room.

"I will see you presently," he said sternly. "I will either come to you
or send for you when I am ready;" and, feeling very crushed, they made
their way to the old nursery, now called "the schoolroom," and there
waited with curiously mingled feelings for what was to happen next.
They did not expect it to be anything _very_ serious; but they hated to
vex their father, and they felt that now they really had vexed him.

Oh how slowly the minutes passed, and what a lot of them there were!
It seemed to them that time enough had elapsed in which to have set
every limb that Jabez possessed, and to hear the recital of every wrong
he had ever received at their hands; and by the time they heard their
father's footstep coming their hopes and fears had gone up and down
again many times, and they had pictured themselves sentenced to every
possible and impossible punishment that their minds could imagine.



CHAPTER II.


THE NEWS, AND HOW THEY RECEIVED IT.

When the door opened and Dr. Trenire came in with the heavy tread of a
very weary man, and the face of a very worried one, another and a larger
wave of shame and remorse rushed over them all.

Dan stepped forward at once to put his feelings into words. "I am
fearfully sorry, father," he said impetuously. "I--I was a brute to