Chapter Twenty Nine.The Position Darkens.“Isn’t a flood coming to sweep us away, is it?” said Vores, in a low voice full of the awe he felt.“Nay, that’s no flood,” said Hardock. “There’ll be no flood, lads, that I can’t master with my pumping gear. Now, look here, all of you; I want to try and find those boys, but we can’t carry the guv’nor farther in. What do you all say?”The men gathered round him, a weird-looking company with their lanthorns, turned to Vores as their spokesman, and the latter took off his hat and wiped his streaming brow.“And I want to find those two poor lads,” he said; “but I want to go back, for it’s turrerble work searching a place that you don’t know, and in which you seem to lose your way. It’s just madness to go on carrying the guv’nor with us; and the captain here is dead beat, so it’s nonsense to let him go on.”“Then what must we do?” said Hardock, who looked quite exhausted.“’Vide into two parties,” said Vores. “One, headed by Sam Hardock, ’ll take the guv’nor back to grass; t’other party, all volunteers, ’ll choose a leader and go on searching till a fresh gang comes down and brings some grub for ’em. That’s all I can say. If some ’un ’ll make a better plan I’d be glad to hear it and follow it out.”There was a dead silence, during which every man thought of the frank lads, who had won the hearts of those who knew them, but no one spoke.“Well, boys,” said Hardock at last, “has anyone anything to say? As for me, I don’t feel like sneaking out of it; I think I’ll be for leading the search-party if anyone volunteers.”“Oh, some on us’ll volunteer,” said one of the men. “I don’t feel like going home to my supper and bed—to can’t eat, and to can’t sleep for thinking of those two merry lads as I’ve often gone out to fish with and shared their dinner with ’em. Not me. I’ll volunteer.”“Same here, my lads,” said Vores; “I’m with you. That’s two of us. Anyone else say the word?”“Ay!—ay!—ay!” Quite a chorus of ‘ays’ broke out as the miners volunteered to a man.“Well done,” cried Vores, “that’s hearty; I feel just as if I’d had a good meal, and was fresh as a daisy. But we can’t all stay. Sam Hardock, how many do you want to help carry the guv’nor back?”“Three twos,” said Hardock, “for I’m no use yet. I can only just carry myself.”“That’s seven then, so pick your men and we’ll stay, five of us, and find the lads somehow.”“I say that Harry Vores leads us,” said the man who had first volunteered.“Hear, hear!” was chorused, and a few minutes only elapsed before Hardock had chosen his party and turned to raise the Colonel, to go back.“What’s limpet-shells and sand doing down here?” said Vores, as he held a lanthorn to light the men.“Forsils,” said Hardock, glancing at a couple Vores had picked up.“Nay, they aren’t stony shells,” said Vores. “I know; they used to eat ’em, and they’re some the old chaps as did the mining brought down for dinner.”“Ready?” said Hardock.“Ay, ay,” cried the men, who had made what children call a dandy chair with their hands, and supported the Colonel, whose arms were placed about their necks.“Then as he says, and I wish I could hear him say it now, ‘Forward!’”The men started, and Hardock turned to Vores.“Seems like acting Tom Dinassy, my lad,” he said bitterly. “I don’t feel as if I could go.”“Do you want to get up a row?” said Vores, sourly. “Be off and look after the guv’nor; don’t stop putting us chaps out of heart and making us think you jealous of me doing your work.”Hardock held out his hand to his fellow-workman.“Thank ye, my lad,” he said. “Go on, then, and take care. I’ve kept just enough candle to last us to the shaft foot; don’t go farther than you can find your way out.”“We’re going to find those two boys,” said Vores through his set teeth. “By-and-by, if we don’t come back, you send a fresh shift, and let ’em bring us some prog and some blankets; but I’m hoping you’ll find them up at grass when you get there. Now off you go, and so do we.”They parted without another word, and the next minute the dim light of the lanthorns borne by the men were dying away in two directions—the party bearing the Colonel progressing slowly till he recovered himself somewhat and ordered them to stop.“Nay, sir, there’s no need,” said Hardock; “we keep on taking you in three shifts, and can go on for long enough.”“Thank you, my lads, thank you,” said the Colonel; “but I am better now. Anxiety and fatigue were too much for me. I’m stronger, and can walk.”“Nay, sir, you can better ride.”“If I am overdone again I will ask you to carry me,” said the Colonel. “I am not a wounded man, my lads; only at the heart,” he added bitterly to himself. “How am I to face his mother if he is not found?”They set him down, and he walked on slowly for a few hundred yards; but after that one of the men saw him display a disposition to rest, and in his rough way offered his arm.“May help you a bit, sir, like a walking stick,” said the man, with a smile.“Thank you, my lad. God bless you for your kindness,” said the Colonel as he took the man’s arm; and they went on again for some time till far ahead there was the faint gleam of a light reflected from the wet granite rock, and the Colonel uttered a cry—“Ah! Quick! quick! My poor boys! At last! at last!”He hastened his steps, and the men exchanged glances and then looked at Hardock, expecting him to speak.But Hardock felt choking, and remained silent as they went on, till, turning about an angle in the zigzagging gallery, they came suddenly upon a nearly burned-out candle stuck against the wall, and beneath it, plainly to be seen, one of the leaves of the Colonel’s pocket-book.It was some moments before the old officer spoke, for the finding of the light confused him.“Why, what’s this?” he said, in an agitated voice; “you have taken some turning by mistake, and worked round to the way we came. Then very likely my poor boys have done the same, and found their way out by now.”No one spoke.“Don’t you think so, my lads?”Still no one answered; and now he began to grasp the truth.“Why, what’s this?” he cried angrily. “Surely you men have not dared—have not been such cowards—as to turn back! Halt!”The last word was uttered in so commanding a tone of voice that the little party stopped as one man.“Hardock! Explain yourself, sir. Did you dare to change the arrangements during my temporary indisposition?”“Beg your pardon, sir, you were completely beat out, and we felt that we must carry you back to the shaft.”“What insolence!” roared the Colonel. “Right about face. Forward once more. But,” he added bitterly, “if any man among you is too cowardly to help me, he can go back.”He turned and strode off into the darkness, and Hardock followed just in time to catch him as he reeled and snatched at the side of the gallery to save himself from falling.