Mrs. Greville so dreaded telling Luke the news she had received from the doctor that she did not ask him to come round to see her that evening. So she sat and brooded over the news, and in her heart she blamed Rachel for neglecting herself as she had evidently done. Of course people would lay the blame on Luke; but how could you expect a man whose every moment was filled in with his parish duties to notice when his wife looked pale, or lost her appetite. And what a terrible hindrance to his work to have an invalid wife! Moreover, it was easy for the doctor to prescribe a different climate and complete rest; but how his plans were to be carried out she did not know. Meanwhile Rachel quite unconscious of the doctor's visit to Mrs. Greville, after the first shock of the news, determined to behave as if he had never been. She was resolved not to become an invalid and a hindrance to her husband, an hour before it was positively necessary. And after all doctors often made mistakes. She would drink more milk, a matter on which he had laid great stress, and there she would leave it. When Luke returned home from the clerical meeting he was in good spirits. The paper he had read had been well received and the discussion that had followed had been intensely interesting. Rachel was as interested in all that had happened as she always was in his concerns, and he did not notice that she was looking unusually tired and worn. The next day two letters lay on the hall table for Luke. But he had to hurry off directly after lunch to an appointment, and so he put them in his pocket to read in the tram on the way. It was only after taking his seat that he remembered them. One he saw at once was from the Bishop, the other had the London postmark. He opened the second first as being more interesting to him; and he could scarcely believe what he read. It was the offer of a living in a crowded part of London, where he would have the charge of 16,000 souls. He could have shouted for joy. It was exactly what he had been longing for. It was true that financially it was not much better than his present living, but money had very little attraction or indeed meaning for Luke, and he dismissed from his mind that part of the news in the letter almost without a thought. It was the work that he craved, and work in the very centre of the universe, as he liked to think of London. At last the dream of his life was coming true. He felt he could hardly get through his work, so anxious was he to tell the news to Rachel and to his mother.