Luke's wife

by Evelyn R. Garratt

Even the arranging of the flowers was not left entirely to her. Having placed them gracefully with their long stalks in the flower vase, she put them in the centre of the luncheon table and was admiring them, when Mrs. Greville came into the room, her hands laden with dishes. Putting them on the sideboard she turned and looked critically at Rachel's flowers; then quick as thought lifted them out of the water and breaking their stalks put them again into the vase on the table, pressing them down so that the blossoms might all be even.

"There! they look better so and more tidy," she said, whilst Rachel stood by too astonished and taken by surprise even to expostulate.

But no sooner had Mrs. Greville left the house having done everything to her satisfaction, than Rachel slipped on her hat and ran round to the florist. Even if her mother-in-law had her way in everything else she was determined that her flowers should be an exception. The Bishop should anyhow see something to remind him of her old home, and the flowers were those he particularly loved. They were a fabulous price, but Rachel was reckless.

Happily the pie did not arrive from Evesham's till her mother-in-law had disappeared. Rachel found Polly regretfully contemplating it as it lay on the kitchen table.

"It's such a beauty!" she said to Rachel as she came in. "It's ever so much nicer than the one Mrs. Greville brought. It has such a pretty edge, and is varnished like, and there's a piece of parsley sticking out of the top. The other looks ever so plain by its side."

"Go and fetch the other back from the table Polly," said Rachel. "We'll put this one in its place."

Polly wondered how her mistress dared to do such a thing, and fervently hoped that Mrs. Greville would not scold her too much, but she fetched it gladly with an inward thrill of excitement.

Rachel went to the Confirmation Service in no devout state of mind. She felt out of touch with all good things. She knew she was indulging in wrong and unworthy feelings towards her mother in-law, as she was not blind to the fact that all she did was done in pure kindness, and because she had a false preconceived idea of her daughter-in-law's incapability. It was a case of misunderstanding. But what had happened this morning had made her feel all on edge. However, the sight of the Bishop, the sound of his voice, and still more the Charge he gave to the Confirmation candidates, filled her with a feeling of shame. How badly she was keeping the resolutions she had made at her own Confirmation. How half-heartedly she was fighting the world, the flesh, and the devil; what an unsatisfactory soldier of the King, under whose banner she had promised to fight unto her life's end.

She felt so ashamed of herself and so full of repentance, that she hurried home as fast as she could after the service and told Polly to put Mrs. Greville's pie on the table again. It was more necessary for her to be good and for her mother-in-law to be saved pain, than for the Bishop to partake of a pie with a frilled edge and, as Polly had expressed if, "all varnished like."

Then with an easier mind she was able to welcome her friend and even to smile at Luke's mother. It must be confessed however, that the smile was difficult to maintain, as she could scarcely get in a word edgeways with the Bishop. Her mother-in-law entirely engrossed his attention. Even Luke had to sit and listen, which made Rachel every now and then feel furious.