"No, no, no," said Louisa; "dear me, it is so stupid."
"Well, now really, Louisa," he insisted, "you must come another time; it won't do, dearest; it won't do."
"Oh, I recollect," she said, "I recollect—'Abbeys and Abbots;' I want to get some hints for improving the rectory-windows when we get home; and our church wants, you know, a porch for the poor people. The book is full of designs."
The book was found and added to the rest, which had been already taken to the carriage. "Now, Louisa," said White. "Well, dearest, there's one more place we must call at," she made answer; "tell John to drive to Sharp's; we can go round by the nursery—it's only a few steps out of the way—I want to say a word to the man there about our greenhouse; there is no good gardener in our own neighbourhood."
"What is the good, Louisa, now?" said her husband; "we shan't be at home this month to come;" and then, with due resignation, he directed the coachman to the nurseryman's whom Louisa named, as he put her into the carriage, and then followed her.
Charles breathed freely as they went out; a severe text of Scripture rose on his mind, but he repressed the uncharitable feeling, and turned himself to the anxious duties which lay before him.
CHAPTER III.
Nothing happened to Charles worth relating before his arrival at Steventon next day; when, the afternoon being fine, he left his portmanteau to follow him by the omnibus, and put himself upon the road. If it required some courage to undertake by himself a long journey on an all-momentous errand, it did not lessen the difficulty that that journey took in its way a place and a person so dear to him as Oxford and Carlton.