A VISITOR BY EXPRESS
It had been arranged that Emily should receive news from Wilfrid by the
first post on Monday morning. Her father left home at half-past eight,
and Emily, a little ashamed at so deceiving him, went into the town at
the same time on pretence of a desire to share his walk. Taking leave of
him as soon as the mill was in sight, she walked towards the
post-office. At this early hour there was no one before the counter: she
overcame her nervousness and asked for letters. That which she expected
was given to her, and at the same time a telegram.
The sight of the telegram agitated her. Drawing aside, she opened it at
once. Wilfrid had despatched it the previous night from London. 'I shall
be in Dunfield at one o'clock to-morrow. Please leave a note for me at
the post-office, appointing any place of meeting at any time you like. I
shall find the place from your description.'
The letter, as she could perceive by feeling it, was long; there was no
necessity to open it until she reached home. But the note she must write
at once. In agitation which would scarcely allow her to reflect, she
left the office and sought a small shop where she could procure
note-paper. On her way she devised a plan for meeting. In the shop where
she made her purchase, she was permitted also to write the note. Having
stamped the envelope, she returned to the post-office, and, to make sure
that no delay might disappoint Wilfrid, gave the letter into the hands
of a clerk, who promised, with a smile, that it should at once be put
into the right place. Emily found the smile hard to bear, but
fortunately she was unknown.
Then she set forth homewards. Such news as this, that she would see and
speak with Wilfrid in a few hours, set self-command at defiance. Between
joy at the thought that even now he was nearing her, and fear of the
events which might have led him to such a step, she was swayed in a
tumult of emotion. She longed to open the letter, yet felt she could not
do so in the public roads. She tried to think whether any ill chance
could possibly interpose to prevent her being at the place of meeting;
none was to be anticipated, unless, what was very unlikely, her mother
should propose to join her afternoon walk. But what could his coming
mean? She feared that she understood too well.
Often she had to check the over-haste of her pace, and the way seemed
terribly long, but at length she was at home and close shut in her
bedroom. The letter did not aid her to account for his coming; it had
been written late on Friday night, but made absolutely no reference to
what had passed between Wilfrid and his relations. It was a long and
passionate poem of his love, concerned not with outward facts, but with
states of feeling. Only at the end he had added a postscript, saying
that he should write again on Monday.
It was difficult to live through the morning. She felt that she must be
busy with her hands, and, her mother's objections notwithstanding, set
herself resolutely to active housework. Her anxious feelings in this way
toned themselves to mere cheerfulness. She listened with unfailing
patience to the lengthily described details of domestic annoyances of
which Mrs. Hood's conversation chiefly consisted, and did her best to
infuse into her replies a tone of hopefulness, which might animate
without betraying too much. The hours passed over, and at length it was
time to set forth. Mrs. Hood showed no desire to leave home. Emily,
though foreseeing that she might again be late for tea, did not venture
to hint at such a possibility, but started as if for a short walk.
Not much more than a mile from Banbrigg, in a direction away alike from
the Heath and from Dunfield, is the village of Pendal, where stand the
remains of an ancient castle. Very slight indeed are these relics, one
window and some shapeless masses of defaced masonry being alone exposed;
but a hill close beside them is supposed to cover more of the fabric,
though history tells not how or when the earth was so heaped up. The
circle of the moat is still complete, and generally contains water.
Pendal Castle Hill, as the locality is called, is approached by a rustic
lane leading from the village; it is enclosed like an ordinary meadow,
and shadowed here and there with trees. On Sundays and holidays it is a
resort much favoured by Dunfieldians; at other times its solitude is but
little interfered with. Knowing this, Emily had appointed the spot for
the meeting. She had directed Wilfrid to take a train from Dunfield to
Pendal, and had described the walk up to the castle hill.
He was not before her this time, and there were endless reasons for fear
lest she should wait in vain. She remained standing on the inner side of
the stile by which the field was entered, and kept her gaze on the point
where the lane turned. A long quarter of an hour passed, then of a
sudden the expected form appeared.
There had been no train to Pendal at the right time; he had taken a meal
at Dunfield station, and then had found a cab to convey him to the
village.
Wilfrid was very calm, only the gleam of his fine eyes showed his
delight at holding her hands again. They walked to the side of the hill
remote from the road. Wilfrid looked about him, and remarked that the
place was interesting. He seemed in no hurry to speak of what had
brought him here; they walked hand in hand, like children. 'Emily'--and
then his name in return, with interchange of looks; was it not enough
for some minutes?
