"Charging the furnace," Paul said. He was as thrilled as his son at the sight.
Guild, in the window corner, shriveled still farther into his seat, his lined face crackling with pleasure, as he observed the boy's intense astonishment.
Pelham did not answer his father. He greedily absorbed every sharp detail of the burning picture. The metallic buildings seemed made of flame. The occasional windows just passed flickered redly,—as if the night, within and without, were on fire. The light dimmed, burned brightly for a moment, then startlingly went out. The vacant night was blacker than ever.
Dim thoughts struggled within the mind of the child,—clouded fancies of the mouth of hell, the pit of eternal burning and damnation.
Then, as the train ground to a standstill, again the night flared brilliantly. The tracks glowed like pulsing, living gold. Just beyond the third pair, and parallel to them, ran a long mound, hardly higher than the train. Every few feet leaping fire twisted up from it. The smell of the smoke stung his nostrils.
A man with a lantern ran shouting past the window, and disappeared; his face was coal-smeared, red, horrible, in the sudden glow. The boy shuddered. There were black figures standing around the fire holes. Three or four were dumping a squat-bellied car into one of them. The waiting train was stiflingly warm. It must be frightfully hot above the fire! Those devils there emptying cargoes of lost souls into the brimstone pits,—surely they could not be men!
"Coke ovens," explained the father.
Pelham pressed his nose more tightly to the pane.
The other man drew out his bulky wallet, and was lost in the intricacies of some creased maps. Paul Judson pointed here, there, upon their surfaces, arguing vehemently. The boy paid no attention to any of it.
This was his first sight of the iron city. He never forgot it....