Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed. [Illustration: With the other hand she poured some bright coins into Lucia's lap.] _Lucia's Trust._ BY CATHARINE SHAW AUTHOR OF "LILIAN'S HOPE," "DICKIE'S SECRET," "THE GABLED FARM," ETC. ————— NEW EDITION. ————— JOHN F. SHAW AND CO., LTD. _Publishers_ 3, PILGRIM STREET, LONDON, E.C. BRITISH MANUFACTURE 1893 CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. HOW IT CAME II. AT THE COTTAGE III. LUCIA'S QUEEN IV. UNDER THE ELMS V. LUCIA'S GIFT VI. IN THE FOREST VII. VOICES IN THE FOREST VIII. MAY'S HEART'S DESIRE IX. "A SLIP BETWIXT" X. A PROMISE XI. EVAN IS GLAD XII. BARBARA'S GIFT LUCIA'S TRUST. [Illustration] CHAPTER I. HOW IT CAME. "I SUPPOSE you must go?" asked her cousin, reading the letter for the third time. "There is no choice, is there?" "None whatever," said Lucia, thinking it all over with a very sober face. That letter had come as a very unpleasant break in a most happy visit. It was not often that Lucia could get away from her home, where a little flock of step-brothers and sisters kept her busy from morning till night. But this time she had got away! Her mother had long planned for her to visit some cousins of her own in the North, and Lucia had been with them for a month already. She had begun to feel that her home in London was a very long way off, and that her step-father, and even her own mother, had grown of less absorbing interest than formerly. Life seemed to centre in that charming country house, her cousins with their affairs began to fill her horizon, and when the letters came from her mother speaking of her step-father having been ill with the dreaded influenza, and being better again, she dismissed the matter with the comfortable hope that no one else would take it, and that mother would not be over-tired. Then she did not hear for a week, but was too happy to be nervous, when one evening, just as she and her cousins were settling down for a cosy time, the second post brought her that news which overturned all her plans, and spoke of changes which might alter the aspect of her life for years to come. Her step-father had had a relapse; a dormant delicacy of the chest had suddenly developed, and he was ordered to take a sea voyage if his life were to be saved.