“Good heavens, Caroline!” cried Mrs. Warden, “pray don’t think that I’m reproaching you. These things depend entirely upon one’s individual point of view—every one must follow the dictates of his own conscience.”
The conversation continued for some time, and Mrs. Warden related that it was her intention to drive out to the very lowest of the suburbs, in order to assure herself, with her own eyes, of the conditions of life among the poor.
On the previous day she had read the annual report of a private charitable society of which her husband was a member. She had purposely refrained from applying to the police or the poor-law authorities for information. It was the very gist of her design personally to seek out poverty, to make herself familiar with it, and then to render assistance.
The ladies parted a little less effusively than usual. They were both in a serious frame of mind.
Mrs. Abel remained in the garden-room; she felt no inclination to set to work again at the walking-dress, although the stuff was really pretty. She heard the muffled sound of the carriage-wheels as they rolled off over the smooth roadway of the villa quarter.
“What a good heart Emily has,” she sighed.
Nothing could be more remote than envy from the good-natured lady’s character; and yet—it was with a feeling akin to envy that she now followed the light carriage with her eyes. But whether it was her friend’s good heart or her elegant equipage that she envied her it was not easy to say. She had given the coachman his orders, which he had received without moving a muscle; and as remonstrance was impossible to him, he drove deeper and deeper into the queerest streets in the poor quarter, with a countenance as though he were driving to a Court ball.
At last he received orders to stop, and indeed it was high time. For the street grew narrower and narrower, and it seemed as though the fat horses and the elegant carriage must at the very next moment have stuck fast, like a cork in the neck of a bottle.
The immovable one showed no sign of anxiety, although the situation was in reality desperate. A humorist, who stuck his head out of a garret window, went so far as to advise him to slaughter his horses on the spot, as they could never get out again alive.
Mrs. Warden alighted, and turned into a still narrower street; she wanted to see poverty at its very worst.