Chapter XXII: The Dream of His Life

Rachel did not hurry to see a doctor, but having promised to do so she knew she must keep her word, so the second day after the Bishop's visit, knowing that Luke would be away at a clerical meeting in the country, she wrote a note to the doctor who had been attending her mother-in-law asking him to come and see her. She did not suppose that there was anything seriously the matter with her notwithstanding the fact that she felt so ill; and after all, she thought to herself, she need not follow out his injunctions if they were inconvenient.

She was quite unprepared for his verdict. He told her that both her heart and her lungs were affected, and that it was absolutely necessary that she should give up all parish work and if possible take a thorough rest. To Mrs. Greville, he gave a still more serious account.

"She should leave this place at once," he said, "and live as far as possible an open air life. A sanatorium would give her the best chance. But if this is impossible she should go into the country or to the sea. Of course she has been doing the work of two or three women. She must drop all that and what is more she should be fed up. She is not properly nourished."

"Do you mean to say you think that she has not had enough food?" asked Mrs. Greville very much distressed.

"I am afraid not. She has not looked after herself at all. I made her tell me what she had had in the way of food yesterday, and when I heard I was not surprised at her state of health.

"I am afraid it will be an awful blow to my son," said Mrs. Greville.

"I'm afraid it will, but if he wants to keep her he must make some other arrangement for her. I won't be responsible for her life unless she is removed as soon as possible, and is given the opportunity of changing entirely her way of living."

Mrs. Greville so dreaded telling Luke the news she had received from the doctor that she did not ask him to come round to see her that evening. So she sat and brooded over the news, and in her heart she blamed Rachel for neglecting herself as she had evidently done. Of course people would lay the blame on Luke; but how could you expect a man whose every moment was filled in with his parish duties to notice when his wife looked pale, or lost her appetite. And what a terrible hindrance to his work to have an invalid wife! Moreover, it was easy for the doctor to prescribe a different climate and complete rest; but how his plans were to be carried out she did not know.

Meanwhile Rachel quite unconscious of the doctor's visit to Mrs. Greville, after the first shock of the news, determined to behave as if he had never been. She was resolved not to become an invalid and a hindrance to her husband, an hour before it was positively necessary. And after all doctors often made mistakes. She would drink more milk, a matter on which he had laid great stress, and there she would leave it.

When Luke returned home from the clerical meeting he was in good spirits. The paper he had read had been well received and the discussion that had followed had been intensely interesting. Rachel was as interested in all that had happened as she always was in his concerns, and he did not notice that she was looking unusually tired and worn.

The next day two letters lay on the hall table for Luke. But he had to hurry off directly after lunch to an appointment, and so he put them in his pocket to read in the tram on the way.

It was only after taking his seat that he remembered them. One he saw at once was from the Bishop, the other had the London postmark. He opened the second first as being more interesting to him; and he could scarcely believe what he read. It was the offer of a living in a crowded part of London, where he would have the charge of 16,000 souls. He could have shouted for joy. It was exactly what he had been longing for. It was true that financially it was not much better than his present living, but money had very little attraction or indeed meaning for Luke, and he dismissed from his mind that part of the news in the letter almost without a thought. It was the work that he craved, and work in the very centre of the universe, as he liked to think of London. At last the dream of his life was coming true. He felt he could hardly get through his work, so anxious was he to tell the news to Rachel and to his mother.

He felt that his mother would rejoice with him almost more than Rachel. Now that he came to think of it his wife had never taken much to the thought of London; though he knew that she would do nothing to prevent him going. Had she not said when they had been talking about the possibility of him one day being offered a church there, "Where thou goest I will go?" But the remembrance of her words about London and her dislike of it, for a moment or two rather damped his spirits; but he knew she would not fail him now that the dream of his life was coming true.

So full was he of the news the letter contained, that he forgot there was another one in his pocket till he was in the tram again on his way home.

To his amusement, he found that this one was also an offer of a living; but one in the country. It was a good one, much better than the one offered to him in London; but this did not weigh with him in the least, and the fact of it being in the country at once made him dismiss it from his mind. In fact, he scarcely took in the Bishop's letter in which he said, that he felt sure a country life would be beneficial both for his wife and his son, adding that when he called at his house he had thought Rachel looking very tired and worn.

Rachel was always so bright in her husband's presence that he supposed the Bishop must have called at an inconvenient time and that unfortunately Rachel had not been able to conceal the fact. He had not noticed anything wrong in her looks himself, and he did not recollect her once complaining of even a headache ever since her marriage. The Bishop evidently had got a wrong impression of her from his call. He would write and thank him for his kind thought of them but decline the country living and tell him why. Then he thrust the Bishop's letter into his pocket and made his way joyfully toward his mother's rooms.