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, and, pausing on the threshold, asked timidly, "Mamma Vi, may I come in?"
"Yes, Lulu," Violet answered with a kindly look and smile; and the little girl, stepping quickly to Mr. Dinsmore's side, addressed him, with eyes cast down and cheeks burning with blushes: