Lady Car looked at her father with a light in her mild eyes such as no one could remember to have seen there before. ‘Why was my boy of that stock?’ she said, in a voice which was very low, but full of a passion that could not be restrained. Her mother and sister started with one impulse to stop further utterance. ‘Carry!’ they cried. ‘What? What did she say?’ cried Lord Lindores; but neither Carry nor any of the others repeated what she had said. After this strange little scene there was, however, no more said about Tom’s coming of age, which they could not have kept back if they would. But all kinds of preparations were made to make the celebration worthy, if not of Tom, yet of the position which he ought to take in the county so far as wealth went. His long minority, and the scrupulous care with which both his estate and his money had been managed, made Tom one of the richest commoners in Scotland, the very richest perhaps whose income came from property alone, and not from trade; and though the county did not recollect his father with very particular regard, nor anticipate very much from himself--for everybody knew those unsatisfactory points in Tom’s history which it was hoped had attracted no observation--yet Lady Car had gained all respect, and for her sake, and perhaps a little for their own amusement, the neighbours threw themselves readily into all the details of the feastings, and drank his health, and wished him joy, with every appearance of friendliness and sincerity. And there were many ladies heard to declare that a good wife would just be the making of the young man. Perhaps this sentiment as much as respect for Lady Car made the county people warm in their sympathy. There were a great many young ladies in the county; it might very well happen that one of these was destined by Providence to be the making of the second Tom Torrance of the Towers. And the parents who thought, with a softened consideration of all the circumstances that had been against him, that a daughter of theirs might perhaps have that mission to fulfil, had certainly much less to tolerate and forgive than Lord Lindores had when he married his daughter to Tom’s father. Therefore everybody accepted the invitations that were sent out, and for a week the house blazed with light and rang with festive sounds, and life stirred and quickened throughout the entire neighbourhood. The long interregnum was over, and Tom had come into his kingdom.