“O papa! you know she always wants things—­bad things—­over.”

“The bad thing she has brought upon the poor baby will not be over very soon,” he said sternly.  “I must go now to it and your mamma.”

He did so; and sharing Violet’s deep grief and anxiety, and perceiving that his very presence was a comfort and support to her, he remained at her side for hours.

Hours, that to Lulu seemed like weeks or months.  Alone in her room, in an agony of remorse and fear, she waited and watched and listened for her father’s coming, longing for, and yet dreading it, more than words could express.

“What would his anger be like?” she asked herself.  “What terrible punishment would he inflict?  Would he ever love her again, especially if the baby should die?

“Perhaps he would send her away to some very far-off place, and never, never come near her any more.”

Naturally of a very impatient temperament, suspense and passive waiting were well-nigh intolerable to her.  By turns she walked the floor, fell on her knees by the bedside, and buried her face in a pillow, or threw herself into a chair by table or window, and hid it on her folded arms.

“Oh! would this long day, this dreadful, dreadful waiting for—­what? ever come to an end?” she asked herself over and over again.

Yet, when at last the expected step drew near, she shuddered, trembled, and turned pale with affright, and, starting to her feet, looked this way and that with a wild impulse to flee:  then, as the door opened, she dropped into her chair again, and covered her face with her shaking hands.

She heard the door close:  the step drew nearer, nearer, and stopped close at her side.  She dared not look up, but felt her father’s eyes gazing sternly upon her.

“Miserable child!” he said at length, “do you know what your terrible temper has wrought?—­that in your mad passion you have nearly or quite killed your little sister? that, even should she live, she may be a life-long sufferer, in consequence of your fiendish act?”

“O papa, don’t!” she pleaded in broken accents, cowering and shrinking as if he had struck her a deadly blow.

“You deserve it,” he said:  “indeed, I could not possibly inflict a worse punishment than your conduct merits.  But what is the use of punishing you? nothing reforms you!  I am in despair of you!  You seem determined to make yourself a curse to me instead of the blessing I once esteemed you.  What am I to do with you?  Will you compel me to cage or chain you up like a wild beast, lest you do some one a fatal injury?”

A cry of pain was her only answer, and he turned and left the room.

“Oh!” she moaned, “it’s worse than if he had beaten me half to death! he thinks I’m too bad, even to be punished; because nothing will make me good:  he says I’m a curse to him, so he must hate me; though he used to love me dearly, and I loved him so too!  I suppose everybody hates me now, and always will.  I wish I was dead and out of their way.  But, oh! no, I don’t; for I’m not fit to die.  Oh! what shall I do?  I wish it was I that was hurt instead of the baby.  I’d like to go away and hide from everybody that knows me; then I shouldn’t be a curse and trouble to papa or any of them.”