"Yes, that's all right, sir," they were answering; and then, seeing us as we entered, my father said to Lord Raa:
"And what about you two?"
"We're all right also," said his lordship in his drawling voice.
"Good!" said my father, and he slapped his lordship sharply on the back, to his surprise, and I think, discomfiture.
Then with a cackle of light laughter among the men, we all trooped into the drawing room.
Aunt Bridget in her gold-rimmed spectacles and new white cap, poured out the tea from our best silver tea-pot, while Nessy MacLeod with a geranium in her red hair, and Betsy Beauty, with large red roses in her bosom, handed round the cups. After a moment, my father, with a radiant face, standing back to the fire, said in a loud voice:
"Friends all, I have something to tell you."
Everybody except myself looked up and listened, though everybody knew what was coming.
"We've had a stiff tussle in the library this afternoon, but everything is settled satisfactory—and the marriage is as good as made."
There was a chorus of congratulations for me, and a few for his lordship, and then my father said again: