From the shock of seeing the stage connecting the Ait and the Quay he recovered quickly. He went back to the window and looked out again.
There was not a cloud in the heavens. The noonday sun of mid-June blazed in the sky. There was no beauty in the scene, but it was looking its best and brightest. Under the broad intense light of day the waters of the Bay and the Canal shone like burnished silver, all their turbidity hidden from sight by the glare, as the darkness in the heart of steel is masked by the polished surface. Now and then a stray wayfarer passed along the tow-path. A barge, piled up high with yellow deals, trailed with slackened rope after the leisurely horse. The grass on the slope up from the tow-path was still green and fresh with the rains of recent spring. Beyond the wall at the top of the bank burned a huge vermilion show-van with golden letters naming in the light. The tiles of Bramwell's cottage glowed a deep red under the blue sky. Afar off factory chimneys, like prodigious columns of some gigantic ruined fane, stood up against the transparent air with diaphanous capitals of blue smoke uniting them to the blue vault above. From Welford Bridge came the dull sound of heavy traffic, and faintly caught from some deep distance came the faint napping beat of heavy hammers driving metal bolts through the stubborn oak of lusty ships. Sparrows skipped on the ground and twittered in the air. High up in the blue measures of the sky a solitary crow sailed silently by unheeding. All the world appeared dwelling in an eternal calm of vital air and wholesome light. All abroad seemed at peace under the spell of a Sabbath sky.
Suddenly he became conscious of voices near and beneath him. He looked out, but could see no one.
"They seem to come from the island," he thought, "and to be children's voices."
"It's a 'bus," said one of the young voices, "and I'm the driver."
"No," said another young voice, but a more resonant one than the former; "it's a tramcar, and I'm the driver."
"And I'm the conductor."
"No; I'm the conductor too."
"And what am I?"
"O, you're the people in the car. Fares, please. Here, give me this piece of slate. That's your fare. O, I say, there's a coal wagon on the line before us!"