'There is a fallen trunk,' Wilfrid said, pointing to a remoter spot.
'Shall we sit there?'
'How well it has been managed,' he exclaimed when they had seated
themselves. 'You remember the fairy tales in which the old woman bids
some one go to a certain place and do such and such a thing and
something is sure to happen? "And it befell just as the old woman had
said."'
'And I am the old woman. They call her a witch in the stories.'
'A witch, yes; but so young and beautiful. What delight it was to find
your letter, dearest! What careful directions! I laughed at your
dreadful anxiety to make it quite, quite clear. Won't you take the glove
off? How your hand trembles; no, I will unbutton it myself.'
He kissed the fingers lightly, and then held them pressed.
'But why have you come all this distance, Wilfrid?'
'Would it not be enough if I said I had come to see you? What distance
would be too far for that?'
'But you were to have left England to-day?'
'So I was, but I shall not go--till you go with me, Emily.'
She looked at him with anxious eyes.
'Well, I will tell you all there is to tell. In the first place, my
father and my aunt think that the plan of your returning to teach the
little girls is not a very good one.'
He spoke with perfect cheerfulness, but firmly, as was his wont. Emily's
eyes fell.
'I have felt it myself,' she said.
'And so have I; so that we are happily all agreed. We talked it all over
after you had gone on Friday, and since then I have taken time to make
up my mind. I can see that you would be uncomfortable in the house under
such conditions; at the same time it is certainly out of the question
that you should go elsewhere; and so--come to London and let us be
married as soon as the arrangements can be made.'
'I don't quite understand, Wilfrid. Do you mean that your father
approves this?'
'They all went off to-day. He knows, no doubt, what my intention is. In
a matter like this I must judge for myself.'
She was silent, then asked with apprehension, 'Has it caused trouble?'
'Of the kind which passes as soon as it has been well talked about,' he
answered with a smile; 'nothing more serious.'
She could not meet his look.
'And you wish not to return to Oxford?'
'I have done with that. I see now that to go back and play the schoolboy
would have been impossible; all that is over and a new life
beginning--you will be in readiness to come up as soon as I scud for
you?'
She looked in his face now with pleading.
'It is too hasty, Wilfrid. It was better, far better, that we should
wait till next year. Can it be your father's wish that your marriage
should take place in his absence? You know that I have no foolish
desires; the more simply everything is done the better it will please
me. But I would, I would have it done with your father's goodwill. I
foresaw his objections only too well; they are natural, it could not be
otherwise; but I hoped that time would help. Let us wait!'
She closed both hands on his, and gazed at him steadily.
'I think you must be guided by me, Emily,' he replied, with his calm
self-assertiveness. 'There is no reason why we should wait. My father is
a man who very sensibly accepts the accomplished fact. His own marriage,
I may tell you, was an affair of decision in the face of superficial
objections, and he will only think the better of me for following his
example. You say, and I am sure, that you care nothing for the show of a
wedding; if you did, I should not be here at this moment. It is only for
that that we need postpone the marriage. I will take rooms till I can
find a house and have it made ready for us.'
Emily kept silence. She had released his hand. There were signs on her
face of severe inward conflict.
'Will you let me go and see your parents?' he asked. 'Shall our marriage
take place here? To me it is the same; I would only be ruled by your
choice. May I go home with you now?'
'I would say yes if I could make up my mind to a marriage at once,' she
answered. 'Dear, let me persuade you.'
'The sound of your words persuades too strongly against their sense,
Emily,' he said tenderly. 'I will not put off our marriage a day longer
than forms make necessary.'
'Wilfrid, let me say what--'
'I have scraps of superstition in my nature,' he broke in with a half
laugh. 'Fate does not often deal so kindly as in giving you to me; I
dare not _seem_ even to hesitate before the gift. It is a test of the
worth that is in us. We meet by chance, and we recognise each other;
here is the end for which we might have sought a lifetime; we are not
worthy of it if we hold back from paltry considerations. I dare not
leave you, Emily; everything points to one result--the rejection of the
scheme for your return, my father's free surrender of the decision to
myself, the irresistible impulse which has brought me here to you. Did I
tell you that I rose in the middle of the night and went to Charing
Cross to telegraph? It would have done just as well the first thing in
the morning, but I could not rest till the message was sent. I will have
no appearances come between us; there shall be no pause till you bear my
name and have entered my home; after that, let life do with us what it
will.'
