"For some things. Won't you pour tea for Mrs. MacBirney, Dolly? Let us go downstairs, anyway."
He walked with Alice into the house, talking as they went.
Dolly bent over Uncle John's chair. "Isn't she nice?" she whispered, nodding toward Alice as Alice disappeared with Kimberly. "You know Madame De Castro went to school in Paris with her mother, who was a De Gallon, and her father--Alice's grandfather--was the last man in Louisville to wear a queue."
Uncle John seemed not greatly moved at this information, but did look reminiscent. "What was her father's name?"
"Alice's father was named Marshall. He and her mother both are dead. She has no near relatives."
"I remember Marshall--he was a refiner."
"Precisely; he met with reverses a few years ago."
Uncle John looked after Alice with his feeble, questioning grin. "Fine looking," he muttered, still looking after her much as the toothless giant looked after Christian as he passed his cave. "Fine looking."
Dolly was annoyed: "Oh, you're always thinking about fine looks! She is nice."
Uncle John smiled undismayed. "Is she?"