“In the parlor I believe,” said Grace.  “Oh no! see, they are just coming down the stairs.”

“Yes, here we are,” said Violet; “anxious, for a report of the morning’s proceedings in the magistrate’s office.  Won’t you walk into the parlor, gentlemen, and let us have it?”

“Certainly, we will be very happy to gratify your very excusable curiosity,” returned her husband laughingly, as she came to his side, and he stooped his tall form to give her the kiss with which he never failed to greet her after even a brief separation.

The older people all repaired to the parlor, but the children did not follow.

“I must go and look over my lessons,” said Max.

“And I’m going to my room,” said Lulu.  “Gracie, if you will come with me, I’ll tell you all about the trial—­if that’s what they call it.”

“O yes, do!” responded Grace, as the two started up the stairs together.  “Were you scared, Lu?”

“No; I didn’t feel frightened, for I’m not timid you know, and papa was near me all the time; and he’d told me all I had to do was to tell a straightforward, truthful story.

“I did hate to take the oath, but I knew I had to, and that it wasn’t wrong, though it does seem a dreadful thing to do.”

“It isn’t like other swearing,” remarked Max, who was moving on up the stairs, somewhat ahead of his sisters.  “There must be a right kind, because in the psalms, where David is describing a good man, he says of him, ‘He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not.’”

“Yes, I know,” said Lulu, “I can see the difference; and this must be the right kind or papa would never have let us do it.”

“How do they do it?” asked Grace.  “How did you do it, Lu?”

“A man said over the words for me—­a promise to ’tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth’—­and I promised by kissing the Bible; that was all.”

“That wasn’t very hard to do,” said Grace, “but oh I’d have been so frightened to have to tell something with so many people listening!”

“Of course; because you’re such a weak, timid little thing; but I’m big and strong and not afraid of anybody or anything.

“There were a good many people there; the room was quite full; but I felt that that did not make much difference, when I thought about God hearing every word I said and knowing if it was really the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

“Ajax’s wife was there; crying fit to break her heart too; specially when they took him back to jail.

“Papa stopped and spoke to her before we got into the carriage to come home.  He said he was very sorry for her, but if she continued to be honest and industrious, he would see that she did not want; and he hoped her husband would some day come out of prison a better man.”

“Did she seem thankful to papa?” asked Grace.

“Yes; and she said she didn’t see how Ajax could be so bad and ungrateful as to try to steal papa’s money after he’d been so kind to her and the children.”