“You can’t do it, sir, you can’t do it,” said Hardock, with his voice full of the rough sympathy he felt. “We did it all for the best. We’d have carried you farther in, but it seemed like so much madness, and so we decided. Part’s gone on with Harry Vores, and we’re going to send in another shift as soon as we get back.”The Colonel looked at him despairingly, for he knew that the man’s words were true, and that it would be impossible to go on.“We did what we thought were right, sir,” continued Hardock; “and it’s quite likely that the young gents have got safely back by now.”The Colonel made no reply, but suffered himself to be led back to where the men were waiting, and then, growing more helpless minute by minute, he was conducted, after a long and toilsome task, which included several pauses to rest, to the foot of the shaft.The water had increased till it was nearly knee-deep when they waded to where the skep was waiting, and the Colonel was half fainting from exhaustion; but the feeling that the boys might be safely back revived him somewhat, and he strove hard to maintain his composure as they all stepped in, the signal was given, and they began to rise. But he was hanging heavily upon the arm of one of the men before the mouth of the shaft was reached, and he looked dazed and confused, feeling as if in a dream, when the engineer cried,—“Well, found ’em?”“Then they’ve not come back?” said Hardock.The Colonel heard no more, but just as his senses left him he was conscious of a trembling hand being thrust into his, and a voice saying,—“Our poor lads, Pendarve; can nothing more be done?”Something more could be done, for the work-people about the place—carpenters, smiths and miners—volunteered freely enough; and in the course of the night two more gangs went down, and Vores and his party gave them such advice as they could, after returning utterly wearied out; but it became more and more evident that the lads had either fallen down some smaller shaft, as yet undiscovered, in one of the side drifts of the mine, or wandered right away—how far none could tell until the place had been thoroughly explored.And at this time anxious watchers in the shed over the mouth of the mine had been recruited by the coming of one who said little, her pale, drawn face telling its own tale of her sufferings as she sat there, ready to start at every sound, and spring up excitedly whenever the signal was given for the skep to be raised.But there was no news, and she always shrank back again, to seat herself in a corner of the shed, as if desirous of being alone, and to avoid listening to the words of comfort others were eager to utter.“Not a word, Jollivet, not a word,” whispered the Colonel once during the horrors of that long-drawn night. “She has not spoken, but her eyes are so full of reproach, and they seem to keep on asking me why I could not be content without plunging into all the excitement and trouble connected with this mine.”The Major groaned.“Don’t you look at me like that,” said the Colonel, appealingly. “I am doing everything I can; and as soon as I can stir, I will head a party to go right on as far as the mine extends.”
“Isn’t a flood coming to sweep us away, is it?” said Vores, in a low voice full of the awe he felt.
“Nay, that’s no flood,” said Hardock. “There’ll be no flood, lads, that I can’t master with my pumping gear. Now, look here, all of you; I want to try and find those boys, but we can’t carry the guv’nor farther in. What do you all say?”
The men gathered round him, a weird-looking company with their lanthorns, turned to Vores as their spokesman, and the latter took off his hat and wiped his streaming brow.
“And I want to find those two poor lads,” he said; “but I want to go back, for it’s turrerble work searching a place that you don’t know, and in which you seem to lose your way. It’s just madness to go on carrying the guv’nor with us; and the captain here is dead beat, so it’s nonsense to let him go on.”
“Then what must we do?” said Hardock, who looked quite exhausted.
“’Vide into two parties,” said Vores. “One, headed by Sam Hardock, ’ll take the guv’nor back to grass; t’other party, all volunteers, ’ll choose a leader and go on searching till a fresh gang comes down and brings some grub for ’em. That’s all I can say. If some ’un ’ll make a better plan I’d be glad to hear it and follow it out.”
There was a dead silence, during which every man thought of the frank lads, who had won the hearts of those who knew them, but no one spoke.
“Well, boys,” said Hardock at last, “has anyone anything to say? As for me, I don’t feel like sneaking out of it; I think I’ll be for leading the search-party if anyone volunteers.”
“Oh, some on us’ll volunteer,” said one of the men. “I don’t feel like going home to my supper and bed—to can’t eat, and to can’t sleep for thinking of those two merry lads as I’ve often gone out to fish with and shared their dinner with ’em. Not me. I’ll volunteer.”
“Same here, my lads,” said Vores; “I’m with you. That’s two of us. Anyone else say the word?”
“Ay!—ay!—ay!” Quite a chorus of ‘ays’ broke out as the miners volunteered to a man.
“Well done,” cried Vores, “that’s hearty; I feel just as if I’d had a good meal, and was fresh as a daisy. But we can’t all stay. Sam Hardock, how many do you want to help carry the guv’nor back?”
“Three twos,” said Hardock, “for I’m no use yet. I can only just carry myself.”
“That’s seven then, so pick your men and we’ll stay, five of us, and find the lads somehow.”
“I say that Harry Vores leads us,” said the man who had first volunteered.
“Hear, hear!” was chorused, and a few minutes only elapsed before Hardock had chosen his party and turned to raise the Colonel, to go back.
“What’s limpet-shells and sand doing down here?” said Vores, as he held a lanthorn to light the men.
“Forsils,” said Hardock, glancing at a couple Vores had picked up.
“Nay, they aren’t stony shells,” said Vores. “I know; they used to eat ’em, and they’re some the old chaps as did the mining brought down for dinner.”
“Ready?” said Hardock.
“Ay, ay,” cried the men, who had made what children call a dandy chair with their hands, and supported the Colonel, whose arms were placed about their necks.
“Then as he says, and I wish I could hear him say it now, ‘Forward!’”
The men started, and Hardock turned to Vores.
“Seems like acting Tom Dinassy, my lad,” he said bitterly. “I don’t feel as if I could go.”
“Do you want to get up a row?” said Vores, sourly. “Be off and look after the guv’nor; don’t stop putting us chaps out of heart and making us think you jealous of me doing your work.”
Hardock held out his hand to his fellow-workman.
“Thank ye, my lad,” he said. “Go on, then, and take care. I’ve kept just enough candle to last us to the shaft foot; don’t go farther than you can find your way out.”
“We’re going to find those two boys,” said Vores through his set teeth. “By-and-by, if we don’t come back, you send a fresh shift, and let ’em bring us some prog and some blankets; but I’m hoping you’ll find them up at grass when you get there. Now off you go, and so do we.”
