“Oh, is there?” said he, “I forgot, I believe you drove through it.”
“I did,” she answered, “and the whole pleasure of getting them, would be buying them with you.”
“You kind little darling,” he said, with a faint smile, “so it would to me, I know, choosing them with you; but are you sure there is a place there?”
“Such a nice little shop, with a great red and blue jug, hanging over the door for a sign,” she insisted, cheerily, “and there is something pleasant, isn’t there, in the sort of queer rustic things one would meet in such an out-of-the-way place?”
“Yes, so there is, but, however, we’ll think about it, and, in fact, it doesn’t matter a farthing where we get them.”
Our friend Charles seemed put out a little, and his slight unaccountable embarrassment piqued her curiosity, and made her ever so little uncomfortable. She was still, however, a very young wife, and in awe of her husband. It was, therefore, rather timidly that she said,—
“And why, darling Ry, can’t we decide now, and go to-morrow, and choose our plates, and cups, and saucers? it would be such a pleasant little adventure to look forward to.”
“So it might, but we’ll have to make up our minds to have many days go by, and weeks too, here, with nothing pleasant to look forward to. You knew very well,” he continued, not so sharply, “when you married me, that I owed money, and was a poor miserable devil, and not my own master, and you really must allow me to decide what is to be done, when a trifle might any day run us into mischief. There now, your eyes are full of tears, how can you be so foolish?”
“But, indeed, Ry, I’m not,” she pleaded, smiling through them. “I was only sorry, I was afraid I had vexed you.”
“Vexed me! you darling; not the least, I am only teased to think I am obliged to deny you anything, much less to hesitate about gratifying so trifling a wish as this; but so it is, and such my hard fate; and though I seem to be vexed, it is not with you, you must not mistake, never, darling, with you; but in proportion as I love you, the sort of embarrassment into which you have ventured with your poor Ry, grieves and even enrages him, and the thought, too, that so small a thing would set it all to rights. But we are not the only people, of course, there are others as badly off, and a great deal worse; there now, darling, you must not cry, you really mustn’t; you must never fancy for a moment when anything happens to vex me, that I could be such a brute as to be angry with you; what’s to become of me, if you ever suffer such a chimera to enter your pretty little head? I do assure you, darling, I’d rather blow my brains out, than inflict a single unhappy hour upon you; there now, won’t you kiss me, and look quite happy again? and come, we’ll go out again; you did not see the kennel, and the brewhouse, and fifty other interesting ruins; we must be twice as happy as ever for the rest of the day.”