eemed too much overcome for speech.

"Such a darling as she is!" said Zoe; "the pet of the whole house, and
just the loveliest little creature I ever saw."

"Did you--either of you--see her fall?" asked the captain huskily.

"Yes," said Zoe, "I did. Violet and I happened to be at the window of
the little reception-room overlooking the veranda, and were watching the
little creature as she toddled along, and"--But Zoe paused, suddenly
remembering that her listener was the father of Lulu as well as of her
poor little victim.

"Please go on," he said with emotion. "What was it that sent her down
the steps?"

"Lulu was standing there," Zoe went on, hesitating, and coloring with
embarrassment, "and I saw the baby-hands clutch at her skirts"--

Again she paused.

"And Lulu, giving the tender, toddling thing a savage kick, caused the
dreadful catastrophe?" he groaned, turning away his face. "You need not
have feared to tell me. I had already heard it from the servants who
were eye-witnesses, and I only wanted further and undoubtedly reliable
testimony."

"I think," said Edward, "that Lulu really had no idea what it was she
was kicking at. I happened to be out in the grounds, and coming round
the corner of the house just in time to catch her look of horror and
despair as she half turned her head and saw the baby fall."

"Thank you," the captain said feelingly. "It is some relief to her
unhappy father to learn of the least extenuating circumstance."

CHAPTER XII.

"Anger resteth in the bosom of fools."--ECCLES. vii. 9.

"Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child; but the rod of correction
shall drive it far from him."--PROV. xxii. 15.

"He seems to feel terribly about it, poor man!" remarked Zoe with a
backward glance at the retreating form of Capt. Raymond, as he left
them and pursued his way to the house.

"Yes, and no wonder," said Edward. "Not for worlds would I be the father
of such a child as Lulu!"

"Nor I her mother," said Zoe. "So I'm glad it was you I got for a
husband instead of Capt. Raymond."

"Only for that reason?" he queried, facing round upon her in mock
astonishment and wrath.

"Oh, of course!" she returned, laughing, then sobering down with a
sudden recollection of the sorrow in the house. "But, O Ned! how
heartless we are to be joking and laughing when poor Vi and the captain
are in such distress!"

"I'm afraid you are right," he assented with a sigh. "Yet I am quite
sure we