They parted without another word, and the next minute the dim light of the lanthorns borne by the men were dying away in two directions—the party bearing the Colonel progressing slowly till he recovered himself somewhat and ordered them to stop.
“Nay, sir, there’s no need,” said Hardock; “we keep on taking you in three shifts, and can go on for long enough.”
“Thank you, my lads, thank you,” said the Colonel; “but I am better now. Anxiety and fatigue were too much for me. I’m stronger, and can walk.”
“Nay, sir, you can better ride.”
“If I am overdone again I will ask you to carry me,” said the Colonel. “I am not a wounded man, my lads; only at the heart,” he added bitterly to himself. “How am I to face his mother if he is not found?”
They set him down, and he walked on slowly for a few hundred yards; but after that one of the men saw him display a disposition to rest, and in his rough way offered his arm.
“May help you a bit, sir, like a walking stick,” said the man, with a smile.
“Thank you, my lad. God bless you for your kindness,” said the Colonel as he took the man’s arm; and they went on again for some time till far ahead there was the faint gleam of a light reflected from the wet granite rock, and the Colonel uttered a cry—
“Ah! Quick! quick! My poor boys! At last! at last!”
He hastened his steps, and the men exchanged glances and then looked at Hardock, expecting him to speak.
But Hardock felt choking, and remained silent as they went on, till, turning about an angle in the zigzagging gallery, they came suddenly upon a nearly burned-out candle stuck against the wall, and beneath it, plainly to be seen, one of the leaves of the Colonel’s pocket-book.
It was some moments before the old officer spoke, for the finding of the light confused him.
“Why, what’s this?” he said, in an agitated voice; “you have taken some turning by mistake, and worked round to the way we came. Then very likely my poor boys have done the same, and found their way out by now.”
No one spoke.
“Don’t you think so, my lads?”
Still no one answered; and now he began to grasp the truth.
“Why, what’s this?” he cried angrily. “Surely you men have not dared—have not been such cowards—as to turn back! Halt!”
The last word was uttered in so commanding a tone of voice that the little party stopped as one man.
“Hardock! Explain yourself, sir. Did you dare to change the arrangements during my temporary indisposition?”
“Beg your pardon, sir, you were completely beat out, and we felt that we must carry you back to the shaft.”
“What insolence!” roared the Colonel. “Right about face. Forward once more. But,” he added bitterly, “if any man among you is too cowardly to help me, he can go back.”
He turned and strode off into the darkness, and Hardock followed just in time to catch him as he reeled and snatched at the side of the gallery to save himself from falling.
“You can’t do it, sir, you can’t do it,” said Hardock, with his voice full of the rough sympathy he felt. “We did it all for the best. We’d have carried you farther in, but it seemed like so much madness, and so we decided. Part’s gone on with Harry Vores, and we’re going to send in another shift as soon as we get back.”
The Colonel looked at him despairingly, for he knew that the man’s words were true, and that it would be impossible to go on.
“We did what we thought were right, sir,” continued Hardock; “and it’s quite likely that the young gents have got safely back by now.”
The Colonel made no reply, but suffered himself to be led back to where the men were waiting, and then, growing more helpless minute by minute, he was conducted, after a long and toilsome task, which included several pauses to rest, to the foot of the shaft.
The water had increased till it was nearly knee-deep when they waded to where the skep was waiting, and the Colonel was half fainting from exhaustion; but the feeling that the boys might be safely back revived him somewhat, and he strove hard to maintain his composure as they all stepped in, the signal was given, and they began to rise. But he was hanging heavily upon the arm of one of the men before the mouth of the shaft was reached, and he looked dazed and confused, feeling as if in a dream, when the engineer cried,—
“Well, found ’em?”
“Then they’ve not come back?” said Hardock.
The Colonel heard no more, but just as his senses left him he was conscious of a trembling hand being thrust into his, and a voice saying,—
“Our poor lads, Pendarve; can nothing more be done?”
Something more could be done, for the work-people about the place—carpenters, smiths and miners—volunteered freely enough; and in the course of the night two more gangs went down, and Vores and his party gave them such advice as they could, after returning utterly wearied out; but it became more and more evident that the lads had either fallen down some smaller shaft, as yet undiscovered, in one of the side drifts of the mine, or wandered right away—how far none could tell until the place had been thoroughly explored.
And at this time anxious watchers in the shed over the mouth of the mine had been recruited by the coming of one who said little, her pale, drawn face telling its own tale of her sufferings as she sat there, ready to start at every sound, and spring up excitedly whenever the signal was given for the skep to be raised.
But there was no news, and she always shrank back again, to seat herself in a corner of the shed, as if desirous of being alone, and to avoid listening to the words of comfort others were eager to utter.
“Not a word, Jollivet, not a word,” whispered the Colonel once during the horrors of that long-drawn night. “She has not spoken, but her eyes are so full of reproach, and they seem to keep on asking me why I could not be content without plunging into all the excitement and trouble connected with this mine.”
The Major groaned.
“Don’t you look at me like that,” said the Colonel, appealingly. “I am doing everything I can; and as soon as I can stir, I will head a party to go right on as far as the mine extends.”
