They proceeded towards wide window-doors and entered the drawing-room, where Miriam and the other two women had risen on hearing the hubbub. Louise went straight to the elder woman. “I’m Louise,” she announced. “Full of apologies.”
Her mother-in-law kissed her and presented Alice. “We arrived before we expected. Keble got a special locomotive to bring us through the pass, and couldn’t let you know because the telegraph office was closed.”
“It always is, in an emergency. And when it’s open, the wires are down. We just guess back and forth. Please don’t mind my get-up. You all look so fresh and frilly. Out here we dress like soldiers, in order to be in keeping with our slouchy telegraph service and other modern inconveniences.”
“I’m sure you look very comfortable,” said Lady Eveley with a maternal smile. She was bird-like, with an abundance of white hair and a coquettish little moiré band around her neck to conceal its ruins. When she smiled, her good will seemed to be reiterated by a series of wrinkles that extended as far as her forehead.
“Oh, I’m anything but! First of all I’m dusty, and second of all I’m parched.”
“There’ll be a fresh pot in a minute, dear,” said Miriam. “Do sit here.”
Mrs. Windrom was asking Dare to confirm her statement that the pillars were Corinthian, which he could not honestly do, and by a monstrous geographical leap their discussion wandered to a region beyond Girlie’s focus. “Mother talks architecture as glibly as Baedeker, but she’s really as ignorant about it as I am,” she assured Dare. “I’ve been dragged to Italy goodness knows how many times, but the only thing I’m sure of is the leaning tower of Pisa.”
Louise presented Dare to Lady Eveley and felt that she was being studied by Keble’s sister. She went to sit beside Alice near tea, which Miriam had resuscitated. She gave Miriam’s hand a grateful pat, then turning to her sister-in-law, expressed the hope that she had found her right room. “After living so long in a log cabin I assume that everybody will get lost in this warehouse. Keble is so methodical he refers to right wing and left wing, like a drill-sergeant. The only way I can remember which room is which is by the color of the carpet or what you can see from the windows.”
Alice was laughing, her amusement being divided between Louise’s mock-seriousness and the reckless velocity of speech which left no gaps for replies. She was a dry, alert, lean woman of nearly forty, who should never have been named Alice. She had none of Keble’s grace, but something of his openness and discernment. Alice would make as good a judge as Keble, Louise reflected, but a less merciful jury. As to dress, she gave Louise the impression of having ordered too much material, and the white dots in her foulard frock merely emphasized her angles. Her hair had once been blond like Keble’s, but was now frosted, and arranged in a fashion that reminded Louise of the magazine covers of her girlhood.
When there was a hiatus Alice assured her that they had all been safely distributed and had spent an hour running back and forth comparing quarters. “My room has a pale blue and primrose carpet, and I should think about forty miles of entirely satisfactory view! And gladioli on the table. How did you know, or did you, that gladioli are my favorite flowers,—and how did they ever get here?”