Vicki put her hand on Lucy’s, and touched the silver ring. “Your grandmother sent me.”
The girl stiffened, distrustful again. “I have no grandmother. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She was pale and trying not to cry.
“If you’re not the granddaughter, where did you get your silver ring?”
Lucy took a deep quivering breath. She admitted she was Marshall and Lucy Bryant’s long-unwanted granddaughter. Vicki noted that Lucy, not herself, was the first to bring up the Bryant name.
“If you want proof of who I am, Vicki, I have proof. Right here in the house with me. Letters, photographs, this ring. My mother gave it to me when I was a child. There are only two rings like these in existence.”
There were supposed to be only two such rings, Vicki thought. She had seen three rings—one which Mrs. Bryant had taken from her trinket box, one on the hand of Lucy in New York, one on the hand of the Lucy here beside her.
One of the two Lucys was an impostor. The Lucy in New York also possessed letters and documents to prove her identity. Those things could be forged, a ring could be copied. Which girl was the true Lucy? Vicki believed her to be this friendly light-brown-haired girl, the girl of the portrait, the girl whom Mr. Hall, Jill Joseph, the clerk at the Hotel Alcott had reported to be with Mrs. Heath—the girl whom Mr. Dorn easily could have traced, if he had wanted to.
Mrs. Heath called again. The girls started downstairs together. Vicki whispered, “Not a word to Mrs. Heath about this,” and Lucy nodded. She was still shaken.
The lady announced with some impatience that she was keeping dinner hot in the warming oven. Would Lucy make the salad and coffee, while she herself set the table? Lucy hurried into the kitchen. Vicki went into the kitchen, too, to help. In low voices they arranged to meet at midnight to talk further. Lucy thought the guest bedroom would be the safest place. Mrs. Heath would have no reason to enter Vicki’s room, even if the light were on.
“You two girls,” said Mrs. Heath, coming into the kitchen, “seem to have a great deal to say to each other.”