CHAPTER XI.
It had been arranged with Emma Thornycroft that Mrs. Harper should take the benefit of that lady's superior domestic and worldly experience—for Agatha herself was a perfect child in such matters—and that they two should go over the intended house together. Accordingly, in the course of the following day Mrs. Thornycroft appeared to carry away the young wife, and give her the first lesson in household responsibilities.
From this important business, Mr. Harper was laughingly excluded, as being only a “gentleman,” and required merely to pronounce a final decision upon the niceties of feminine choice.
“In fact,” said Emma, gaily assuming the autocracy of her sex, “husbands ought to have nothing at all to do with house-choosing or house-keeping, except to pay the rent and the bills.”
Agatha could not help laughing at this, until she saw that Mr. Harper was silent.
A few minutes before they started he took his wife aside, and showed her a letter. It was the formal renunciation of the appointment he held at Montreal.
“How kind!” she cried in unfeigned delight. “And how quickly you have fulfilled your promise!”
“When I have once decided I always like to do the thing immediately. This letter shall go to-day.”
“Ah!—let me post it,” whispered Agatha, taking a wilful, childish pleasure in thus demolishing every chance of the future she had so dreaded.