ghtening the
lower button of his snug-fitting plum-colored coat as a bracing to his
waist-line; throwing open the collar of his overcoat the wider to
give his shoulders the more room--very happy--very well satisfied with
himself, with the world, and with everybody who lived in it.

CHAPTER III

Moorlands was ablaze!

From the great entrance gate flanked by moss-stained brick posts capped
with stone balls, along the avenue of oaks to the wide portico leading
to the great hall and spacious rooms, there flared one continuous burst
of light. On either side of the oak-bordered driveway, between the
tree-trunks, crackled torches of pine knots, the glow of their curling
flames bringing into high relief the black faces of innumerable
field-hands from the Rutter and neighboring plantations, lined up
on either side of the gravel road--teeth and eyeballs flashing white
against the blackness of the night. Under the porches hung festoons
of lanterns of every conceivable form and color, while inside the wide
baronial hall, and in the great drawing-room with the apartments
beyond, the light of countless candles, clustered together in silver
candelabras, shed a soft glow over the groups of waiting guests.

To-night Colonel Talbot Rutter of Moorlands, direct descendant of
the house of De Ruyter, with an ancestry dating back to the Spanish
Invasion, was to bid official welcome to a daughter of the house of
Seymour, equally distinguished by flood and field in the service of
its king. These two--God be thanked--loved each other, and now that the
young heir to Moorlands was to bring home his affianced bride, soon
to become his wedded wife, no honor could be too great, no expense too
lavish, no welcome too joyful.

Moreover, that this young princess of the blood might be accorded
all the honors due her birth, lineage, and rank, the colonel's own
coach-and-four, with two postilions and old Matthew on the box--twenty
years in the service--his whip tied with forget-me-nots, the horses'
ears streaming with white ribbons--each flank as smooth as satin and
each panel bright as a mirror--had been trundled off to Kennedy Square,
there to receive the fairest of all her daughters, together with such
other members of her royal suite--including His Supreme Excellency
the Honorable Prim--not forgetting, of course, Kate's old black mammy,
Henny, who was as much a part of the fair lady's belongings when she
went afield as her ostrich-plume