eturned the rector. "I suspect our future member will be a
cabinet minister before the world is many years older."

Lady Alice looked up with more of pleasure and animation than she had
yet shown. Errington bent his head.

"Many thanks for your prophecy;" and he immediately turned the
conversation to the ever-genial topics of hunting and horses. Then Mrs.
Ormonde gave the signal of retreat to the drawing-room.

Here Katherine looked in vain for her nephews.

"I suppose the boys have gone to bed, Ada?"

"To bed! oh yes, of course. Why, it is more than half past eight; it
would never do to keep them up so late. Would you like to see baby boy
asleep? he looks quite beautiful."

"Yes, I should, very much," returned Katherine, anxious to gratify the
mother.

"Come, then," cried Mrs. Ormonde, starting up with alacrity. As the
invitation was general, Lady Alice said, in her gentle way.

"Thank you; I saw the baby yesterday."

"She has really very little feeling," observed Mrs. Ormonde, as she went
upstairs with her sister-in-law. "She never notices baby."

"I am afraid I should not notice children much if they did not belong to
me."

"My dear Katherine, you are quite different. Of course Lady Alice is
sweet and elegant, but not clever. Indeed, I cannot see the use of
cleverness to women. There is a fine aristocratic air about her. After
all, there is nothing like high birth. I assure you it is a high
compliment her being allowed to stay here. Her aunt, Lady Mary Vincent,
is a very fine lady indeed, and chaperons Lady Alice. But her father,
Lord Melford, is a curious, reckless sort of man, always wandering
about--yachting and that kind of thing; he is rather in difficulties
too. They are glad enough to send her down here to see something of
Errington. You know Errington is a very good match; he has bought a
great deal of the Melford property, and when old Errington dies he will
be immensely rich. The poor old man is in miserable health; he has not
been down here all the winter. I believe the wedding is to take place in
June; we will be invited, of course; you see Colonel Ormonde is so
highly connected that I am in a very different position from what I was
accustomed to. And you, dear, you _must_ marry some person of rank;
there is nothing like it."

"Yes," said Katherine, with a sigh, "everything is changed."

"Fortunately!" cried the exultant Mrs. Ormonde, opening the door of a
luxuriously appointed nursery.