Chapter Thirty.In Darkness.Gwyn Pendarve opened his eyes, feeling sore and in grievous pain. A sharp point seemed to be running into his side, and he was hurting his neck, while one shoulder felt as if it had become set, so that, though it ached terribly, he could not move.He did not know how it was or why it was, for all was confused and strange; and he lay trying to puzzle out clearly why Caer Point light should be revolving so quickly, now flashing up brightly, and now sinking again till all was nearly dark.It seemed very strange, for he had often looked out to sea on dark nights, over to where the great lighthouse stood up on the Jagger Rock ten miles away, seeing the light increase till it seemed like a comet, whose long, well-defined tail slowly swept round over the sea till it was hidden by the back of the lanthorn, and he waited till it flashed out again; but it had never given him pains in the body before, neither could he recall that it smelt so nasty, just like burnt mutton-chops.That was the strangest part of it, for he remembered when the fishermen sailed over there with them so that they could have some conger fishing off the rocks, the light keepers took them round, and among other things showed them the store-room in the lower part of the building, where the great drums of crystal oil for trimming the lamps were lifted into the tank. Yes, of course they burned paraffin oil in the great optical lanthorn; but though it was tremendously hot there, when the light was in full play, there was scarcely any odour, while now it smelt of burnt mutton fat.Gwyn could not make it out. There, in the far distance, was the light, now flashing out brightly, now dying; out into darkness, smelling horribly, making him very hot, and giving him all those aching pains from which he was suffering.There was another problem, too, that he had to solve; why was it that a lighthouse lanthorn ten miles away on a dark night should make him so hot that the perspiration stood out all over his face, and the collar of his shirt was soaked?Why was it?—why was it? He puzzled and puzzled in a muddled way, but seemed to get no nearer the solution. There was the light still coming and going and smelling badly, and making him so hot that he felt as if he could not breathe.Then the solution came like a flash, which lit up his mind just as all was black darkness; and in spite of the agony he felt as soon as he moved, he started up into a sitting posture, and then made for the light.For he knew now that it was not the lighthouse lanthorn on Jagger Rock ten miles away, but the common lanthorn he had brought down into the mine some time before, and set about ten feet off, where it could not be kicked over when they turned over in their sleep—the sleep into which he had plunged at once as if into a stupor.It was from this stupor that he had now awakened to turn from the sultry heat of the mine, chilled to the heart with horror, for the fresh candle he had lit had burned down into the socket, and was giving the final flickers before going out, and they had not a match to strike and light another.Stretching out his trembling hands, he felt in the black darkness for the lanthorn, touched it after two or three ineffectual trials, and snatched it back, feeling his fingers burnt, just as the light gave a final flare, the jar of his touch upon the lanthorn being sufficient to quench the tiny flame.In the horror of the moment Gwyn uttered a loud cry, and the result was a quick movement close at hand, followed by a voice saying,—“Yes, father, all right. I’ll get up and fetch it. Is the pain so bad?”Gwyn tried to speak, but no words came.“Did you call, father?”There was perfect silence in the stifling place, and Joe Jollivet spoke again, drowsily now.“Must have dreamt it. But—hallo—Oh, my back! What ever’s the matter with it, and—here! hallo! What does it all mean? I must have been walking in my sleep.”“Oh, Joe, Joe!” cried his companion.“Ydoll! You there? I say—what—what—where are we?”“Don’t you understand?—where we lay down when we could get no farther.”There was the sound of some one drawing a long gasping breath, and then silence again, till Joe spoke in a piteous voice.“I was dreaming that father was taken ill in the night, and he called me. Oh, Ydoll, old chap, my head feels so queer. Then we haven’t found them? I don’t feel as if I could recollect anything. It’s all black like. We came down to find them, didn’t we?”“Yes,” said Gwyn, “and walked till you stumbled and fell.”“I did? Yes, I recollect now. I was regularly beaten. We came such a long way for hours and hours. Then we’ve both been to sleep?”“I suppose so.”“But why is it so dark?”“The candle I set up burned out.”“Well, light another. You have some more.”“What am I to light one with?” groaned Gwyn.“Oh! I’d forgotten,” cried Joe, piteously, “you’ve no matches.”“No, I’ve no matches.”“But you had some, I know—you had a box; feel in your pockets again.”There was a faint rustling sound as in obedience to his companion’s imperative words, Gwyn felt in each pocket vainly, and then uttered a sigh like a groan.“No, no, no!” he cried, “there is a hole in my pocket, and the box must have gone through.”“Oh,” cried Joe, angrily; “how could I be such a fool as to trust you to carry them?”“You mean how could you be such a fool as to come without a box yourself,” said Gwyn, bitterly.“Yes, that’s it, I suppose. Here, I know—we must strike a light from the rock with the backs of our knives.”“What for?” said Gwyn, bitterly. “Where are the tinder and matches?”Joe uttered a sigh, and they both relapsed into silence once more.“What are we to do?” said Joe, at last. “It is horrible, horrible to be in this black darkness. Say something, Ydoll—we can’t lie down here and die.”“We can’t go on in the black darkness,” said Gwyn, bitterly.“We must feel our way.”“And suppose we come to some hole and go down?”Joe drew his breath sharply through his teeth as he winced at the horrible idea.“Better lie down again and go to sleep,” said Gwyn, despondently. “We can do no more.”“Lie down till they come with lights and find us?”“Yes,” said Gwyn, who gathered courage from these words of hope. “It’s of no use to give up. Father must have found his way out by this time. Sam Hardock knows so much about mines; he is sure not to be lost for long.”“But if they don’t find us? I’m so faint and hungry now I don’t know what to do.”“Yes, I suppose what I feel is being hungry,” sighed Gwyn, “but we mustn’t think about it. I say, how far do you think we wandered about yesterday?”“Miles and miles and miles,” said Joe, dismally; “and for nothing at all but to lose ourselves. But I say, Ydoll, it wasn’t yesterday. We couldn’t have slept long.”“I felt as if I slept all night.”“But we couldn’t; because we only slept as long as our candle burned.”“Of course not. How stupid! But I’m so done up that my head doesn’t seem as if it would go; let’s lie down and go to sleep till they find us.”“And perhaps that will be never. Someone will find our bones, perhaps.”“Ha, ha!” cried Gwyn, bursting into a mocking laugh. “We’re a nice pair of miserable cowards! I did think you had more pluck in you, Joe.”“That’s what I thought about you, Ydoll.”“So did I,” said Gwyn, frankly; “and all the time I’m as great a coward as you are. I say, though, doesn’t it show a fellow up when he gets into trouble? Can’t show me up in the dark, though, can it?”“Oh, I don’t know; I only know I feel horribly miserable. Let’s go to sleep and forget it all.”“Sha’n’t,” shouted Gwyn, making an effort over himself. “I won’t be such a jolly miserable coward, and you sha’n’t neither. We’ll do something.”“Ay, it’s all very well to talk, but what can we do?—cooey?”“No good, or I’d cooey loud enough to bring some of the stones down. I say, though, isn’t it wonderful how solid it all is—no stones falling from the roof.”“How could they fall when there are none to fall? Isn’t it all cut through the solid rock?”“Humph! yes, I suppose so; but we have found scarcely anything to fall over.”“No,” said Joe, sarcastically, “it’s a lovely place. I wish the beastly old mine had been burnt before we had anything to do with it.”“Oh, I say, what a plucked ’un you are, Joey. Breaking down over a bit of trouble. I feel ever so much better now, for I’m sure the dad has found his way out.”“I was thinking about my father.”“Well, so was I. My father wouldn’t go out without yours. They’re too good old chums to forsake one another; and you see if before long they don’t both come with a lot of men carrying baskets—cold roast chicken, slices of ham, bread and butter, and a kettle and wood to light the fire and make some tea.”“I say! don’t, don’t, don’t,” cried Joe. “I was bad enough before, now you’re making me feel savagely hungry. But I say, Ydoll, do you really think they’ve got out?”“I’m sure of it.”“And not lost themselves so that they won’t be found till it’s too late?”“Get out! Too late? They’ll be all right, and so shall we; we’re only lost for a bit in the dark, and we don’t mind a bit. I don’t now. I feel as plucky as a gamecock. And I say, Joe.”“Well?”“Tom Dinass?”“What about him?—a beast!”“What we’re going to do when we see the sneak again. I say, it won’t be the first time we’ve had a set-to with him.”“Oh, I should like to—”“Ah!”Gwyn uttered a wild cry, as if something from out of the darkness had seized him; and as the cry went echoing down the long zigzag passage in which they were, Joe uttered a gasp, and in spite of his desire to stand by his friend, dashed off from the unknown danger by which they were beset.
