to be decided is what I intend; and I answer, 'Never to
leave my husband, but to go when he goes and stay when he stays!' What do
you say to that?"

"That I am blest with the dearest of little wives," he whispered close to
her ear, and tightening his clasp of her waist.

They had nearly forgotten the presence of the others, who were too busy
arranging the time for setting out upon their contemplated journey to
notice this bit of by-play.

The children--Lulu included--were all in the room and listening with
intense interest to the consultation of their elders.

At length it was settled that they would leave in a few days, and Rosie,
Max, Grace, and Walter burst into exclamations of delight; but Lulu stole
quietly and unobserved from the room and hurried to her own.

"Oh, I wonder," she sighed to herself as she shut the door and dropped
into a chair, "if I am to go too! I wouldn't be left behind for anything;
and as there is a school there that I can be sent to as a day-scholar,
maybe Mamma Vi will coax to have me go; she's more likely to be in favor
of taking me than anybody else--unless it's Grandma Elsie."

Just then she heard footsteps coming up the stairs, through the hall, and
into the adjoining room, and the voices of the three who were in her
thoughts.

"What do you think about it, papa?" Elsie was saying. "I should be very
glad to have the dear child enjoy all that the rest of us do; but it must
not be at the cost of spoiling your enjoyment."

"I shall not allow it to do so," Mr. Dinsmore answered. "Lulu is a
lovable child in spite of her very serious faults, and it would distress
me to have her deprived of the delights of a winter at Viamede; which she
has, I believe, been looking forward to with as great eagerness as any of
the others, children or adults."

"I know she has; and, dear grandpa, I thank you very much for your kind
willingness to take her with us," Violet responded feelingly; her mother
adding,

"I also, papa; it would grieve me deeply to be compelled to leave her
behind; especially as it must necessarily be in a boarding-school; Edward
and Zoe being too young and inexperienced to take charge of her."

Lulu's first emotion on hearing all this was delight that she was to go;
the next, gratitude to these kind friends, mingled with a deep sense of
shame on account of her misconduct.

Impulsively she rose from her seat, hastened to the door of communication
with the room where they were,