She called to her mother and Miss Franklin and then asked, "Has dinner been announced?"
Her tone was quiet and natural, and Mart was relieved. He answered with attempt at jocularity, "Lucius is this minute winkin' at me over the soup-tureen."
As they took seats at the table Mrs. Gilman exclaimed, "Why, dearie, where did you dig up that old waist?"
"Will it do to visit Sibley in?"
"No indeed! I should say not. When you go back there I want you to wear the best you've got. They'll consider it an insult if you don't."
A faint smile lighted Bertha's pale face. "I don't think they'll take it so hard as all that."
"Are you goin' to Sibley?" asked Mart, an anxious tone in his voice.
"I thought of it. Mother is going over to-night, and I rather guess I'll run over with her. I've never been back, you see, since that night."
There was something ominous in her restraint, in her abstraction of glance, and especially in her lack of appetite. She took little account of her guests and seemed profoundly engaged upon some inward calculation. The beautifully spread table, which would have thrilled her a few short weeks ago, was powerless to even hold her gaze, and it was Lucius (deft and watchful) who brought the meal to a successful conclusion—for the mother was awed and helpless in the presence of the queenly daughter whom wealth had translated into something almost too high and shining for her to lay hand upon.
Miss Franklin did her best, but she was not a person of light and dancing intellectual feet, and she had never understood Haney, anyhow. Altogether it was a dismal and difficult half-hour.