, and now full of mental distress, she did not pause a
moment to consider, but, snatching up a hat and coat lying conveniently
at hand, stole noiselessly from the room, putting them on as she went.

She gained a side-door without meeting any one; and the grounds seemed
deserted as she passed round the house and entered the avenue, down
which she ran with swift footsteps, after one hasty glance around to
make sure that she was not seen.

She reached the great gates, pushed them open, stepped out, letting
them swing to after her, and started on a run down the road.

But the next instant some one had caught her: a hand was on her
shoulder, and a stern, astonished voice cried, "Lulu! is it possible
this can be you? What are you doing out here in the public road alone,
and in the darkness of evening? Where were you going?"

"I--I--don't want--to tell you, papa," she faltered.

"_Where_ were you going?" he repeated, in a tone that said an answer he
would have, and that at once.

"Nowhere--anywhere to get away from this place, where everybody hates
me!" she replied sullenly, trying to wrench herself free. "Please let me
go, and I'll never come back to trouble you any more."

He made no reply to that, but simply took her band in a firm grasp, and
led her back to the house, back to her own room, where he shut himself
in with her, locking the door on the inside.

Then he dropped her hand, and began pacing the floor to and fro,
seemingly in deep and troubled thought, his arms folded, his head bowed
upon his breast.

A servant had brought in a light during Lulu's absence; and now, looking
timidly up at her father, she saw his face for the first time since
they had bidden each other farewell a year before. It struck her as not
only very pale, stern, and grief-stricken, but very much older and more
deeply lined than she remembered it: she did not know that the change
had been wrought almost entirely in the last few hours, yet recognized
it with a pang nevertheless.

"Papa is growing old," she thought: "are there gray hairs in his head, I
wonder?" Then there came dimly to her recollection some Bible words
about bringing a father's gray hairs down with sorrow to the grave. "Was
her misconduct killing her father?" She burst into an agony of sobs and
tears at the thought.

He lifted his head, and looked at her gravely, and with mingled
sternness and compassion.

"Take off that hat and coat, get your night-dress, and make yo