ADVENTURES UNDER GROUND.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 77, 31 March 1928, Page 3 (Supplement)

ADVENTURES UNDER GROUND.

TOMMY DANE, MINER. (Concluded.) CHAPTER 11. The air was warm and damp and moisture dripped from the glutenin" rocks overhead. The walls of the tunnel showed strains of many colours in the lamplight; and in several places Tommy tall for his age. had to bend his head to pass beneath the thick shoring timbers that supported the roof. Mulcahy waved a hand at last. "Here we are," he said. "Here's the stope where we do our little job." Tommy looked about, stumbled near a deep hole beside him, and almost dropped a box of dynamite in the excitement. The light from his lamp revealed a small weatherboard, sign tacked to a timber above ilie hole. The letters were scrawled unevenly in black paint, "Burton." lummy pointed to it. "The sign—what does it mean?" he asked. "Oh, Burton was a man who was killed here. lie was a friend of mine, and I don t like to talk about it, son. Let's on to the end of the working." They did not have far to go. Tha tunnel stopped abruptly in a few yards, •and. a dead wall of rock faced them. The silent Antonio unburdened himself aud set about preparations, finding more equipment lying ready near by. A hiss of compressed air was released as he attached the drill. "Now, I'll start my little lecture," beg-n Mulcahy, ; miling, "and it worVt be t ' fault if you're not a first-class driller in 110 time. The driller has one of the most dangerous jobs there is. He works with explosives, and itr needs more than common carefulness and luck in handling H.E. stuff. It's quite a trick to lix a charge so that she blasts what you want her to Mast. Now, see this drill?" He took the instrument and began to explain its details slowly. Tommy listened eagerly, storing: up e\ery scrap of advice. He asked manv questions, and all were given careful answers. He liked Mulcaliy more than ever. "All right, Antonio," said the driller finally. "Pi onto!" A shot was marked, and the big drill bi't.ed and made read v. °

"One tiling you wont have to worry about, when you start drilling out at jour claim," remarked Mulcahy, as he

directed Antonio's movements, "is having (lead charges. Sometimes a charge is placed, but for some reason doesn't go off. For instance, this stope has been worked a lot. In the vail here there might be an unexploded charge of dynamite that we don't know about. If our drill was to run into it^now —curtains? rou said it." Tommy looked about him. Mulcahy smiled. J "Not much chance of getting out, eh? " ell, don't worry—not one chance in a thousand that it will happen." The whirring drill bit into the rock, and the splinters began to fly. Mulcahy watched the progress sharply. Well make three holes, trianglewise, and charge them all. Always keep yonr dynamite in your steel chest until you iK'ed it—then a falling rock won't set it off and—blow your hat off!" Tommy backed off several yards. The dank air weighed upon him, and the whirring drill rasped his nerves. It stopped suddenly, and the echo came winding back down the dark cavern. ° "Hole Number One," said Mulcahy, cheerily. "la she hot, Antonio?" Tommy waited. A cloud of gloomy foreboding settled on his shoulders. He Rioted a little running stream, a mere [trickle of stained water, at his side, shedding off down the stope. "Number Two!" called Mulcahv. Tommy squatted again at his sheltered post. The drill began its knocking song, and tlie splinters flew. "How does she go, Antonio?" asked the drill, r. feueno' (good) said the Mexican assistant. It w 5 the first and last word that Tommy Dane ever heard him say. Boom! lommy was thrown down the passage with the might of a giant's hand. His body hurtle,l off into darkness, and he lay in a tumbled heap, limp and still. For ages and ages he had been dropping through dark space, splashed with blazing stars and' whirling llow suns. The roar of whizzing comets and the smashing shock of planets was in hia ears. His head ached until he thought it wou 1 ! burst. His mouth was dry as an old shoe. What was it that happened 1 If only his head would stop hurting, may' e he could remember. ° Dynamite! That was it. There had been an accident. Hold on—it was drill

His face was wet! He found lie could move his arm and touched his forehead. A chill went through his retched body. Blood! And then he realised that his face was almost in a rill of water that trickled through the dark. The cool liquid had brought him to consciousness. He stirred, found he could sit up. His temples throbbed angrily. There was an acrid, smoky smell in the air. Painfully lie pulled himself together. There had been an accident, but unless he could lind a light he could see and do nothing. Feeling about cautiously, by a lucky chance his groping hand touched not metal. It was liis carbide lamp, bent, but probably still of use.

