“I’m not going,” said Kim. “Wait a minute, Ken.” She came over to Magnolia. “Mother, I just got a telegram.”
“Mama?” She uttered the word as though she were a little girl.
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
Kim indicated it. “There, Ken. Get it for me, will you? Under the make-up tray.”
“Dead?” Magnolia had not unfolded the yellow slip.
“Yes.”
She read it. She looked up. The last shadow had vanished of that mood in which she had entered ten minutes earlier. She looked, suddenly, sallow and sixty. “Let me see. Tennessee. Trains.”
“But not to-night, Mother!”
“Yes. Ken, there’s something to St. Louis—Memphis—I’m sure. And then from there to-morrow morning.”