She stands over the glove counter, and from her secluded outpost looks far across the hall toward the couture department. When the view is reversed, and a couture girl bothers to send a glance toward her, Mirabelle looks like a puppy standing on its hind legs, and the two brown dots of her eyes, set in the china plate of her face make her seem very cute and noticeable. ... the couture department fills with women who are unlikely to notice the slender girl standing at one end of the hallowed hall. They are the Wives of Important Men.