This was fourteen years ago; she was eight-and-thirty then; she was two-and-fifty now. Miss Upton had not wanted for suitors--as the world will readily believe: but she only shook her head and sent them all adrift. It was her money they wanted, not herself, she told them candidly; they had not thought of her when she was supposed to be portionless; they should not think of her now. Thus she had lived on at Court Netherleigh, and was looked upon as a somewhat eccentric lady; but a thoroughly good woman and a kind mistress. And the Acorns? They had swallowed their bitter disappointment with a good grace to the world; and set themselves out to pay the same assiduous court to Miss Upton that they had paid to Sir Francis. "I don't think hers will be a long life," Lady Acorn said in confidence to her lord, "and then all the property must come to us; to you and to me: she has no other relative on earth." The world at large took up the same idea, and Lord Acorn was universally regarded as the undoubted heir to the broad lands of Netherleigh. As to the peer himself, nothing short of a revelation from heaven would have shaken his belief in the earnest of their future good fortune; and, between ourselves, he had already borrowed money on the strength of it. There never existed a more sanguine or less prudent man than he. The young ladies now staying with Miss Upton were his two youngest daughters. In the gushing affection professed for her by the family generally, the girls had been trained to call her "Aunt Margery:" though, as the reader perceives, she was not their aunt at all; in fact, only very distantly related to them. "Tiresome things!" cried Lady Frances, toying with the glasses still, but looking towards the distant group of labourers. "I wish it had been the Dalrymples on their way here." "You can put on your hats and go to Moat Grange, as you seem so anxious to see them," observed Miss Upton. "And you may ask the young people to come in this evening, if you like." "Oh, that will be delightful," cried Frances, all alert in a moment. "And that young lady who was at church with them, Aunt Margery--are we to ask her also? They called her Miss Lynn." "Of course you are. What strangely beautiful eyes she had." "Thank you, Aunt Margery," whispered Adela, bending down with a kiss and a bright smile, as she passed Miss Upton. Not that Adela particularly cared for the Dalrymples; but the days at Court Netherleigh were, to her, very monotonous.