"Sir!" cried the indignant Augustus.
Before he could say more, Gilbert Margrave had bowed deferentially to the ladies and to the angry planter himself.
"Oh, it is too clear—he loves her!" exclaimed Adelaide, when they were alone.
"And even if he does," said her aunt, quietly; "what difference can it possibly make to Miss Adelaide Horton that is—Mrs. Mortimer Percy that is to be?"
Crimson mounted to Adelaide's face at this remark. She made no answer, but with an angry look at her aunt, hurried from the room.
This display of emotion had not escaped the penetrating eye of her brother.
"What is the meaning of this, my dear aunt?" he asked.
"I very much fear, Augustus, that your sister has no great inclination to marry her cousin, Mortimer Percy."
"And the cause of this disinclination is some foolish preference for the insolent European who has just left us?"
"Unhappily, yes."