Emily drank in the vehement flow of words with delight and fear. It was
this virile eagerness, this force of personality, which had before
charmed her thought into passiveness, and made her senses its subject;
but a stronger motive of resistance actuated her now. In her humility
she could not deem the instant gain of herself to be an equivalent to
him for what he would certainly, and what he might perchance, lose. She
feared that he had disguised his father's real displeasure, and she
could not reconcile herself to the abrupt overthrow of all the purposes
Wilfrid had entertained before he knew her. She strove with all the
energy of her own strong character to withstand him for his good.
'Wilfrid, let it at least be postponed till your father's return. If his
mind is what you say, he will by then have fully accepted your views. I
respect your father. I owe him consideration; he is prejudiced against
me now, and I would gain his goodwill. Just because we are perfectly
independent let us have regard for others; better, a thousand times
better, that he should be reconciled to our marriage before it takes
place than perforce afterwards. Is it for my constancy, or your own,
that you fear?'
'I do not doubt your love, and my own is unalterable. I fear
circumstances; but what has fear to do with it; I wish to make you my
own; the empire of my passion is all-subduing. I will not wait! If you
refuse me, I have been mistaken; you do not love me.'
'Those are only words,' she answered, a proud smile lighting the trouble
of her countenance. 'You have said that you do not doubt my love, and in
your heart you cannot. Answer me one question, Wilfrid: have you made
little of your father's opposition, in order to spare me pain? Is it
more serious than you are willing to tell me?'
The temptation was strong to reply with an affirmative. If she believed
his father to be utterly irreconcilable, there could be no excuse for
lingering; yet his nobler self prevailed, to her no word of falseness.
'I have told you the truth. His opposition is temporary. When you are my
wife he will be to you as to any wife I could have chosen, I am
convinced of it.'
'Then more than ever I entreat you to wait, only till his return to
England. If you fail then, I will resist no longer. Show him this much
respect, dearest; join him abroad now; let him see that you desire his
kindness. Is he not disappointed that you mean to break off your career
at Oxford? Why should you do that? You promised me--did you not promise
me, Wilfrid, that you would go on to the end?'
'I cannot! I have no longer the calmness, no longer the old
ambitions,--how trivial they were!'
'And yet there will come a day when you will regret that you left your
course unfinished, just because you fell in love with a foolish girl.'
'Do not speak like that, Emily; I hate that way of regarding love! My
passion for you is henceforth my life; if it is trifling, so is my whole
being, my whole existence. There is no sacrifice possible for me that I
should ever regret. Our love is what we choose to make it. Regard it as
a foolish pastime, and we are no better than the vulgar crowd--we know
how they speak of it. What detestable thoughts your words brought to my
mind! Have you not heard men and women, those who have outlived such
glimpses of high things as nature ever sent them, making a jest of love
in young lives, treating it, from the height of their wisdom forsooth,
as a silly dream of boys and girls? If we ever live to speak or think
like that, it will indeed be time to have done with the world. Even as I
love you now, my heart's darling, I shall love you when years of
intimacy are like some happy journey behind us, and on into the very
portal of death. Regret! How paltry all will seem that was not of the
essence of our love! And who knows how short our time may be? When the
end comes, will it be easy to bear, the thought that we lost one day,
one moment of union, out of respect for idle prejudices which vanish as
soon as they find themselves ineffectual? Will not the longest life be
all too short for us?'
'Forgive me the words, dear. Love is no less sacred to me.'
Her senses were playing the traitor; or--which you will--were seconding
love's triumph.
'I shall come home with you now,' he said. 'You will let me?'
Why was he not content to win her promise? This proposal, by reminding
her most strongly of the inevitable difficulties her marriage would
entail, forced her again into resistance.
'Not now, Wilfrid. I have not said a word of this; I must prepare them
for it.'
'You have not spoken of me?'
'I would not do so till I--till everything was more certain.'
'Certain!' he cried impatiently. 'Why do you torture me so, Emily? What
uncertainty is there? Everything is uncertain, if you like to make it
so. Is there something in your mind that I do not understand?'
'You must remember, Wilfrid, that this is a strange, new thing in my
life. It has come to me so suddenly, that even yet I cannot make it part
of my familiar self. It has been impossible to speak of it to others.'
