"We will send for June to-morrow, Daisy, if your mamma will leave you still with me."
"Oh, I shall go home to-morrow I hope," said Daisy. "I hope " she repeated, humbly.
"Yes, I hope so," said Mrs. Sandford. She kissed Daisy and went away. It was all Daisy wanted, to be alone. The October night was mild; she went to the window; one of the windows, which looked out upon the grass and trees of the courtyard, now lighted by a faint moon. Daisy sunk down on her knees there; the sky and the stars were more homelike than anything else; and she felt so strange, so miserable, as her little heart had never known anything like before. She knew well enough what it all meant, her mother's sending her away from home, her father's not being able to bear any disturbance. Speak as lightly, look as calmly as they would, she knew what was the meaning underneath people's faces and voices. Her father had been very much hurt; quite well Daisy was assured of that. He was too ill to see her, or too ill for her mother to like her to see him. Daisy knelt down; she remembered she had a Father in heaven, but it seemed at first as if she was too broken-hearted to pray. Yet down there, through the still moonlight, she remembered His eye could see her, and she knew He had not forgotten His little child. Daisy never heard her door open; but it did once, and some time after it did again.
"I do not know what to do " said Mrs. Sandford, downstairs.
There the lamps made a second bright day; and the two
gentlemen were busy over the table with newspapers and books.
Both of them looked up, at the sound of her perplexed voice.
"That child, " said Mrs. Sandford. "She is not in bed yet."
The lady stood by the table; she had just come from Daisy's room.
"What is she doing?" her husband asked.
"I don't know. She is kneeling by the open window. She was there an hour ago, and she is there yet. She has not moved since."
"She has fallen asleep " suggested Mr. Sandford. "I should say, wake her up."
"She is too wide awake now. She is lifting her little face to the sky, in a way that breaks my heart. And there she has been, this hour and more."