At noon next day MacBirney, seeking his wife, found her in her dressing-room. She had come from the garden and stood before a table filled with flowers, which she was arranging in vases.
"I've been looking for you." MacBirney threw himself into a convenient chair as he spoke. "Robert Kimberly is downstairs."
"Mr. Kimberly? To see you, I suppose."
"No, to see you."
"To see me?" Alice with flowers in her hand, paused. Then she carried a vase to the mantel-piece. "At this time of day?"
"Well--to see us, he says."
She returned to the table. "What in the world does he want to see us about?"
MacBirney laughed. "He says he has something to say to both of us. I told him I would bring you down."
A breath would have toppled Alice over. "I can't dress to go down now," she managed to say. "It may be something from Dolly. Ask him to give you any message he has."
Walking hurriedly to the mantel with another jar of roses, she found her fear extreme. Could it be possible Kimberly would dream of saying to her husband what he had said to her yesterday? She smothered at the thought, yet she knew his appalling candor and felt unpleasantly convinced that he was capable of repeating every word of it. The idea threw her into a panic. She resolved not to face him under such circumstances; she was in no position to do so. "Tell him," she said abruptly, "that as much as I should like to hear what he has to say, he will have to excuse me this morning."