Edited by Charles Aldarondo Aldarondo@yahoo.com




edited by:
Charles Aldarondo
Aldarondo@yahoo.com

George Gissing

EVE'S RANSOM



CHAPTER I


On the station platform at Dudley Port, in the dusk of a February
afternoon, half-a-dozen people waited for the train to Birmingham. A
south-west wind had loaded the air with moisture, which dripped at
moments, thinly and sluggishly, from a featureless sky. The lamps,
just lighted, cast upon wet wood and metal a pale yellow shimmer;
voices sounded with peculiar clearness; so did the rumble of a
porter's barrow laden with luggage. From a foundry hard by came the
muffled, rhythmic thunder of mighty blows; this and the long note of
an engine-whistle wailing far off seemed to intensify the stillness
of the air as gloomy day passed into gloomier night.

In clear daylight the high, uncovered platform would have offered an