“Yes, she has. In every sense. Tell me, Miss Barr, in the course of your stewardess work are you ever in San Francisco?”
“I’ll be in and out of San Francisco all the time, now that I’m based there.”
“That’s extremely interesting.” But Mrs. Bryant did not say why. “Well. Shall we look at my parakeets?”
Vicki walked along with Mrs. Bryant and admired the exquisite birds in their cages. Her elderly hostess pointed out the birds’ markings in every tone of blue and rose and green. Yet her mind seemed to be on something else.
“I hope you won’t find it tiresome at lunch, Vicki, listening to a conversation about a girl you know nothing about.”
“What is Lucy like?” Vicki asked.
Mrs. Bryant said helplessly, “I don’t know. It is odd, isn’t it? Our daughter’s daughter, and we don’t even know what she looks like. Except for an old snapshot. Lucy was ten when it was taken, and she’s twenty-one now.”
From a desk drawer Mrs. Bryant took a small, faded snapshot, in a frame, and handed it to Vicki. Vicki studied it. The little girl’s face was rather blurred. She could have been any little girl sitting on a porch step. Her hair was either dark blond or light brown; it was hard to tell which.
“I suppose Lucy’s hair might be darker by now,” said Mrs. Bryant, as Vicki gave her back the snapshot. “Our daughter Eleanor wrote in one of her rare letters that Lucy had my disposition. They named her Lucy after me, in spite of—everything. But I must be boring you.”
“I’m very much interested, Mrs. Bryant.”