'Do you think I take it as a matter of course? Is your love less a magic
gift to me? I wake in a terror lest I have only dreamed of it; but then
the very truth comes back, and shall I make myself miserable with
imagining uncertainties, when there need be none?'
Emily hesitated before speaking again.
'I have told you very little about my home,' she said. 'You know that we
are very poor.'
She could not say it as simply as she wished; she was angry with herself
to recognise how nearly her feeling was one of shame, what a long habit
of reason it needed to expel the unintelligent prejudice which the world
bestows at birth.
'I could almost say I am glad of it,' Wilfrid replied. 'We shall have it
in our power, you and I, to help so much.'
'There are many reasons,' she continued, too much occupied with her
thoughts to dwell on what he said, 'why I should have time to prepare my
father and mother. You will let me write the things which it is not very
easy to say.'
'Say what you will, and keep silence on what you will, Emily. I cannot
give so much consequence to these external things. You and I are living
souls, and as such we judge each other. Shall I fret about the
circumstances in which chance has cased your life? As reasonable if I
withdrew my love from you because one day the colour of your glove did
not please me. Time you need. You shall have it; a week, ten days. Then
I will come myself and fetch you,--or you shall come to London alone, as
you please.'
'Let it be till your father returns.'
'But he will be two months away.'
'You will join him in Switzerland. Your health requires it.'
'My health! Oh, how tired I am of that word! Spare it me, you at least,
Emily. I am well in body and mind; your love would have raised me if I
had lain at the point of death. I cannot leave England alone; I have
made up my mind that you shall go with me. Have I then no power to
persuade you? You will not indeed refuse?'
He looked at her almost in despair. He had not anticipated more than the
natural hesitancy which he would at once overcome by force of passion.
There was something terrible to him in the disclosure of a quiet force
of will equal to his own. Frustration of desire joined with irritated
instincts of ascendency to agitate him almost beyond endurance.
Emily gazed at him with pleading as passionate as his own need.
'Do you distrust me?' he asked suddenly, overcome with an intolerable
suspicion. At the same moment he dropped her hand, and his gaze grew
cold.
'Distrust you?' She could not think that she understood him.
'Do you fear to come to London with me?'
'Wilfrid?'
Her bosom heaved with passionate resentment of his thought.
'Is _that_ how you understand my motives?' she asked, with tremulous,
subdued earnestness, fixing upon him a gaze which he could not meet.
'Yes,' he answered, below his breath, 'in a moment when love of you has
made me mad.'
He turned away, leaning with one hand upon the trunk. In the silence
which followed he appeared to be examining the shapeless ruins, which,
from this point of view, stood out boldly against the sky.
'When was this castle destroyed?' he asked presently, in a steady voice.
He received no answer, and turned his eyes to her again. Emily's face
was strung into a hard intensity. He laid his hand once more upon hers,
and spoke with self-control.
'You do not know the strength of a man's love. In that moment it touched
the borders of hate. I know that your mind is incapable of such a
suspicion; try to think what it meant to be possessed for an instant by
such frenzy.'
'You felt able to hate me?' she said, with a shake in her voice which
might have become either a laugh or a sob. 'Then there are things in
love that I shall never know.'
'Because your soul is pure as that of the angels they dream of. I could
not love yen so terribly if you were not that perfection of womanhood to
which all being is drawn. Send me to do your bidding; I will have no
will but yours.'
How the light of rapture flashed athwart her face! It was hard for her
to find words that would not seem too positive, too insubmissive.
'Only till you have lived with your father in the thought of this
thing,' she murmured, 'and until I have taught myself to bear my
happiness. Are we not one already, dear? Why should you needlessly make
your life poorer by the loss--if only for a time--of all the old
kindnesses? I think, I know, that in a few days your mind will be the
same as my own. Do you remember how long it is since we first spoke to
each other?'
'Not so many days as make a week,' he answered, smiling.
'Is not that hard to believe? And hard to realise that the new world is
still within the old?'
'Sweet, still eyes--give to me seine of your wisdom! But you have a
terrible way of teaching calmness.'
'You will go straight to the Continent, Wilfrid?'
'Only with one promise.'
'And that?'
'You will bow to my judgment when I return.'
'My fate shall be in your hands.'
They talked still, while the shadows of the ruins moved ever towards
them. All the afternoon no footsteps had come near; it was the sight of
two strangers which at length bade Emily think of the time. It was after
six o'clock.
'Wilfrid, I must go. My absence will seem so strange what fables I shall
have to invent on the way home. Do you know of any train that you can
leave by?'
