"Well, it will be rather nice to have as much money as I want without asking my mother for it. She was my only guardian, you know. My father had such confidence in her rectitude and capacity that he left everything in her hands."
"Do you find Briarwood much improved?" inquired Miss McCroke.
Lady Jane had been doing a good deal to her orchid-houses lately.
"I haven't found Briarwood at all yet," answered Rorie, "and Vixen seems determined I shan't find it."
"What, have you only just returned?"
"Only just,"
"And you have not seen Lady Jane yet?" exclaimed Miss McCroke with a horrified look.
"It sounds rather undutiful, doesn't it? I was awfully tired, after travelling all night; and I made this a kind of halfway house."
"Two sides of a triangle are invariably longer than any one side," remarked Vixen, gravely. "At least that's what Miss McCroke has taught me."
"It was rather out of my way, of course. But I wanted to see whether Vixen had grown. And I wanted to see the Squire."