Gwyn Pendarve opened his eyes, feeling sore and in grievous pain. A sharp point seemed to be running into his side, and he was hurting his neck, while one shoulder felt as if it had become set, so that, though it ached terribly, he could not move.
He did not know how it was or why it was, for all was confused and strange; and he lay trying to puzzle out clearly why Caer Point light should be revolving so quickly, now flashing up brightly, and now sinking again till all was nearly dark.
It seemed very strange, for he had often looked out to sea on dark nights, over to where the great lighthouse stood up on the Jagger Rock ten miles away, seeing the light increase till it seemed like a comet, whose long, well-defined tail slowly swept round over the sea till it was hidden by the back of the lanthorn, and he waited till it flashed out again; but it had never given him pains in the body before, neither could he recall that it smelt so nasty, just like burnt mutton-chops.
That was the strangest part of it, for he remembered when the fishermen sailed over there with them so that they could have some conger fishing off the rocks, the light keepers took them round, and among other things showed them the store-room in the lower part of the building, where the great drums of crystal oil for trimming the lamps were lifted into the tank. Yes, of course they burned paraffin oil in the great optical lanthorn; but though it was tremendously hot there, when the light was in full play, there was scarcely any odour, while now it smelt of burnt mutton fat.
Gwyn could not make it out. There, in the far distance, was the light, now flashing out brightly, now dying; out into darkness, smelling horribly, making him very hot, and giving him all those aching pains from which he was suffering.
There was another problem, too, that he had to solve; why was it that a lighthouse lanthorn ten miles away on a dark night should make him so hot that the perspiration stood out all over his face, and the collar of his shirt was soaked?
Why was it?—why was it? He puzzled and puzzled in a muddled way, but seemed to get no nearer the solution. There was the light still coming and going and smelling badly, and making him so hot that he felt as if he could not breathe.
Then the solution came like a flash, which lit up his mind just as all was black darkness; and in spite of the agony he felt as soon as he moved, he started up into a sitting posture, and then made for the light.
For he knew now that it was not the lighthouse lanthorn on Jagger Rock ten miles away, but the common lanthorn he had brought down into the mine some time before, and set about ten feet off, where it could not be kicked over when they turned over in their sleep—the sleep into which he had plunged at once as if into a stupor.
It was from this stupor that he had now awakened to turn from the sultry heat of the mine, chilled to the heart with horror, for the fresh candle he had lit had burned down into the socket, and was giving the final flickers before going out, and they had not a match to strike and light another.
Stretching out his trembling hands, he felt in the black darkness for the lanthorn, touched it after two or three ineffectual trials, and snatched it back, feeling his fingers burnt, just as the light gave a final flare, the jar of his touch upon the lanthorn being sufficient to quench the tiny flame.
In the horror of the moment Gwyn uttered a loud cry, and the result was a quick movement close at hand, followed by a voice saying,—
“Yes, father, all right. I’ll get up and fetch it. Is the pain so bad?”
Gwyn tried to speak, but no words came.
“Did you call, father?”
There was perfect silence in the stifling place, and Joe Jollivet spoke again, drowsily now.
“Must have dreamt it. But—hallo—Oh, my back! What ever’s the matter with it, and—here! hallo! What does it all mean? I must have been walking in my sleep.”
“Oh, Joe, Joe!” cried his companion.
“Ydoll! You there? I say—what—what—where are we?”
“Don’t you understand?—where we lay down when we could get no farther.”
There was the sound of some one drawing a long gasping breath, and then silence again, till Joe spoke in a piteous voice.
“I was dreaming that father was taken ill in the night, and he called me. Oh, Ydoll, old chap, my head feels so queer. Then we haven’t found them? I don’t feel as if I could recollect anything. It’s all black like. We came down to find them, didn’t we?”
“Yes,” said Gwyn, “and walked till you stumbled and fell.”
“I did? Yes, I recollect now. I was regularly beaten. We came such a long way for hours and hours. Then we’ve both been to sleep?”
“I suppose so.”
“But why is it so dark?”
“The candle I set up burned out.”
“Well, light another. You have some more.”
“What am I to light one with?” groaned Gwyn.
“Oh! I’d forgotten,” cried Joe, piteously, “you’ve no matches.”
“No, I’ve no matches.”
“But you had some, I know—you had a box; feel in your pockets again.”
There was a faint rustling sound as in obedience to his companion’s imperative words, Gwyn felt in each pocket vainly, and then uttered a sigh like a groan.
“No, no, no!” he cried, “there is a hole in my pocket, and the box must have gone through.”
“Oh,” cried Joe, angrily; “how could I be such a fool as to trust you to carry them?”
“You mean how could you be such a fool as to come without a box yourself,” said Gwyn, bitterly.
“Yes, that’s it, I suppose. Here, I know—we must strike a light from the rock with the backs of our knives.”
“What for?” said Gwyn, bitterly. “Where are the tinder and matches?”
Joe uttered a sigh, and they both relapsed into silence once more.
