Service once over, however, she stepped into the auntly coach with a much lighter heart. The drive home seemed an altogether different matter from the drive to church, and each step of the way Carrie’s spirits mounted higher and higher, till, when the coach drew up before the door, she could have danced for joy. Bidding a decorous adieu to her aunt, Carrie was handed out by the man-servant, and mounted the steps to the door with the greatest propriety. But it was well that the departing rumble of the wheels hid from Lady Mallow’s ear that whoop of joy which Carrie uttered as she raced into the parlour and flung her arms round her father’s neck, crying out, ‘’Tis done—done for another week, sir!’ Mrs. Shepley had never permitted such demonstrative greetings—they were indeed considered a great breach of decorum in those days; but I fear many polite rules were broken in upon by Carrie and her father, who neither of them cared as much as they should have done for the generally received ideas of the society of their day. Such good friends were Carrie and her father that the girl sought for no friends of her own age; she went about everywhere with Sebastian when he had leisure to escort her, and when he was busy she amused herself at home, very well content with life and all things. In her father’s company she visited many a strange scene; she would go with him to the hospitals sometimes, and—shade of Mrs. Shepley!—how many a sight she saw in these unsavoury tents of disease! Then Carrie entertained all her father’s friends (those motley friends her poor mother had objected to so much), and in many ways grew up with more of the manners of a boy than of a girl. She was singularly free from the sillinesses and affectations of early girlhood, having heard no talk at all of lovers or admiration, nor having ever entered into rivalry with other women in the matter of looks and charm. Carrie was serenely unconscious that the world held a rival for her; she was the first with all the men of her own little world, and as yet she had not gone beyond it. If she compared her own looks with those of other girls, it was merely from curiosity quite untouched by jealous feeling. The fact was only distantly dawning upon her that she was fair beyond the common; just now she took it as her due from Fortune’s kindly hand. CHAPTER XVI