'No; it matters very little; I suppose there is a mail some time
to-night? I will go back to Dunfield and take my chance.'
'How tired you will be! Two such journeys in one day.'
'And a draught of the water of life between them. But even now there is
something more I ask for.'
'Something more?'
'One touch of the lips that speak so nobly.'
It was only then that her eyes gleamed for a moment through moisture.
But she strengthened herself to face the parting, in spite of a
heaviness at the heart like that which she had felt on leaving The Firs.
She meant at first to go no further than the stile into the lane, and
there Wilfrid held out his hand. She used it to aid herself in stepping
over.
'I must go as far as Pendal station,' she said. 'Then you can look at
the time-table, and tell me what train you will take.'
They walked the length of the lane almost in silence, glancing at each
other once or twice. At the village station, Wilfrid discovered that a
good train left Dunfield shortly after nine o'clock. From Pendal to
Dunfield there would be a train in a quarter of an hour.
They stood together under the station shed. No other passenger was
waiting, and the official had not yet arrived to open the
booking-office.
'When shall I hear from you?' Emily asked, putting off from instant to
instant the good-bye, which grew ever harder to say.
'In less than a week. I shall leave London early tomorrow morning.'
'But it will give you no time for rest.'
'I am not able to rest. Go as often as you can to the castle, that I may
think of you as sitting there.'
'I will go very often.'
She could not trust herself to utter more than a few words. As she
spoke, the station-master appeared. They moved away to the head of the
stairs by which Emily had to leave.
'I shall see your train to-night as it passes Pendal,' she said.
Then there was the clasp of hands, and--good-bye. To Emily the way was
dark before her as she hurried onward....
Mrs. Hood had subsided into the calm of hitter resignation. Emily found
her in the kitchen, engaged in polishing certain metal articles, an
occupation to which she always had recourse when the legitimate work of
the day was pretty well over. Years ago, Mrs. Hood had not lacked
interest in certain kinds of reading, but the miseries of her life had
killed all that; the need of mechanical exertion was constantly upon
her; an automatic conscience refused to allow her repose. When she heard
Emily entering by the front door, a sickly smile fixed itself upon her
lips, and with this she silently greeted the girl.
'It is too bad of me, mother,' Emily said, trying to assume playfulness,
which contrasted strangely with an almost haggard weariness on her face.
'You will give me up as hopeless; I will promise, like the children,
that it shall never happen again.'
'It is your holiday, my dear,' was the reply, as Mrs. Hood went to stir
the fire. 'You must amuse yourself in your own way.'
'Of course you have had tea. I really want nothing till supper-time.'
'It was not worth while to make tea for one,' said her mother, with a
sigh.
'And you have had none? Then I will make it this minute. When will
father be home?'
'It is quite uncertain. He gets more and more irregular.'
'Why should he be kept so beyond the proper time? It is really too bad.'
'My dear, your father is never satisfied with doing his own work; he's
always taking somebody else's as well. Of course, they find that out,
and they put upon him. I've talked and talked, but it's no use; I
suppose it'll go on in the same way to the end.'
Half an hour later Mr. Hood reached home, as usual, worn out. The last
half mile of the walk from Dunfield was always a struggle with
exhaustion. He had to sit several minutes before he was able to go
upstairs to refresh himself with cold water.
'I met Mrs. Cartwright,' he said, when an unexpected cup of tea from
Emily's hands had put him into good spirits. 'Jessie got home on
Saturday, and wants you to go and see her, Emily. I half promised you
would call to-morrow morning.'
'Yes, I will,' said Emily.
'I don't think it's altogether right,' remarked Mrs. Hood, 'that Emily
should have to work in her holidays; and I'm sure it's all no use;
Jessie Cartwright will never do any good if she has lessons from now to
Doomsday.'
'Well, it's very necessary she should,' replied Mr. Hood. 'How ever they
live as they do passes my comprehension. There was Mrs. Cartwright
taking home fruit and flowers which cost a pretty penny, I'll be bound.
And her talk! I thought I should never get away. There's one thing, she
never has any but good-natured gossip; I never leave her without feeling
that she is one of the best-hearted women I know.'