“What are we to do?” said Joe, at last. “It is horrible, horrible to be in this black darkness. Say something, Ydoll—we can’t lie down here and die.”
“We can’t go on in the black darkness,” said Gwyn, bitterly.
“We must feel our way.”
“And suppose we come to some hole and go down?”
Joe drew his breath sharply through his teeth as he winced at the horrible idea.
“Better lie down again and go to sleep,” said Gwyn, despondently. “We can do no more.”
“Lie down till they come with lights and find us?”
“Yes,” said Gwyn, who gathered courage from these words of hope. “It’s of no use to give up. Father must have found his way out by this time. Sam Hardock knows so much about mines; he is sure not to be lost for long.”
“But if they don’t find us? I’m so faint and hungry now I don’t know what to do.”
“Yes, I suppose what I feel is being hungry,” sighed Gwyn, “but we mustn’t think about it. I say, how far do you think we wandered about yesterday?”
“Miles and miles and miles,” said Joe, dismally; “and for nothing at all but to lose ourselves. But I say, Ydoll, it wasn’t yesterday. We couldn’t have slept long.”
“I felt as if I slept all night.”
“But we couldn’t; because we only slept as long as our candle burned.”
“Of course not. How stupid! But I’m so done up that my head doesn’t seem as if it would go; let’s lie down and go to sleep till they find us.”
“And perhaps that will be never. Someone will find our bones, perhaps.”
“Ha, ha!” cried Gwyn, bursting into a mocking laugh. “We’re a nice pair of miserable cowards! I did think you had more pluck in you, Joe.”
“That’s what I thought about you, Ydoll.”
“So did I,” said Gwyn, frankly; “and all the time I’m as great a coward as you are. I say, though, doesn’t it show a fellow up when he gets into trouble? Can’t show me up in the dark, though, can it?”
“Oh, I don’t know; I only know I feel horribly miserable. Let’s go to sleep and forget it all.”
“Sha’n’t,” shouted Gwyn, making an effort over himself. “I won’t be such a jolly miserable coward, and you sha’n’t neither. We’ll do something.”
“Ay, it’s all very well to talk, but what can we do?—cooey?”
“No good, or I’d cooey loud enough to bring some of the stones down. I say, though, isn’t it wonderful how solid it all is—no stones falling from the roof.”
“How could they fall when there are none to fall? Isn’t it all cut through the solid rock?”
“Humph! yes, I suppose so; but we have found scarcely anything to fall over.”
“No,” said Joe, sarcastically, “it’s a lovely place. I wish the beastly old mine had been burnt before we had anything to do with it.”
“Oh, I say, what a plucked ’un you are, Joey. Breaking down over a bit of trouble. I feel ever so much better now, for I’m sure the dad has found his way out.”
“I was thinking about my father.”
“Well, so was I. My father wouldn’t go out without yours. They’re too good old chums to forsake one another; and you see if before long they don’t both come with a lot of men carrying baskets—cold roast chicken, slices of ham, bread and butter, and a kettle and wood to light the fire and make some tea.”
“I say! don’t, don’t, don’t,” cried Joe. “I was bad enough before, now you’re making me feel savagely hungry. But I say, Ydoll, do you really think they’ve got out?”
“I’m sure of it.”
“And not lost themselves so that they won’t be found till it’s too late?”
“Get out! Too late? They’ll be all right, and so shall we; we’re only lost for a bit in the dark, and we don’t mind a bit. I don’t now. I feel as plucky as a gamecock. And I say, Joe.”
“Well?”
“Tom Dinass?”
“What about him?—a beast!”
“What we’re going to do when we see the sneak again. I say, it won’t be the first time we’ve had a set-to with him.”
“Oh, I should like to—”
“Ah!”
Gwyn uttered a wild cry, as if something from out of the darkness had seized him; and as the cry went echoing down the long zigzag passage in which they were, Joe uttered a gasp, and in spite of his desire to stand by his friend, dashed off from the unknown danger by which they were beset.
Chapter Thirty One.Gwyn gives it up.There came a dull sound out of the darkness, as if Joe had struck against the wall of the mine; but he gave vent to no exclamation, and Gwyn cried to him to stop.“Where are you? Don’t run off like that, Joe!—Joe! Where are you?”“Here,” said the lad, hoarsely. “What is it? What has hurt you?”“Hurt me? I thought something had hurt you. What made you rush off?”“You shouted. What was it?”“Enough to make me shout. Where are you?”Guided by their voices, the lads approached till they were close together.“Now what was it?” panted Joe, who was still trembling from the nervous alarm and shock.“Give me your hand.”Joe obeyed shrinkingly, and felt it passed along the skirt of his companion’s jacket.“Feel it?”“Yes, I feel something inside the lining. What is it—a box?”“Yes, the matches. They got through the hole into the lining. Wait till I get them out.”This was only achieved with the help of a knife.“Ah!” ejaculated the boy, as he at last dragged out the box, struck a match, and held it over his head to see where the candle-box had been laid; and then by quick manipulation he managed to get a wick well alight before the tiny deal splint was extinct.In his excitement and delight, Joe clapped his hands as the candle was forced into the empty socket, and the lanthorn door closed.“Oh, what a beautiful thing light is!” he cried.“And what a horrible thing darkness, at a time like this! There, one feels better, and quite rested. Let’s go on, and we may come to them at any time now.”Joe said nothing, for fear of damping his companion’s spirits; but he knew that they were not rested—that they would soon be forced to stop; and as he gazed right away before them, and tried to pierce the gloom beyond the circle of light shed by the candle, the hopeless nature of their quest forced itself upon him more and more.But Gwyn’s spirits seemed to be now unnaturally high, and as they went on following the narrowed tunnels, and passing along such branches as seemed to be the most likely from their size, he held up the lanthorn to point out that the ore seemed to have been cut out for ten or twenty feet above their heads in a slanting direction. In another place he paused to look into a narrow passage that seemed to have been only just commenced, for there was glittering ore at the end, and the marks of picks or hammers, looking as if they had been lately made.“There’s nothing to mind, Joe,” he said; “only I do want to get back to the shaft now.”“Then why not turn?”“We did, ever so long ago. Don’t you remember seeing that beginning of a passage as we came along?”“I remember stopping to look into two niches like this one but they were ever so far back, and we are still going on into the depths of the mine.”“No, no; we took a turn off to the left soon after I lit the fresh candle, and we must be getting back towards the entrance.”Joe said nothing, but he felt sure that he was right; and they went on again till at the end of another lane Gwyn stopped short.“I say, I felt sure we were going back. Do you really believe that we are going farther in?”