As she was well along in years—near to fifty I'd say—I knew she was Mrs. Whitehall. She was very dignified and gentle, with black hair turning gray and lots of lines on her forehead and round her eyes, which were dark like her hair and had a sad, weary expression. I guessed she'd been handsome once, but she looked as if she'd had her troubles, and when I heard her voice, low and so quiet, there was something in it that made me feel she was having them still.
I'd promised to be spokesman and not seeing any reason to waste time I went straight to the point. Mrs. Whitehall stood listening, her hands clasped on the back of a chair, her eyes on the little fern plant in the center of the table.
"Perhaps it would be best," she said, in that soft, faded sort of voice, "if Miss Barry were to see my daughter. I hardly know what to say to her."
She turned and left the room by the hall door and Iola gasped at me:
"Oh, Molly, it's true!"
"Don't cross your bridges till you come to them," I said, but all the same, I thought it looked bad.
"What'll I do if the business shuts down?"
"Shut up till you know if it does," I whispered back.
The double doors rolled back and Mrs. Whitehall stood between them. She looked at Iola.
"If you'll come in here, Miss Barry," she said, "my daughter will see you."