But Beatriz was in no hurry. "The train is on the bridge," she said and caught a quick breath. "Do you hear? It is stopping at the station."
Elizabeth, waiting at the open door, answered: "We can see the new arrivals, if there are any, when we go through the lobby."
Mrs. Weatherbee started across the room, but at the table she stopped to bend over the bowl of violets, inhaling their fragrance. "Aren't they lovely and—prodigal enough to color whole fields?"
Elizabeth laughed. "Frederic must have ordered wholesale, or else he forgot they were in season."
Beatriz lifted her face. "Did Mr. Morganstein send these violets?" she asked. "I thought—but there was no card."
"Why, I don't know," said Elizabeth, "but who else would have ordered whole fields of them?"
Mrs. Weatherbee was silent, but she smiled a little as she followed Elizabeth from the room. When they reached the foot of the staircase, the lobby was nearly deserted; if the train had left any guests, they had been shown already to their rooms.
The Morganstein table was at the farther end of the dining-room, but Frederic, who was watching the door when the young women entered, at once noticed the violets at Mrs. Weatherbee's belt.
"Must have been sent from Seattle on that last eastbound," he commented, frowning. "Say, Marcia, why didn't you remind me to order some flowers from town?"
Marcia's calculating eyes followed his gaze. "You would not have remembered she is fond of violets, and they seem specially made for her; you would have ordered unusual orchids or imported azaleas."