whether...
* * * * * Miss Bennett had come up in the lift with a heap of cardboard boxes, and the azalea.

A taxi was waiting at the door.
Edith opened the boxes, cutting the string with scissors.

She put four gowns out on the sofa.

Grace explained that two were cloaks, two were gowns--all she could get.
'That's the one,' said Edith, taking out one of a deep blue colour, like an Italian sky on a coloured picture post-card.

It had a collar of the same deep blue, spotted with white--a birdseye effect.