“I shall never see the dear child again!” was her anguished thought; “and oh, what news to write to her father!  He will not blame me, I know, but oh, I cannot help blaming myself that I did not miss her sooner and send some one to search for and bring her back.”

Elsie read her daughter’s distress in her speaking countenance, and sitting down by her side tried to cheer her with loving, hopeful words.

“Dear Vi,” she said, “I have a strong impression that the child is not lost, and will be here presently.  But whatever has happened, or may happen, stay your heart, dear one, upon your God; trust Him for the child, for your husband, and for yourself.  You know that troubles do not spring out of the ground, and to His children He gives help and deliverance out of all He sends them.

“‘God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.’  ’He shall deliver thee in six troubles:  yea in seven there shall no evil touch thee.’”

There was perhaps not more than a half hour of this trying suspense between Edward’s departure in search of the missing child and her sudden appearance in their midst:  sudden it seemed because the roar of the sea and howling of the storm drowned all other sounds from without, and prevented any echo of approaching footsteps.

“Lulu!” they all cried in varied tones of surprise and relief, as they started up and gathered about her dripping figure.

“Where have you been?”

“How wet you are!”

“Oh, dear child, I am so glad and thankful to see you; I have been terribly frightened about you!” This last from Violet.

“I—­I didn’t mean to be out so late or to go so far,” stammered Lulu.  “And I didn’t see the storm coming up in time, and it caught and hindered me.  Please, Mamma Vi, and Grandma Elsie, don’t be angry about it.  I won’t do so again.”

“We won’t stop to talk about it now,” Elsie said, answering for Violet and herself; “your clothes must be changed instantly, for you are as wet as if you had been in the sea; and that with fresh water, so that there is great danger of your taking cold.”

“I should think the best plan would be for her to be rubbed with a coarse towel till reaction sets in fully and then put directly to bed,” said Mrs. Dinsmore.  “If that is done we may hope to find her as well in the morning as if she had not had this exposure to the storm.”

Lulu made no objection nor resistance, being only too glad to escape so easily.  Still she was not quite sure that some punishment might not be in store for her on the morrow.  And she had an uncomfortable impression that were it not for her father’s absence it might not be a very light one.

When she was snugly in bed, Grandma Elsie came to her, bringing with her own hands a great tumbler of hot lemonade.

“Drink this, Lulu,” she said, in her own sweet voice and with a loving look that made the little girl heartily ashamed of having given so much trouble and anxiety; “it will be very good for you, I think, as well as palatable.”