'I can't say that her daughters take after her,' Mrs. Hood remarked,
soothed, as always, by comment upon her acquaintances. 'Amy was here the
other afternoon, and all the time she never ceased making fun of those
poor Wilkinses; it really was all I could do to keep from telling her
she ought to be ashamed of herself. Mary Wilkins, at all events, makes
no pretences; she may be plain, but she's a good girl, and stays at home
to do what's required of her. As for the Cartwright girls--well, we
shall see what'll happen some day. It can't go on, that's quite
certain.'
'I don't think there's any real harm in them. They're thoughtless, but
then they're very young. They oughtn't to have so much of their own way.
What's your opinion of Jessie, Emily? Do you think she'll ever be fit to
teach?'
'She might, if she could live apart from her mother and sisters for a
time. I think she'll have to come here for her lessons; it's out of the
question to do anything at that house.'
It was Mr. Hood's habit to spend his evenings in a little room at the
top of the house, which he called his laboratory. It was furnished with
a deal table, a couple of chairs, and some shelves. On the table was his
apparatus for the study of electricity, mostly the product of his own
ingenuity; also a number of retorts, crucibles, test-tubes, and the
like, wherewith he experimented chemically. The shelves exhibited
bottles and jars, and the dozen or so volumes which made his scientific
library. These tastes he had kept up from boyhood; there was something
pathetic in the persistency with which he clung to the pretence of
serious study, though the physical fatigue which possessed him during
his few hours of freedom would in any case have condemned him to mere
trifling. Often he came upstairs, lit his lamp, and sat for a couple of
hours doing nothing more than play with his instruments, much as a child
might; at other times a sudden revival of zeal would declare itself, and
he would read and experiment till late in the night, always in fear of
the inevitable lecture on his reckless waste of lamp-oil. In the winter
time the temperature of this garret was arctic, and fireplace there was
none; still he could not intermit his custom of spending at least an
hour in what he called scientific study, with the result that he went to
bed numbed and shivering. It was but another illustration of
possibilities rendered futile by circumstances. It was more than likely
that the man might, with fair treatment, have really done something in
one or other branch of physics. To Emily, who strove to interest herself
in his subjects out of mere love and compassion, he appeared to have
gained not a little knowledge of facts and theories. She liked to
encourage herself in the faith that his attainments were solid as far as
they went, and that they might have been the foundation of good
independent work; it helped her to respect her father.
'Will you come up to-night, Emily?' he asked, with the diffidence which
he always put into this request.
She assented with apparent cheerfulness, and they climbed the stairs
together. The last portion of them was uncarpeted, and their footsteps
sounded with hollow echoes under the roof. It was all but dark by this
time; Mr. Hood found matches on the table and lit the lamp, which
illuminated the bare whitewashed walls and sloping ceiling with a dreary
dimness. There was no carpet on the floor, which creaked as they moved
here and there. When her father was on the point of drawing down the
blind, Emily interposed.
'Do you mind leaving it up, father?'
'Of course I will,' he assented with a smile. 'But why?'
'The last daylight in the sky is pleasant to look at.'
On the landing below stood an old eight-day clock. So much service had
it seen that its voice was grown faint, and the strokes of each hour
that it gave forth were wheezed with intervals of several seconds. It
was now striking nine, and the succession of long-drawn ghostly notes
seemed interminable.
The last daylight--how often our lightest words are omens!--faded out of
the sky. Emily kept her eyes upon the windows none the less. She tried
to understand what her father was saying sufficiently to put in a word
now and then, but her sense of hearing was strained to its utmost for
other sounds. There was no traffic in the road below, and the house
itself was hushed; the ticking of the old clock, performed with such
painful effort that it ever seemed on the point of failing, was the only
sign of life outside the garret. At length Emily's ear caught a remote
rushing sound; her father's low voice did not overcome it.
'These compounds of nitrogen and oxygen,' he was saying, 'are very
interesting. Nitrous oxide, you know, is what they call Laughing Gas.
You heat solid nitrate of ammonia, and that makes protoxide of nitrogen
and water.'
The words conveyed no sense to her, though she heard them. The rushing
sound had become a dull continuous thunder. Her eyes strained into the
darkness. Of a sudden the horizon flamed. A train was passing a quarter
of a mile away, and the furnace-door of the engine had just been opened
to feed the fire, whose strength sped the carriages to far-off London. A
streaming cloud of smoke reflected the glare; it was as though some
flying dragon vomited crimson fumes. Involuntarily the girl half rose
from her seat and pointed.
'What is it?' asked her father, looking round. 'Ah! pretty sight that
fire on the smoke. Well, this protoxide of nitrogen, you see--'