THE PASTOR'S WIFE
By the Author of "Elizabeth and Her German Garden"
Illustrated by Arthur Litle
GARDEN CITY—NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
1914
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
ELIZABETH AND HER GERMAN GARDEN
ADVENTURES OF ELIZABETH IN RÜGEN
FRAÜLEIN SCHMIDT AND MR. ANSTRUTHER
PRINCESS PRISCILLA'S FORTNIGHT
THE SOLITARY SUMMER
THE CARAVANERS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
"Tell me, Little One," he said when she rejoined him, "will youmarry me?" Frontispiece
"Then why," she asked, with the courage of curiosity, "are youa pastor?"
"Will you not, Ingeborg," said Herr Dremmel, calling her for thefirst time by her name, "cut the cake?"
"But—father, I've been doing it too"
He could no longer walk around his own garden without meeting aninterlaced couple
"You are married to her?" asked the elder Frau Dremmel, turning herpebble eyes slowly from one to the other
Especially her gaze lingered on her feet. Becoming aware of this,Ingeborg tried to hide them
"But these are very wonderful," she said, taking up the sketches."I wish I were really like that."
PART I
CHAPTER I
On that April afternoon all the wallflowers of the world seemed to herreleased body to have been piled up at the top of Regent Street so thatshe should walk in fragrance.
She was in this exalted mood, the little mouse-coloured young ladyslipping along southwards from Harley Street, because she had just had atooth out. After weeks of miserable indifference she was quivering withresponsiveness again, feeling the relish of life, the tang of it, thejollity of all this bustle and hurrying past of busy people. And thebeauty of it, the beauty of it, she thought, fighting a tendency toloiter in the middle of the traffic to have a good look—the beauty ofthe sky across the roofs of the houses, the delicacy of the mistinessthat hung down there over the curve of the street, the loveliness of thelights beginning to shine in the shop windows. Surely the colour ofLondon was an exquisite thing. It was like a pearl that late afternoon,something very gentle and pale, with faint blue shadows. And as for itssmell, she doubted, indeed, whether heaven itself could smell better,certainly not so interesting. "And anyhow," she said to herself, liftingher head a moment in appreciation, "it can't possibly smell morealive."
She herself had certainly never been more alive. She felt electric. Shewould not have been surprised if sparks had come crackling out of thetips of her sober gloves. Not only was she suddenly and incrediblyrelieved from acute pain, but for the first time in her life oftwenty-two years she was alone. This by itself, without the business of