Down the Slope

"I do not understand why he should remain away so long, for he must know I would be troubled concerning him."

"Didn't your boy stay in the house after I left him at the gate, Mrs. Byram?" the breaker boss asked.

Mrs. Byram explained why Fred ventured out, and the man appeared to be disturbed in mind.

"This is just the time when he oughter kept his nose inside. Them young ruffians are likely to do any mischief."

"Then you believe something serious has happened."

"I didn't say quite that; but it won't do much harm to have a look for him. You go home, an' I'll call there in an hour." Then turning to some of the loungers, he asked, "Has anybody seen Skip Miller lately?"

"You're allers tryin' to make out that he's at the bottom of everything that goes wrong," Skip's father, who entered at this moment, said in a surly tone.

"If he ain't, it's not for lack of willingness. Do you know where he is?"

"Home, where he's been for an hour or more."

Donovan looked hard at the speaker, and Miller retorted:

"If you don't believe me, it won't take long to find out for yourself."

"That's exactly what I'm going to do. Mrs. Byram, I will see you again in less than an hour."

With these words the breaker boss left the store, and Fred's mother walked slowly home, the anxiety in her heart growing more intense each moment.

Two hours passed before Donovan returned and announced his inability to find the missing boy.

"I did think Skip might have had a hand in it," he said; "but I reckon he's innocent this time. I found him near his own home with a crowd of cronies, and according to all accounts he's been there since supper."

"But what has become of Fred?" Mrs. Byram asked, preserving a semblance of calmness only after the greatest difficulty.

"I hope nothing serious has happened. The superintendent has been notified, and promises to send men out in search of him at once. It is just possible he went down the slope to see the night shift at work."

There was nothing in these words to afford the distressed mother any relief, and the sorrow which would not be controlled took complete possession of her, as Donovan hurried away to join those who were examining every place where an accident might have occurred.

Meanwhile the subject of all this commotion remained where the regulators had left him. It was a long time before he recovered consciousness, and then several moments were spent in trying to decide where he was and what had happened.

The fragments of conversation heard while the boys were carrying him told that he was in an abandoned shaft, and, unacquainted though he was with mines in general, it did not require much thought to convince him how nearly impossible it would be to escape unaided.

The bonds which fastened his limbs, as well as the gag, had not been tied firmly, and in a short time he was free to begin such an examination of the place as was possible in the profound darkness.

Here and there he could feel the timbers left when the shaft was deserted, and, after groping about some moments, discovered a tunnel-like opening ten or twelve feet across. The roof or top of this place was beyond his reach, and he knew it must be a drift from which all the coal had been taken.

"It may lead for miles under the hill, and I would be no better off by following it," he thought. "Unless there is a slope which communicates with it, I'd be in a worse fix than now, because the chances of being lost or suffocated must be about even."

Then in his despair he shouted at the full strength of his lungs, until it was impossible to speak louder than a whisper.

Nothing less than the booming of a cannon could have been heard from the shaft by any one in the settlement, and with the night shift in the working mine there would hardly be any one in the vicinity.

After giving full sway to his grief for half an hour or more, anger replaced sorrow, and he rushed into the tunnel with no other thought than to escape from that particular place.

Stumbling on over decaying timbers, rocks, and mounds of earth which had fallen from the roof, he pushed straight ahead until the decided inclination told that this drift tended upward. There was now reason to believe it might communicate with another which, in turn, was reached by a slope, and hope grew strong once more.

How long he had traveled when the sound of voices caused him to halt it was impossible to form any idea; but it seemed as if several hours elapsed, and the first thought was to shout for help.

"I won't do it," he said, checking himself. "This tunnel may have led me back to the other mine, and if the people ahead are some of the night shift they'll be likely to have considerable sport at my expense."

Walking cautiously in the direction of the voices he was suddenly brought to a standstill by an apparently solid wall of earth.

He groped around until there was no question but that he had reached the end of the drift, and when this discovery had been made he found a small aperture which opened into a gallery or chamber where were a dozen men, the lamps in their hats illumining the place sufficiently for Fred to distinguish the party.

He had reached the limit of the abandoned drift, and was looking in upon a portion of the new mine.

Even now he made no appeal for help. The conversation of the men caused him to listen with no thought of his own condition.

"Unless we do the job to-morrow night there's little chance of gettin' through with it all right," one of the party was saying, and another replied with an oath:

"There's no reason why we should wait. To-night would suit me."

"I don't believe in it," a third man said. "What's to be gained by floodin' the mine, an' turnin' ourselves out of a chance to earn a living?"

"You allers was chicken-hearted, Joe Brace. Haven't we put up with enough from the mine owners an' bosses? We work for starvation wages, while they can barrel money."

"Would you say that if you hadn't been thrown out of a job?"

"That's my business. Here's a crowd of us who have sworn to stick together, no matter what happens, an' five have been warned out. Are we goin' peaceable, not liftin' a finger agin them as have got rich while we starved?"

"But how are we helpin' ourselves by floodin' the mine?"

