n able to deceive him
and elude his vigilance--the child, because she was the object of Mrs
Quilp's commiseration and constant self-reproach--the single gentleman,
because of his unconcealed aversion to himself--Kit and his mother,
most mortally, for the reasons shown. Above and beyond that general
feeling of opposition to them, which would have been inseparable from
his ravenous desire to enrich himself by these altered circumstances,
Daniel Quilp hated them every one.

In this amiable mood, Mr Quilp enlivened himself and his hatreds with
more brandy, and then, changing his quarters, withdrew to an obscure
alehouse, under cover of which seclusion he instituted all possible
inquiries that might lead to the discovery of the old man and his
grandchild. But all was in vain. Not the slightest trace or clue
could be obtained. They had left the town by night; no one had seen
them go; no one had met them on the road; the driver of no coach, cart,
or waggon, had seen any travellers answering their description; nobody
had fallen in with them, or heard of them. Convinced at last that for
the present all such attempts were hopeless, he appointed two or three
scouts, with promises of large rewards in case of their forwarding him
any intelligence, and returned to London by next day's coach.

It was some gratification to Mr Quilp to find, as he took his place
upon the roof, that Kit's mother was alone inside; from which
circumstance he derived in the course of the journey much cheerfulness
of spirit, inasmuch as her solitary condition enabled him to terrify
her with many extraordinary annoyances; such as hanging over the side
of the coach at the risk of his life, and staring in with his great
goggle eyes, which seemed in hers the more horrible from his face being
upside down; dodging her in this way from one window to another;
getting nimbly down whenever they changed horses and thrusting his head
in at the window with a dismal squint: which ingenious tortures had
such an effect upon Mrs Nubbles, that she was quite unable for the time
to resist the belief that Mr Quilp did in his own person represent and
embody that Evil Power, who was so vigorously attacked at Little
Bethel, and who, by reason of her backslidings in respect of Astley's
and oysters, was now frolicsome and rampant.

Kit, having been apprised by letter of his mother's intended return,
was waiting for her at the coach-office; and great was his surprise
when he s