"Mrs. Colonel is a whole regiment, I tell you, Odalite!" she heard Wynnette say, as she closed the door. Odalite kept her word, and joined her family and friends in the drawing room just before dinner. Her father met her halfway across the room, kissed her, and led her to a chair by the fire. The rector came and gravely congratulated her. Joshua, the bulldog, who had followed her from the hall, came and laid his honest head on her lap. Lastly, Mrs. Col. Anglesea drew a chair to her side, sat down in it, took her hand, looked tenderly in her eyes, and said: "You're not mad 'long o' me, are you, honey, for coming and raising a big rumpus in the church and stopping of the marriage, are you, now?" "Angry with you? No, indeed! I am more grateful to you than words can express!" impulsively exclaimed Odalite. "That's right! That's the proper sperrit, that is! Why, Lord, he ain't much, if he is a colonel into the army! It's only the Injun Army, anyways! And we know what the Injuns is! Leastways, we know what the Injuns is here, and I don't reckon they're any better out yonder, t'other side of the world! No, honey, he ain't much! Why, Lord, there are heaps of fine young fellows would be glad enough to get you! Why, there is that fine young fellow, that midshipman staying here! Why couldn't you fancy him, now? And lots of others! Let alone taking up with a man older and uglier than your own fath--I mean, than the parson! You've no call to hang your harp on a willow tree, on account of the likes of him!" "Indeed, ma'am, I do not in the least regret Col. Anglesea," said Odalite, earnestly. "Lord, don't you, sure enough? Then you wa'n't so very fond of him, after all? Oh, bother! there's that clang-clang of a dinner bell again!" said the speaker, stopping short in her speech. "Shall I have the honor, madam?" inquired the master of the house, coming up and offering his arm to take her into the dining room. The rector spent the evening at Mondreer, and then, as a snowstorm was threatened, he accepted his host's and hostess' invitation and stayed all night with them. Leonidas Force did not return to Mondreer that evening, but the circumstance caused no surprise nor uneasiness, as the young master of Greenbushes was often detained by business to so late an hour that he spent the night at the place. CHAPTER XXVIII A STORM BREWING AT MISS SIBBY'S "Now, tell the truth, and shame the devil, Roland Bayard! Where have you been for the last twenty-four hours?" inquired Miss Sibby, on the afternoon of the same day that witnessed the rector's visit to Mondreer. "To tell you the truth, then, Aunt Sibby, I have been to Port Tobacco, waiting for a telegram." "A telegram!" "Yes, a telegram. After the wedding circus yesterday, the nobs decided to cuss the cost and send several miles of telegram to California, to find out the truth about that alleged marriage." "Yes, I heard that."