Now lor matches! He reached for his liip, and almost, cried with disappointment. Every match was useless—wet through by the water he had been lyins; in.

i i , began its beating again, and ne J d to pause. He must Lave a light. * ' Ed rise, and liis Lolster flap " a ?®, lnst thigh. His new revolver! The movement brought him to his senses again, and he remembered an old trick. The cartridges would be dry. With trembling hands he extracted one from the belt, bit the slug out, and carefully p>ur d " e grains of powder on the side of the holster. He took another cartridge, remo\ed the lead of that one, and plugged it tli a torn scrap of his shirt, making a wad to 7 ! ain the powder. The lantern was at hand. Now tor a try! - Shaking with excitement, he held the niout'i f the. despised little weapon right above the scattered powder and pulled, the trigger. A crack and a flash. Tile exploding cartridge had ignited the strewn powder. It burned for a second, just long enough for the boy to light the carbide lamp, ""he little flame jetted forth, bringii:- with it welc brightness. Now he conld see the worst. Hock all about him—scattered rock and shattered timber. Trapped! The tunnel where they had entered was blocked by a tangled mass of shoring and rock. He shuddered, and spoke aloud to cheer himself. '"There must be some way out!" A moan from behind answered him, and he remembered that he had not been alone. The light revealed a man lying crookedly amid the wreckage. Mulcahy! The boy stumbled forward, and knelt beside his friend. "My shoulder —we caught it this time —dead charge—bored right into it—" His voice fell back into silence. Tommy scooped a handful of water and dashed it over Mulcahy's face. Antonio must be dead, dead and buried in the tumble of rock beyond. He had been right at the heart of the blast, and no one there could have lived. Tommy, squatting further from it, had survived with no more than a few scratches and a bad shaking-up; but Malcahy's escape had been miraculous. The driller moaned again under Tommy's hand. "Do yon think they will come for us?" the boy asked eagerly. "Can't tell—oh, my head'." Tommy felt his friend's body rapidly. Several cuts—probably bones broken too. He must have help quickly or—. Would they come to them ? Even if the minera had heard the blast and knew that they were trapped, it might be Loins before they could clear away the wall of rock that cut them off from the tunnel. Tommy was desperate. He bent to hear the mumbled words of Mulcahy. "Get out—Burton's hole—leads to orebins," he gasped. '"Only chance." Burton's hole! The one way out! lie did not want to leave his injured companion, but it was the only way. If the hole really did lead out, then help could come before it was too late. Quickly Tommy Dane decided. "I'll make it, Senor Tim," he said. He stripped off his shirt and pillowed the man's head, arranging his body tenderly. •He snatched his lamp and staggered to the hole. A frail ladder clung to the side. The only chance! He dangled his feet over (he edge, hung the lamp on his belt and began the descent. It seemed years before he reached the bottom of that fateful hole, climbing down wearily, rung by rung, into the darkness below. The light made wavering lines of shadow about him. Every few steps he was forced to pause, and wait uutil the throbbing of his head was j for a moment stilled. Would he never reach the bottom. His foot touched nothingness. The lamp showed a slippery floor of rock a few feet below. At last the passage! He dropped down and lay for a moment panting. Now which way? The tunnel ran in two directions. From one side came a steady roar. That must be the orebins. He crawled forward, carefully storing up his strength. Forward and forward —and then a light! Shadows stood before him—shadows that might be men. Someone supported him by the arm. "Help!" he gasped. "Senor Mulcahy— blast in the Dead Man Stope—get there through the hole. You must hurry—he is—he is—" He fainted. Tommy Dane returned up the mineshaft on a stretcher. The first-aid gang had brought him to consciousness, and lie lay quietly beside the bandaged body of the man whose life he had saved. At the top of the shaft, they were met by Joe Buckingham, his face showing pale beneath its tan. "If anything has happened to that boy, Doctor, I*ll never forgive myself!" he exclaimed. Tommy tried to smile. "Senor Mulcahy, he is going to be all right?" The doctor rose from Mulcahy's stretched form. "He seems to be trying to say something to you, Buckingham," he said. Buckingham bent over the driller. "WTiat is it, Tim, old fellow Y" "That boy of yours—grit clear through. WTiv don't you get him a man-size gun •>." "Man-size gun? What does he mean, Tommy ?" Tommy flushed. "It is only—l am sorry. 1 said to him that my present was a gun l'or rabbits only." "Huh! Say, 1 should ha\e thought of that, blame my hide! Son, when you wake up, you're going to find you own the biggest forty-live in Sonora! By thunder, I'd get you. cannon if 1 thought you could carry it." "los," came the voice of Mulcahy, "and a cannon wouldn't- be any more than he deserved, either." Tommy Mniled painfully and closed his eyes. " 1 o-inoiTow. ' lie said weakly, "tomorrow' I gn d-nvn and learn some irore how to drill the rock, ves