"There is very little to tell. A friend of Doctor Rugvie's, an Englishman who was with him for a week in Scotland while he was with us, is owner of the Seigniory of Lamoral; it is his, I think, by inheritance, although I am not positive; and this is the old manor house. The estate is very large, but has been neglected; I have understood it is to be cultivated; some of it is to be reforested and the present forest conserved. He will be his own manager and will make his home here a great part of the year. Mean while, he has installed us here in his absence, through Doctor Rugvie, of course, and given over the charge of house and servants to Jamie and me." "And what is the owner's title?" "He has none that I know of. The real 'Seignior' and 'Seignioress' live in Richelieu-en-Bas in the new manor house--I say 'new', but that must be seventy-five years old. This is only a part of the original seigniory." "I don't understand these seigniories, and I tried to read up about them before I came here." "It is very perplexing--these seigniorial rights and rents and transferences. I don't make any pretence of understanding them." "Are the farm buildings occupied now?" "No; Doctor Rugvie wants to attend to those himself. It is his recreation to make plans for this farm, and he will be here himself to see that they are begun and carried out right. He tells me he has always loved Canada." "And what am I to do for you? I want to begin to feel of a little use," I said half impatiently. "You are doing for me now, my dear." (How easily Delia Beaseley's name for me came from the "elderly Scotchwoman's" lips!) "Your presence cheers Jamie; the young need the young, and belong to the young--" "But," I protested, "I am not young; I am twenty-six." "And Jamie is twenty-three. But when you laughed together to-night, you both might have been sixteen. It did me good to hear you; this old house needs just that--and I can't laugh easily now," she added. I heard a note of hopelessness in her voice. How lovely she was as she sat by the fire in the soft radiance of candle light! "Elderly"!--She could not be a day over fifty-seven or eight. The fine white cap rested on heavy, smoothly parted hair; the figure was round to plumpness; the dress, not modernized, became her; her voice was still young if a little weary, and her brown eyes bright, the lids unwrinkled. "Do you know Delia Beaseley well? Doctor Rugvie says she is a fine woman." "She is noble," I said emphatically; "I feel that I know her well, although I have seen her only a few times." "Is she a widow?" The door opened before I could gather my wits to answer. I felt intuitively that I could not say to this Scotchwoman, that Delia Beaseley was neither widow nor wife. I welcomed the sudden inrush of all four dogs and Jamie behind them, with the smell of a fresh pipe about him.