“What did you want to see me for, Mamma Vi?” asked Lulu, as she presently entered her young stepmother’s dressing-room.

“Just to make sure that your hair and dress are all right, dear.  You know we have company to-night, and I am particularly anxious that my little Lulu shall look her very best.”

The child’s face flushed with pleasure.  She liked to be well and becomingly dressed, and it was gratifying to have Mamma Vi care that she should be.  Mrs. Scrimp was so different; she had never cared whether Lulu’s attire was tasteful and becoming or quite the reverse, but always roused the child’s indignation by telling her it was all sufficient if she were only neat and clean.

“Am I all right?” she asked.

“Pretty nearly; we will have you quite so in a minute,” Violet answered.  “Tie her sash Agnes, and smooth down the folds of her dress.”

“Mamma Vi, is that strange lady any relation to you?” asked Lulu.

“Yes, she is my aunt, mamma’s sister.”

“She is pretty, but not nearly so pretty as Grandma Elsie.”

“No; I have always thought no one else could be half so beautiful as mamma.”

“Why, Mamma Vi, you are yourself!” exclaimed Lulu in a tone of honest sincerity that made Violet laugh.

“That is just your notion, little girl,” she said, giving the child a kiss.

“Oh, I have eyes and can see! besides, papa thinks so, too, and Max and Gracie.”

“Yes, my dear husband! he loves me, and love is very blind,” murmured Vi, half to herself, with a sigh and a far-off look in the lovely azure eyes.  Her thoughts were following him over the deep, wide, treacherous sea.

She stole on tiptoe into the next room for another peep at his sleeping baby girl, Lulu going with her; then hearing the tea-bell, they went down to the dining-room together.

They gathered about the table, a large cheerful party, the travellers full of satisfaction in being at home again, the others so glad to have them there once more.

Zoe was very merry and Rosie in almost wild spirits, but Max and Lulu, to whom all was new and strange, were quite quiet and subdued, scarcely speaking except when spoken to, “Mamma,” Rosie said, when they had adjourned to the parlor, “it’s lovely out of doors, bright moonlight and not a bit cold; mayn’t I take Max and Lulu down to the lakelet?”

“Do you think the evening air would be injurious to them, Arthur?” Mrs. Travilla asked, turning to her cousin.

“I think there is malaria in it, and would advise them to stay within doors until after breakfast to-morrow morning,” he answered, drawing Rose to a seat upon his knee.

“Then you’d better let us go,” she said archly, “so you can have some more patients.  Don’t you like to have plenty of patients?”

“That’s a leading question, little coz,” he said laughingly, toying with her curls.  “When people are sick I like to have an opportunity to exercise my skill in trying to relieve and cure them, but I hope I don’t want them made sick in order to furnish me with employment.”