e to say good-night to her
aunt.

"My dear child, it's quite early," said Lady Jane; "Roderick's last
night, too. And your mamma is in no hurry."

Mabel looked at Roderick, but that young gentleman was airing himself
on the hearth-rug, and gazing absently up at the ceiling. It evidently
signified very little to him whether his aunt and cousin went or stayed.

"You know you told papa you would be home soon after ten," said Lady
Mabel, and the Duchess rose immediately.

She had a way of yielding to her only daughter which her
stronger-minded sister highly disapproved. The first duty of a mother,
in Lady Jane's opinion, was to rule her child, the second, to love it.
The idea was no doubt correct in the abstract; but the practice was not
succeeding too well with Roderick.

"Good-night and good-bye," said Lady Mabel, when the maid had brought
her wraps, and Rorie had put them on.

"Not good-bye," said the good-natured Duchess; "Rorie must come to
breakfast to-morrow, and see the Duke. He has just bought some
wonderful short-horns, and I am sure he would like to show them to you,
Rorie, because you can appreciate them. He was too tired to come out
to-night, but I know he wants to see you."

"Thanks, I'll be there," answered Rorie, and he escorted the ladies to
their carriage; but not another word did Mabel speak till the brougham
had driven away from Briarwood.

"What a horrid young man Roderick has grown, mamma!" she remarked
decisively, when they were outside the park-gates.

"My love, I never saw him look handsomer."

"I don't mean his looks. Good looks in a man are a superfluity. But his
manners--I never saw anything so underbred. Those Tempest people are
spoiling him."

"Roderick," said Lady Jane, just as Rorie was contemplating an escape
to the billiard-room and his cigar, "I want a little serious talk with
you."

Rorie shivered in his shoes. He knew too well what his mother's serious
talk meant. He shrugged his shoulders with a movement that indicated a
dormant resistance, and went quietly into the drawing-room.

CHAPTER IV.

Rorie comes of Age.

"Bless my soul!" cried the Squire; "it's a vixen, after all."

This is how Squire Tempest greeted the family doctor's announcement of
the his baby's sex. He had been particularly anxious for a son to
inherit the Abbey House estate, succeed to his father's dignities as
master of the fox-hounds, and in a general way sustain the pride and
glory of the