A SUNRISE
A MONTH after this, on the evening of the 20th of August, Simon Ford and Madge took leave, with all manner of good wishes, of four tourists, who were setting forth from the cottage.
James Starr, Harry, and Jack Ryan were about to lead Nell's steps over yet untrodden paths, and to show her the glories of nature by a light to which she was as yet a stranger.
The excursion was to last for two days. James Starr, as well as Harry, considered that during these eight and forty hours spent above ground, the maiden would be able to see everything of which she must have remained ignorant in the gloomy pit; all the varied aspects of the globe, towns, plains, mountains, rivers, lakes, gulfs, and seas would pass, panorama-like, before her eyes.
In that part of Scotland lying between Edinburgh and Glasgow, nature would seem to have collected and set forth specimens of every one of these terrestrial beauties. As to the heavens, they would be spread abroad as over the whole earth, with their changeful clouds, serene or veiled moon, their radiant sun, and clustering stars. The expedition had been planned so as to combine a view of all these things.
Simon and Madge would have been glad to go with Nell; but they never left their cottage willingly, and could not make up their minds to quit their subterranean home for a single day.
James Starr went as an observer and philosopher, curious to note, from a psychological point of view, the novel impressions made upon Nell; perhaps also with some hope of detecting a clue to the mysterious events connected with her childhood. Harry, with a little trepidation, asked himself whether it was not possible that this rapid initiation into the things of the exterior world would change the maiden he had known and loved hitherto into quite a different girl. As for Jack Ryan, he was as joyous as a lark rising in the first beams of the sun.
He only trusted that his gayety would prove contagious, and enliven his traveling companions, thus rewarding them for letting him join them.
Nell was pensive and silent.
James Starr had decided, very sensibly, to set off in the evening.
It would be very much better for the girl to pass gradually from the darkness of night to the full light of day; and that would in this way be managed, since between midnight and noon she would experience the successive phases of shade and sunshine, to which her sight had to get accustomed.
Just as they left the cottage, Nell took Harry's hand saying, "Harry, is it really necessary for me to leave the mine at all, even for these few days?"
"Yes, it is, Nell," replied the young man. "It is needful for both of us."
"But, Harry," resumed Nell, "ever since you found me, I have been as happy as I can possibly be. You have been teaching me.
Why is that not enough? What am I going up there for?"
Harry looked at her in silence. Nell was giving utterance to nearly his own thoughts.
"My child," said James Starr, "I can well understand the hesitation you feel; but it will be good for you to go with us.
Those who love you are taking you, and they will bring you back again.
Afterwards you will be free, if you wish it, to continue your life in the coal mine, like old Simon, and Madge, and Harry. But at least you ought to be able to compare what you give up with what you choose, then decide freely. Come!"
"Come, dear Nell!" cried Harry.
"Harry, I am willing to follow you," replied the maiden.
At nine o'clock the last train through the tunnel started to convey Nell and her companions to the surface of the earth.
Twenty minutes later they alighted on the platform where the branch line to New Aberfoyle joins the railway from Dumbarton to Stirling.
The night was already dark. From the horizon to the zenith, light vapory clouds hurried through the upper air, driven by a refreshing northwesterly breeze. The day had been lovely; the night promised to be so likewise.
On reaching Stirling, Nell and her friends, quitting the train, left the station immediately. Just before them, between high trees, they could see a road which led to the banks of the river Forth.
The first physical impression on the girl was the purity of the air inhaled eagerly by her lungs.
"Breathe it freely, Nell," said James Starr; "it is fragrant with all the scents of the open country."
"What is all that smoke passing over our heads?" inquired Nell.
"Those are clouds," answered Harry, "blown along by the westerly wind."
"Ah!" said Nell, "how I should like to feel myself carried along in that silent whirl! And what are those shining sparks which glance here and there between rents in the clouds?"
"Those are the stars I have told you about, Nell. So many suns they are, so many centers of worlds like our own, most likely."
The constellations became more clearly visible as the wind cleared the clouds from the deep blue of the firmament.
Nell gazed upon the myriad stars which sparkled overhead.
"But how is it," she said at length, "that if these are suns, my eyes can endure their brightness?"
"My child," replied James Starr, "they are indeed suns, but suns at an enormous distance. The nearest of these millions of stars, whose rays can reach us, is Vega, that star in Lyra which you observe near the zenith, and that is fifty thousand millions of leagues distant.
Its brightness, therefore, cannot affect your vision.
But our own sun, which will rise to-morrow, is only distant thirty-eight millions of leagues, and no human eye can gaze fixedly upon that, for it is brighter than the blaze of any furnace.
But come, Nell, come!"
They pursued their way, James Starr leading the maiden, Harry walking by her side, while Jack Ryan roamed about like a young dog, impatient of the slow pace of his masters. The road was lonely.
Nell kept looking at the great trees, whose branches, waving in the wind, made them seem to her like giants gesticulating wildly.
