Second Floor.

AN EXHAUSTED SHOPPER. I want the Lift, please.

The usual directions as to going Straight Through, Round to the Left and the Lift will be facing you, follow.

LIFT ATTENDANT (impassively). Going up, please. Blouses, jumpers, ladies' underwear, children's outfitting, third floor, Elizabethan Restaurant, Tropical Lounge, Mannequin Parade, fourth floor.... Going up, please.

HALF A DOZEN VOICES (entirely regardless of this). I want to go downstairs, please. The Ground floor.

L. A. (looking straight through them and in a still more impassive voice). Going up, please.

Disappearance of Lift. A fresh throng of exhausted shoppers hastens to the gate to await its reappearance. When this eventually takes place, the workings of some strange law entirely incomprehensible to the general public compel the L. A. to proclaim exactly as before:

L. A. Going up, please. Blouses, jumpers ... and so on. Going up, please.

Second disappearance. A rumour spreads that there is another Lift, just round the Department to the Right, and this will be Going Down, please. General Impression that if one makes a rush for it, the first Lift will inevitably reappear, this time on its way to the basement. The majority of Exhausted Shoppers give it up and go down by the Stairs.

In the Coat Department a Gentleman is helping his wife to choose a winter coat. Fifteen of these garments are strewn on surrounding chairs and sofas, and a sixteenth is being Tried On.

THE LADY. I like this one, Robert. (She has said this about almost all of them.) What do you think?

ROBERT. Very nice, dear.

THE LADY. But which do you think suits me best, Robert? This one, or the navy-blue, or that one with the fur collar, or the green?

ROBERT (quite at random, but in the faint hope of hurrying things up a little). The green, I think, dear.

SALES-LADY (enthusiastically). Moddam looked marvellous in the green, I thought. Won't you slip it on again, moddam?

Robert is assailed by an intimate and painful conviction that the Green will turn out to be the most expensive of the lot, and that his wife will insist upon having it because he said it was the one he really preferred her in, and anyway it's always an economy in the end to get a thoroughly good thing.

And this, indeed, is exactly what happens.