"Will she know I am there? Is she too far up, father?"
"I cannot tell, darling."
"But if—if—if Violet had—"
The question died on her lips, and John had become strangely silent. By-and-by, as the room darkened and the long summer evening grew shadowy, he rose up and lifted his little weary daughter in his arms and laid her down on her bed. This time the knots came undone without trouble, and no Kate was needed to assist in putting on the white frilled night-dress, or to shake up the pillows behind her aching shoulders. John seemed to-night to have hands like her mother's, so softly did he lay her down and so quietly did he sit by her side stroking her hair while she said the prayers her mother had taught her, and to which her little lips remained ever faithful. As he leaned over her to give her his good-night and a kiss, she said softly, "Another kiss, father;" which having received, she murmured to herself lovingly, "Good-night, father; good-night, mother;" and soon she was fast asleep.
CHAPTER VI. GREAT EXCITEMENT.
When John knew by Violet's regular breathing that she was fast asleep, he rose gently from his seat beside the bed and went over to the little table, on which lay, amongst so many others of the child's treasures, the mother's Bible and the gold-spotted book.
He took them up with quite a reverent, almost a guilty touch, and placed them with care upon the larger table at the foot of the bed. Then he lit the lamp, shaded it, and having once more leaned over the bed to see that Violet slept, he sat down to look at this new book in the pretty paper cover which seemed by its contents to have so excited and interested her.