“I felt sure that we were a little while ago, but I am not so sure now, for one gets confused.”“Yes, confused,” said Gwyn, sadly. “We seem to have been constantly following turnings leading in all directions, and they’re all alike, and go on and on. Aren’t you getting tired?”“Horribly; but we mustn’t think of that. Let’s notice what we see, so as to have something to tell them when we get home.”“Well, that’s soon done; the walls are nearly all alike, and the passages run in veins, one of which the people who used to work here followed until they had got out all the ore, and then they opened others.”“But the ore seems to be richer in some places than in others.”“Yes, and the walls seem wetter in some places than in others; and sometimes one crushes shells beneath one’s feet, and there’s quantities of sand.”“But how far should you think we are now from the entrance?”“I don’t know. Miles and miles.”“Oh, that’s exaggeration, for we’ve come along so slowly; and being tired makes you feel that it is a long way.”They went on and on, at last, as if in a dream, following the winding and zigzagging passages, and speaking more and more seldom, till at last they found themselves in a place which they certainly had not seen before, for the mine suddenly opened out into a wide irregular hall, supported here and there by rugged pillars left by the miners; and now confusion grew doubly confused, for, as they went slowly around over the rugged, well-worn floor, and in and out among the pillars, they could dimly see that passages and shafts went from all sides. The roof sparkled as the light was held up, and they could note that in places the marks of the miners’ picks and hammers still remained.Roughly speaking, the place was about a hundred feet across, and the floor in the centre was piled up into a hillock, as if the ore that had been brought from the passages around had been thrown in a heap—for that it was ore, and apparently rich in quality, they were now learned enough in metallurgy to know.Gwyn had a fancy that, this being a central position, if the party they sought were still in the mine they would be somewhere here; and he made Joe start by hailing loudly, but raised so strange a volley of echoes that he refrained from repeating his cry, preferring to wait and listen for the answer which did not come.“It’s of no use,” he said; “let’s turn back; they must have got out by now.”“Yes, I hope so; but what an awfully big place it is. I say, though, where was it we came in—by that passage, wasn’t it?”Gwyn looked in the direction pointed out, but felt certain that it was not correct. At the same time, though, he fully realised that he was quite at fault, for at least a dozen of the low tunnels opened upon this rugged, pillared hall, so exactly alike, and they had wandered about so much since they entered, and began to thread their way in and out among the pillars, that he stared blankly at Joe in his weariness, and muttered despairingly,—“I give it up.”
There came a dull sound out of the darkness, as if Joe had struck against the wall of the mine; but he gave vent to no exclamation, and Gwyn cried to him to stop.
“Where are you? Don’t run off like that, Joe!—Joe! Where are you?”
“Here,” said the lad, hoarsely. “What is it? What has hurt you?”
“Hurt me? I thought something had hurt you. What made you rush off?”
“You shouted. What was it?”
“Enough to make me shout. Where are you?”
Guided by their voices, the lads approached till they were close together.
“Now what was it?” panted Joe, who was still trembling from the nervous alarm and shock.
“Give me your hand.”
Joe obeyed shrinkingly, and felt it passed along the skirt of his companion’s jacket.
“Feel it?”
“Yes, I feel something inside the lining. What is it—a box?”
“Yes, the matches. They got through the hole into the lining. Wait till I get them out.”
This was only achieved with the help of a knife.
“Ah!” ejaculated the boy, as he at last dragged out the box, struck a match, and held it over his head to see where the candle-box had been laid; and then by quick manipulation he managed to get a wick well alight before the tiny deal splint was extinct.
In his excitement and delight, Joe clapped his hands as the candle was forced into the empty socket, and the lanthorn door closed.
“Oh, what a beautiful thing light is!” he cried.
“And what a horrible thing darkness, at a time like this! There, one feels better, and quite rested. Let’s go on, and we may come to them at any time now.”
Joe said nothing, for fear of damping his companion’s spirits; but he knew that they were not rested—that they would soon be forced to stop; and as he gazed right away before them, and tried to pierce the gloom beyond the circle of light shed by the candle, the hopeless nature of their quest forced itself upon him more and more.
But Gwyn’s spirits seemed to be now unnaturally high, and as they went on following the narrowed tunnels, and passing along such branches as seemed to be the most likely from their size, he held up the lanthorn to point out that the ore seemed to have been cut out for ten or twenty feet above their heads in a slanting direction. In another place he paused to look into a narrow passage that seemed to have been only just commenced, for there was glittering ore at the end, and the marks of picks or hammers, looking as if they had been lately made.
“There’s nothing to mind, Joe,” he said; “only I do want to get back to the shaft now.”
“Then why not turn?”
“We did, ever so long ago. Don’t you remember seeing that beginning of a passage as we came along?”
“I remember stopping to look into two niches like this one but they were ever so far back, and we are still going on into the depths of the mine.”
“No, no; we took a turn off to the left soon after I lit the fresh candle, and we must be getting back towards the entrance.”
Joe said nothing, but he felt sure that he was right; and they went on again till at the end of another lane Gwyn stopped short.
“I say, I felt sure we were going back. Do you really believe that we are going farther in?”
“I felt sure that we were a little while ago, but I am not so sure now, for one gets confused.”
“Yes, confused,” said Gwyn, sadly. “We seem to have been constantly following turnings leading in all directions, and they’re all alike, and go on and on. Aren’t you getting tired?”
“Horribly; but we mustn’t think of that. Let’s notice what we see, so as to have something to tell them when we get home.”
“Well, that’s soon done; the walls are nearly all alike, and the passages run in veins, one of which the people who used to work here followed until they had got out all the ore, and then they opened others.”
“But the ore seems to be richer in some places than in others.”
“Yes, and the walls seem wetter in some places than in others; and sometimes one crushes shells beneath one’s feet, and there’s quantities of sand.”
“But how far should you think we are now from the entrance?”
“I don’t know. Miles and miles.”
“Oh, that’s exaggeration, for we’ve come along so slowly; and being tired makes you feel that it is a long way.”
