All the time this wonderful woman was quietly filling her purse, looking forward to the time when Fred's family would increase, and the Gatehouse might no longer suit her as a home. She had saved a good deal of money from her housekeeping allowance, though no one suspected it, because she always kept everything so comfortable. She now began to speculate cautiously with her hoards, and thanks to a brother who was in a stockbroker's office in London, she was very fortunate. Little did any one think, as she sat so quietly at her work of an evening, listening to Fred reading aloud or playing the flute, or perhaps to the baby crying—even good babies cry sometimes—that she was mentally gazing at the sitting-room she meant to have at some not very distant time. She meant to live in London, and to enjoy herself; her rooms were to be models of comfort and elegance, and were to be all for herself; no one to please but herself, no one to flatter, no one to humour, no flute to listen to, no baby to cry. Everything that she liked, plenty of it, and all her very own, exclusively for her own use. Mrs. Rayburn was deeply attached to her "own dear self." [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER II. THE ROAD TO RUIN. I WONDER if any of my readers are wondering what is the want in my first chapter? For there is a want, and I feel it myself. For all that I have said, so far, there might be no such thing as religion in the world. Self-interest is the only "motive-power" that I have mentioned. To be respectable, to be comfortable, to make or save money, to be happy in a quiet way—these are the motives I have spoken of, because, alas! They are the motives that governed the lives of those of whom I was writing. Is it not sad to think that, in a Christian country, after nineteen centuries of Christianity, people can contentedly live as if they had never learned the truths that our Saviour taught? I do not mean that their lives would have been the same if Christianity did not exist in the country. For Christianity gives us all of civilization that is worth having, and civilization is actually necessary before a quiet life is possible. But do you not think it is very ungrateful to accept the blessings and to ignore or to forget Him Who "ascended up on high to give gifts to men"? There were excuses for these people, no doubt, for Hemsborough was, as concerned religion, a very sleepy place. Yet they all went to church or chapel at least once every Sunday—even Mrs. Lydia did so: it was a nice quiet place for thinking over her plans. Even poor Fred, though he had aspirations and a mind, and wrote poetry and played the flute, never dreamed of questioning the usefulness of going to church: his mind did not take an independent turn.