CHAPTER VII.
"The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame."-- _Prov_.

29: 15.
Lulu hated suspense; it seemed to her worse than the worst certainty; so when they had gone a few steps farther she said, hesitating and blushing very deeply, "Papa, if you are going to punish me as--as I--said I 'most wished you would, please don't let Mamma Vi or anybody know it, and--" "Certainly not; it shall be a secret between our two selves," he said as she broke off without finishing her sentence; "if we can manage it," he added a little doubtfully.
"They all go down to the beach every evening, you know, papa," she suggested in a timid, half-hesitating way, and trembling as she spoke.
"Yes, that would give us a chance; but I have not said positively that I intend to punish you in that way." "No, sir; but--oh, do please say certainly that you will or you won't." The look he gave her as she raised her eyes half fearfully to his face was very kind and affectionate, though grave and judicial.

"I am not angry with you," he said, "in the sense of being in a passion or out of patience--not in the least; but I feel it to be my duty to do all I possibly can to help you to be a better child, and noticing, as I have said, for the last two or three days what a wilful, wicked temper you were indulging, I have been considering very seriously whether I ought not to try the very remedy you have yourself suggested, and I am afraid I ought indeed.

Do you still think, as you told me a while ago, that this sort of punishment might be a help to you in trying to be good ?" Lulu hesitated a moment, then said impetuously, and as if determined to own the truth though it were to pass sentence upon herself, "Yes, papa, honestly I do; though I don't want you to do it one bit.

But," she added, "I sha'n't love you any less if you whip me ever so hard, because I shall know you don't like to do it, and wouldn't except for the reason you've given." "No, indeed, I should not," he said; "but you are to stay behind to-night when the others go to the beach." "Yes, papa, I will," she answered submissively, but with a perceptible tremble in her voice.
Grace and Max were coming to meet them, so there was no opportunity to talk any more on the subject, and she walked on in silence by her father's side, trying hard to act and look as if nothing was amiss with her, clinging fast to the hand in which he had taken hers, while Grace took possession of the other.
"You ought to have three hands, papa," laughed Max a little ruefully.
"Four," corrected Grace; "for some day little Elsie will be wanting one." "I shall have to manage it by taking you in turn," the captain said, looking down upon them with a fatherly smile.
Violet and some of the other members of their party were still seated where they had left them on the benches under the awning just out of reach of the waves, and thither the captain and his children bent their steps.
Sitting down by his wife's side, he drew Grace to his knee and Lulu close to his other side, keeping an arm round each while chatting pleasantly with his family and friends.
Lulu was very silent, constantly asking herself, and with no little uneasiness, what he really intended to do with her when, according to his direction, she should stay behind with him after tea while the others returned to the beach.
One thing she was determined on--that she would if possible obey the order without attracting any one's notice.