They frequently met, either at the cottage or at the works in the pit.

Jack did not fail to remark the sentiments entertained by Harry towards Nell. Harry would not confess to them; but Jack only laughed at him when he shook his head and tried to deny any special interest in her.

It must be noted that Jack Ryan had the greatest possible wish to be of the party when Nell should pay her first visit to the upper surface of the county of Stirling. He wished to see her wonder and admiration on first beholding the yet unknown face of Nature. He very much hoped that Harry would take him with them when the excursion was made. As yet, however, the latter had made no proposal of the kind to him, which caused him to feel a little uneasy as to his intentions.

One morning Jack Ryan was descending through a shaft which led from the surface to the lower regions of the pit. He did so by means of one of those ladders which, continually revolving by machinery, enabled persons to ascend and descend without fatigue. This apparatus had lowered him about a hundred and fifty feet, when at a narrow landing-place he perceived Harry, who was coming up to his labors for the day.

"Well met, my friend!" cried Jack, recognizing his comrade by the light of the electric lamps.

"Ah, Jack!" replied Harry, "I am glad to see you. I've got something to propose."

"I can listen to nothing till you tell me how Nell is," interrupted Jack Ryan.

"Nell is all right, Jack--so much so, in fact, that I hope in a month or six weeks--"

"To marry her, Harry?"

"Jack, you don't know what you are talking about!"

"Ah, that's very likely; but I know quite well what I shall do."

"What will you do?"

"Marry her myself, if you don't; so look sharp," laughed Jack. "By Saint Mungo! I think an immense deal of bonny Nell! A fine young creature like that, who has been brought up in the mine, is just the very wife for a miner. She is an orphan--so am I; and if you don't care much for her, and if she will have me--"

Harry looked gravely at Jack, and let him talk on without trying to stop him. "Don't you begin to feel jealous, Harry?" asked Jack in a more serious tone.

"Not at all," answered Harry quietly.

"But if you don't marry Nell yourself, you surely can't expect her to remain a spinster?"

"I expect nothing," said Harry.

A movement of the ladder machinery now gave the two friends the opportunity--one to go up, the other down the shaft. However, they remained where they were.

"Harry," quoth Jack, "do you think I spoke in earnest just now about Nell?"

"No, that I don't, Jack."

"Well, but now I will!"

"You? speak in earnest?"

"My good fellow, I can tell you I am quite capable of giving a friend a bit of advice."

"Let's hear, then, Jack!"

"Well, look here! You love Nell as heartily as she deserves. Old Simon, your father, and old Madge, your mother, both love her as if she were their daughter. Why don't you make her so in reality? Why don't you marry her?"

"Come, Jack," said Harry, "you are running on as if you knew how Nell felt on the subject."

"Everybody knows that," replied Jack, "and therefore it is impossible to make you jealous of any of us. But here goes the ladder again--I'm off!"

"Stop a minute, Jack!" cried Harry, detaining his companion, who was stepping onto the moving staircase.

"I say! you seem to mean me to take up my quarters here altogether!"

"Do be serious and listen, Jack! I want to speak in earnest myself now."

"Well, I'll listen till the ladder moves again, not a minute longer."

"Jack," resumed Harry, "I need not pretend that I do not love Nell; I wish above all things to make her my wife."

"That's all right!"

"But for the present I have scruples of conscience as to asking her to make me a promise which would be irrevocable."

"What can you mean, Harry?"

"I mean just this--that, it being certain Nell has never been outside this coal mine in the very depths of which she was born, it stands to reason that she knows nothing, and can comprehend nothing of what exists beyond it. Her eyes--yes, and perhaps also her heart--have everything yet to learn. Who can tell what her thoughts will be, when perfectly new impressions shall be made upon her mind? As yet she knows nothing of the world, and to me it would seem like deceiving her, if I led her to decide in ignorance, upon choosing to remain all her life in the coal mine. Do you understand me, Jack?"

"Hem!--yes--pretty well. What I understand best is that you are going to make me miss another turn of the ladder."

"Jack," replied Harry gravely, "if this machinery were to stop altogether, if this landing-place were to fall beneath our feet, you must and shall hear what I have to say."

"Well done, Harry! that's how I like to be spoken to! Let's settle, then, that, before you marry Nell, she shall go to school in Auld Reekie."

"No indeed, Jack; I am perfectly able myself to educate the person who is to be my wife."

"Sure that will be a great deal better, Harry!"

"But, first of all," resumed Harry, "I wish that Nell should gain a real knowledge of the upper world. To ill.u.s.trate my meaning, Jack, suppose you were in love with a blind girl, and someone said to you, 'In a month's time her sight will be restored,' would you not wait till after she was cured, to marry her?"

"Faith, to be sure I would!" exclaimed Jack.

"Well, Jack, Nell is at present blind; and before she marries me, I wish her to see what I am, and what the life really is to which she would bind herself. In short, she must have daylight let in upon the subject!"

"Well said, Harry! Very well said indeed!" cried Jack. "Now I see what you are driving at. And when may we expect the operation to come off?"

"In a month, Jack," replied Harry. "Nell is getting used to the light of our reflectors. That is some preparation. In a month she will, I hope, have seen the earth and its wonders--the sky and its splendors. She will perceive that the limits of the universe are boundless."

But while Harry was thus giving the rein to his imagination, Jack Ryan, quitting the platform, had leaped on the step of the moving machinery.

"Hullo, Jack! Where are you?"

"Far beneath you," laughed the merry fellow. "While you soar to the heights, I plunge into the depths."