ny head cools the
temper amazingly. I used to be rather hot once.'

'You could be peppery, my lady.'

'Now I'm cool, Tom, and so must you be; or, if you fight, it must be in
my cause, as you did when you thrashed that saucy young carter. Do you
remember?'

'If you'll sit ye down, my lady, I'll just tell you what I'm come
for,' said Old Tom, who plainly showed that he did remember, and was
alarmingly softened by her ladyship's retention of the incident.

Lady Jocelyn returned to her place.

'You've got a marriageable daughter, my lady?'

'I suppose we may call her so,' said Lady Jocelyn, with a composed
glance at the ceiling.

''Gaged to be married to any young chap?'

'You must put the question to her, Tom.'

'Ha! I don't want to see her.'

At this Lady Jocelyn looked slightly relieved. Old Tom continued.

'Happen to have got a little money--not so much as many a lord's got,
I dare say; such as 'tis, there 'tis. Young fellow I know wants a wife,
and he shall have best part of it. Will that suit ye, my lady?'

Lady Jocelyn folded her hands. 'Certainly; I've no objection. What it
has to do with me I can't perceive.'

'Ahem!' went Old Tom. 'It won't hurt your daughter to be married now,
will it?'

'Oh! my daughter is the destined bride of your "young fellow,"' said
Lady Jocelyn. 'Is that how it's to be?'

'She'--Old Tom cleared his throat 'she won't marry a lord, my lady; but
she--'hem--if she don't mind that--'ll have a deuced sight more hard
cash than many lord's son 'd give her, and a young fellow for a husband,
sound in wind and limb, good bone and muscle, speaks grammar and two or
three languages, and--'

'Stop!' cried Lady Jocelyn. 'I hope this is not a prize young man? If
he belongs, at his age, to the unco quid, I refuse to take him for a
son-in-law, and I think Rose will, too.'

Old Tom burst out vehemently: 'He's a damned good young fellow, though
he isn't a lord.'

'Well,' said Lady Jocelyn, 'I 've no doubt you're in earnest, Tom. It
's curious, for this morning Rose has come to me and given me the first
chapter of a botheration, which she declares is to end in the common
rash experiment. What is your "young fellow's" name? Who is he? What is
he?'

'Won't take my guarantee, my lady?'

'Rose--if she marries--must have a name, you know?'

Old Tom hit his knee. 'Then there's a pill for ye to swallow, for he
ain't the son of a lord.'

'That's swallowed, Tom. What is he?'

'He's the so