“No, my dear,” sitting down beside her, “unless you wished for me to be a Cabinet Minister.”
“Oh no, Alick,” and there was pain in her voice, “not unless you wish it very much too; I had a very different desire from that.”
“Perhaps you were longing for a house in the country; well, that may come by-and-by.”
“Wrong again, Alick. I was wishing that you were a poor man—not a very poor man, I should not like that—and that we lived in a small house with a pretty garden where there would be a lawn for the children to play on, and plenty of flowers for them to pick.”
“Indeed! this is a strange wish of yours, you discontented woman.”
“No, not discontented, but very, very happy, dear, so you need not frown over my poor little wish; everyone builds castles, only mine is not a castle, but a cottage.”
“I should not care to live in your cottage, Violet; I am an ambitious man. The Cabinet would be more to my taste.”
“Yes, dear,” with a sigh, “it was only make believe nonsense,” and she did not say another word about that fancy of hers, but began questioning him about last night’s debate. That was just her way to forget herself and follow his bent. No wonder he could not do without her, and was restless and ill at ease if she were unavoidably absent.
I wonder he understood in the least what she meant by wishing him to be poor. No doubt her innocent fancy had constructed a home where no uncongenial anxieties or ambition should sever her from her children, where she should be all in all to them as well as to her husband.
I daresay she imagined herself no longer burthened with wearisome receptions, but sitting working in the shade of the little porch while her children made daisy chains on the lawn of that humble abode. The mother would undress her children and hear them say their little prayers. Hark! was not that a click of the gate? Father has come home. How late you are, Alick; the children are asleep; you must kiss them without waking them. Hush, what nonsense, she is dreaming. Alick would be in the Cabinet; people were prophesying that already. She must take up her burthen again and follow him up the steep hill of fame. What if her woman’s heart fainted sometimes, women must do their work in life, as she would do hers.