'I don't know,' she said; 'I've never seen the sea.'
'Well, you can see it now,' he answered. 'Look out there; the valley between us and the hills filled with mist is more like the ocean than anything I've ever seen.'
'The ocean,' Kate repeated. 'Have you been to America?'
'Yes,' he answered, 'I have lived there for several years. I may take the company out there—probably next year, if all goes well.'
'And will you take me with you?'
'Yes,' he said, 'but you must come away to-morrow morning. Why do you hesitate?'
'I'm not hesitating,' she answered, 'but those hills beyond the valley have always seemed to me very wonderful; ever since I was a little child I've asked myself what lies beyond those hills.'
For answer Dick kissed her, and they relapsed into contemplation.
The tall stems of the factory chimneys, the bottle-shaped pottery ovens, the intricate shafts of the collieries were hidden in the mist, and the furnace fires flashing through the mist enhanced the likeness of the Hanley Valley to a sea of stars; like stars these furnaces flamed, now here, now there, over the lower slopes of the hills, till at last one blazed into existence high amid the hills, so high that it must have been on the very lowest verge. It seemed to Kate like a hearth of pleasure and comfort awaiting her in some distant country, and all her fancies were centred in this distant light, till another light breaking suddenly higher up in the hills attracted her, and she deemed that it would be in or about this light that she would find happiness. She must ascend from one light to the next, but the light on which her eyes were fixed was not a furnace light, but a star. Would she never find happiness, then, in this world? she asked. Was Dick going to desert her? And without telling him that she had mistaken an earthly for a heavenly light, she threw her arms about him.
'Of course, Dick, I'll go with you; I will follow you wherever you may choose to go and do the work that you bid me to do. You've spoken well of my voice. Oh yes, Dick, I'll go with you. Why shouldn't I? You're everything to me! I never knew what happiness was till I saw you; I've never had any amusement, I've never had any love; it was nothing but drudgery from morning to night. Better be dead than continue such an existence. Tell me, Dick, you'll take me away.'