"Three or four of sich bosses as Donovan may be in the drift when with one stroke of a pick I let the water into the lower level, and that'll show the others we're men, even if they do treat us like brutes."

"You will drown some of your own mates."

"Them as are on the level must take their chances."

"It's murder, that's what it is, an' I'll have none of it!" Brace cried, as he leaped to his feet, and in another instant the whole party were facing him who dared dispute their right to do wrong.

For some moments our hero could not distinguish a word, so great was the confusion; but when the tumult subsided in a measure two men were holding Brace, while he who appeared to be leader stood before him in a threatening attitude.

"You've sworn to go with the crowd, and know the penalty for traitors."

"I know that I'll blow the whole business if I get the chance. I've got a brother in the lower level; do you think I'll stand by while he is bein' murdered?"

"Better do that than turn agin us. We'll give you one chance; swear to hold your tongue, an' we'll do no more than make sure you can't betray us."

"An' if I don't choose to swear?"

"Then we'll leave you here lashed hand an' foot. When the mine is flooded this drift will be cut off, an' it don't need a lawyer to say what'll happen then."

"So to spite them as have done you a bad turn you're willin' to murder me?"

"That's about the size of it."

"Listen to me, Cale Billings. I promised to stand by you fellers when the agreement was to help each other agin the bosses; but now it's murder you mean. I'd rather be on the lower level when the deed is done than have part or parcel with them as are willin' to make widows an' orphans."

"Then we know what to do," Billings cried angrily, as he rushed toward Brace, and for several moments Fred had only a confused idea of what was taking place.

Brace was fighting against the entire party, and, under such circumstances, the struggle could not be prolonged.

When the watcher could next distinguish the occupants of the chamber Brace laid on his back bound hand and foot, while the others were on the point of departure.

Billings remained behind his companions to say:

"We gave you all the chance we could, an' now it's only yourself you've got to thank for what'll happen before forty-eight hours go by."

"I'd die twice over rather than put the stain of blood on my hands."

"Well, you've got the chance to try it once, an' I reckon you'll wish things was different before long. We'll take good care nobody comes this way too soon."

Then the party filed out of the room, one or two glancing back with undisguised pity, and as they passed along the drift the place was wrapped in profound darkness, with nothing to break the silence save the doomed man's heavy breathing.

Fred waited until believing the would-be murderers were beyond the sound of his voice, and then he called softly:

"Brace! Brace!"

"Who's there?"

"A breaker boy who came into the mine yesterday."

"Where are you?"

Fred explained to the best of his ability, and added:

"Do you know of any way I can get out of here?"

"No; that part of the mine has been closed a good many years, an' it would take a week to work up through the old slope. Before then the water on the lower level is bound to flood this end of the workings."

"And we shall be drowned."

"I don't see any help for it."

"But we can't stay here and be killed!" Fred cried in an agony of fear.

"It's tough, but there's no way out of it unless – "

"What? Speak quickly, for time mustn't be lost if we're to do anything toward helping ourselves."

"How large a cut is there through the wall where you are standing?"

"It's only a small one – perhaps four or five inches across."

"Couldn't you make it large enough to crawl through?"

"It wouldn't take long if I had a shovel; but without one it will be hard."

"Set about it, lad; work is better than idleness when a fellow is in this kind of a scrape."

Fred obeyed instantly, tearing away the earth regardless of the injury done his hands; but making very slow progress. The wall was composed of slate and gravel, and a pick would have been necessary to effect a speedy entrance.

Meanwhile Brace strove to cheer the boy by talking of the possibility that they might yet escape, and hour after hour Fred continued at the task until the moment arrived when it was possible, by dint of much squeezing, to make his way through the aperture.

"Do you think it is near the time when the men are to flood the mine?" he asked, groping around until his outstretched hands touched Brace's prostrate body, when he began feverishly to untie the ropes.

"No, lad, we must have half a dozen hours before us."

"Then we are all right!" Fred cried joyfully. "You know the way out, and Billings' plot can be made known in time to prevent the mischief."

"Don't fool yourself with the idea that matters have been straightened because I'm free," Brace replied, as he rose to his feet when Fred's task had been finished.

"But what is to prevent our leaving here?"

"Did you catch what Billings said when he left?"

"Yes."

"Then there's no need of sayin' anything more. Some of the murderin' crowd will be on guard at the entrance to the drift, and, knowing what we do of their plans, every means will be used to prevent our ever seeing daylight again."

"Don't you intend to do anything toward trying to escape?"

"Of course. I'm not quite a fool."

"Shall you go back with me, or try to find the shaft?"

"That would be useless. We will go straight through this drift."

"But if Billings' crowd are watching for you?"

"It's simply a case of fighting for life. There ain't much hope of overpowerin' them; the job will be child's play compared with tryin' to hold our own agin the flood that's sure to come soon."

Brace groped around for something which would serve as a weapon, but finding nothing, he said grimly:

"We'll have to go as we are, lad, an' remember that if we don't get through the drift you'll never see the breaker again."