It may, perhaps, have struck her that to have been
honest and humble, to have done her duty, and to have
marched straightforward on her way, would have brought
her as near happiness as that path by which she was
striving to attain it. But—just as
the children at Queen’s Crawley went round the
room where the body of their father lay—if
ever Becky had these thoughts, she was accustomed to
walk round them and not look in. She eluded
them and despised them—or at least she
was committed to the other path from which retreat
was now impossible. And for my part I believe
that remorse is the least active of all a man’s
moral senses—the very easiest to be deadened
when wakened, and in some never wakened at all.
We grieve at being found out and at the idea of shame
or punishment, but the mere sense of wrong makes very
few people unhappy in Vanity Fair.
So Rebecca, during her stay at Queen’s Crawley,
made as many friends of the Mammon of Unrighteousness
as she could possibly bring under control. Lady
Jane and her husband bade her farewell with the warmest
demonstrations of good-will. They looked forward
with pleasure to the time when, the family house in
Gaunt Street being repaired and beautified, they were
to meet again in London. Lady Southdown made
her up a packet of medicine and sent a letter by her
to the Rev. Lawrence Grills, exhorting that gentleman
to save the brand who “honoured” the letter
from the burning. Pitt accompanied them with
four horses in the carriage to Mudbury, having sent
on their baggage in a cart previously, accompanied
with loads of game.
“How happy you will be to see your darling little
boy again!” Lady Crawley said, taking leave
of her kinswoman.
“Oh so happy!” said Rebecca, throwing
up the green eyes. She was immensely happy to
be free of the place, and yet loath to go. Queen’s
Crawley was abominably stupid, and yet the air there
was somehow purer than that which she had been accustomed
to breathe. Everybody had been dull, but had
been kind in their way. “It is all the
influence of a long course of Three Per Cents,”
Becky said to herself, and was right very likely.
However, the London lamps flashed joyfully as the
stage rolled into Piccadilly, and Briggs had made
a beautiful fire in Curzon Street, and little Rawdon
was up to welcome back his papa and mamma.
CHAPTER XLII
Which Treats of the Osborne Family
Considerable time has elapsed since we have seen our
respectable friend, old Mr. Osborne of Russell Square.
He has not been the happiest of mortals since last
we met him. Events have occurred which have not
improved his temper, and in more in stances than one
he has not been allowed to have his own way.
To be thwarted in this reasonable desire was always
very injurious to the old gentleman; and resistance
became doubly exasperating when gout, age, loneliness,
and the force of many disappointments combined to weigh
