In the deeper, tenderer, more absorbing love with which Rachel loved her husband, she found a compensation for what she lost in being separated from her sisters and father.  She was happy—­but happy with a subdued and thankful spirit.

Not more than a year elapsed after their marriage before Parker began to complain of the badness of the times, and to sit thoughtful and sometimes gloomy during the evenings he spent at home.  This grieved Rachel very much, and caused her to exercise the greatest possible prudence and economy in order that the household expenses might be as little burdensome as possible to her husband.  But all would not do.

“I am afraid I shall never get ahead here in the world,” Parker at length said outright, thereby giving his wife the first suspicion of what was in his mind—­a wish to try his fortune in some other place.

The truth was, Parker was making a living and a little over, but he was not satisfied with this, and had moreover a natural love of change.  An acquaintance had talked to him a good deal about the success of a young friend who had commenced in a town some fifty miles away, a business precisely like the one in which he was engaged.  According to the account given, on half the capital which Parker possessed, this person was selling double the quantity of goods and making better profits.

A long time did not pass before Parker, after a bitter complaint in regard to his business, said: 

“I don’t know what is to be done unless we go to Fairview.  We could do a great deal better there.”

“Do you think so?” asked Rachel, in a calm voice, although her heart sank within her at the thought of being separated from those she so tenderly loved.

“I know it,” was the answer.  “Fairview is a thriving town, while this place is going behindhand as fast as possible.  I shall never get along if I remain here, that is certain.”

Rachel made no reply, but the hand that held the needle with which she was sewing moved at a quicker rate.

“Are you willing to go there?” the husband asked, with some hesitation of manner.

“If you think it best to go I am willing, of course,” Rachel said, meekly.

Parker looked into the face of his wife, as it bent lower over the work she held in her hand, and tried to understand as well as read its expression.  But he could not exactly make it out.  Nor did the tone of voice in which she so promptly expressed her willingness to remove, if he thought it best, entirely satisfy his mind.  Her assent, however, had been obtained, and this being the thing he most desired, he was not long in forgetting the manner in which that assent was given.  Of the cloud that fell upon her heart—­of the sadness that oppressed—­of the foreshadowing loneliness of spirit that came over her, he knew nothing.