But your father, my dear, though he married my daughter, was a gentleman by birth.

And one who knows heraldry respects a gentleman by birth." He laid his hand now on the handle of the safe, as if the time were nearly come for opening it, but not quite.

"He sent me, with this last letter, a small parcel for you, my dear, not to be opened until you reached the age of twenty-one.

As for the person who had succeeded to his inheritance, she was to be left in peaceable possession for a reason which he gave--quite a romantic story, which I will tell you presently--until you came of age.

He was very urgent on this point.