They went on and on, at last, as if in a dream, following the winding and zigzagging passages, and speaking more and more seldom, till at last they found themselves in a place which they certainly had not seen before, for the mine suddenly opened out into a wide irregular hall, supported here and there by rugged pillars left by the miners; and now confusion grew doubly confused, for, as they went slowly around over the rugged, well-worn floor, and in and out among the pillars, they could dimly see that passages and shafts went from all sides. The roof sparkled as the light was held up, and they could note that in places the marks of the miners’ picks and hammers still remained.
Roughly speaking, the place was about a hundred feet across, and the floor in the centre was piled up into a hillock, as if the ore that had been brought from the passages around had been thrown in a heap—for that it was ore, and apparently rich in quality, they were now learned enough in metallurgy to know.
Gwyn had a fancy that, this being a central position, if the party they sought were still in the mine they would be somewhere here; and he made Joe start by hailing loudly, but raised so strange a volley of echoes that he refrained from repeating his cry, preferring to wait and listen for the answer which did not come.
“It’s of no use,” he said; “let’s turn back; they must have got out by now.”
“Yes, I hope so; but what an awfully big place it is. I say, though, where was it we came in—by that passage, wasn’t it?”
Gwyn looked in the direction pointed out, but felt certain that it was not correct. At the same time, though, he fully realised that he was quite at fault, for at least a dozen of the low tunnels opened upon this rugged, pillared hall, so exactly alike, and they had wandered about so much since they entered, and began to thread their way in and out among the pillars, that he stared blankly at Joe in his weariness, and muttered despairingly,—
“I give it up.”
Chapter Thirty Two.A Novel Nightmare.From that hour they both “gave it up”—in other words, resigned themselves in a hopeless weary way to their fate, and went on in an automatic fashion, resting, tramping on again over patches of sand and clean hard places where the rock had been worn smooth. The pangs of hunger attacked them more and more, and then came maddening thirst which they assuaged by drinking from one of the clear pools lying in depressions, the water tasting sweet and pure. From time to time the candles were renewed in the lanthorn, and the rate at which they burned was marked with feverish earnestness; and at last, in their dread of a serious calamity, it was arranged that one should watch while the other slept. In this way they would be sure of not being missed by a body of searchers who might come by and, hearing no sound, pass in ignorance of their position.Gwyn kept the first watch, Joe having completely broken down and begun to reel from side to side of the passage they were struggling along in a hopeless way; and when Gwyn caught his arm to save him from falling, he turned and smiled at him feebly.“Legs won’t go any longer,” he said gently; and, sinking upon his knees, he lay down on the bare rock, placed his hand under his face as he uttered a low sigh, and Gwyn said quietly,—“That’s right; have a nap, and then we’ll go on again.”There was no reply, and Gwyn bent over him and held the lanthorn to his face.“How soon anyone goes to sleep!” he said softly. “Seems to be all in a moment.”The boy stood looking down at his companion for a few moments, and then turned with the light to inspect their position.They were in a curve of one of the galleries formed by the extraction of the veins of tin ore, and there was little to see but the ruddy-tinted walls, sparkling roof, and dusty floor. A faint dripping noise showed him where water was falling from the roof, and in the rock a basin of some inches in depth was worn, from which he refreshed himself, and then felt better as he walked on for a hundred yards in a feeble, weary way, to find that which gave him a little hope, for the gallery suddenly began to run upward, and came to an end.“But it may only be the end of this part,” muttered Gwyn; “there are others which go on I suppose, but one can’t get any farther here, and that’s something.”He walked back to where Joe lay sleeping heavily, after convincing himself of the reason why the turning had come to an end where it did, for the vein had run upward, gradually growing thinner till, at some thirty feet up, as far as he could make out by his dim light, the men had ceased working, probably from the supply not being worth their trouble.Joe was muttering in his sleep when Gwyn reached his side, but for a time his words were unintelligible. Then quite plainly he said,—“Be good for you, father. The mine will give you something to do, and then you won’t have time to think so much of your old wounds.”“And if he has got out safely and they never find us, this will be like a new wound for the poor old Major to think about,” mused Gwyn. “How dreadful it is, and how helpless we seem! It’s always the same; gallery after gallery, just alike, and that’s why it’s so puzzling. I wonder whether any of the old miners were ever lost here and starved to death.”The thought was so horribly suggestive that the perspiration came out in great drops on the boy’s face, and he glanced quickly to right and left, even holding up his lanthorn, fancying for the moment that he might catch sight of some dried-up traces of the poor unfortunates who had struggled on for days, as they had, and then sunk down to rise no more.“How horrible!” he muttered; “and how can Joe lie there sleeping, when perhaps our fate may be like theirs?”But he had unconsciously started another train of thought which set him calculating, and took his attention from the imaginary horrors which had troubled him.“Wandered about for days and days,” he mused. “It seems like it, but that’s impossible. It can’t be much more than one, or we couldn’t have kept on. We should have been starved to death. We couldn’t have lived on water.”He wiped his wet brow, and it seemed to him that the gallery they were in was not so stifling and hot, unless it was that he had grown weaker. Still one thing was certain; he could breathe more freely.“Getting used to it,” he thought; and, putting down the lanthorn, he seated himself with his back close to the wall.Joe slept heavily, and the lad looked at him enviously.“I couldn’t sleep so peaceably as that,” he said half aloud. “How can a fellow sleep when he doesn’t know but what his father may be dying close by from starvation and weakness. It seems too bad.”Gwyn opened the lanthorn and found that the candle was half burned down, and for a moment he thought of setting up another in its place, for fear he should go to sleep and it should burn out.“Be such a pity,” he said, “we don’t want light while we’re asleep; only to wake up here in this horrible place is enough to drive anybody mad.”Then he closed the lanthorn again.“I sha’n’t go to sleep,” he muttered. “In too much trouble.” And he began thinking in a sore, dreary way of his mother seated at home waiting for news of his father and of him.“It’ll nearly kill her,” he said. “But she’ll like it for me to have come here in search of poor dad. It would have been so cowardly if I hadn’t come, and she would have felt ashamed of me. Yes, she’ll like my dying like this.”He paused, for his thoughts made him ponder.“We can’t be going to die,” he said to himself, “or we shouldn’t be taking it all so easily and be so quiet and calm. If we felt that we really were going to die, we should be half mad with horror, and run shrieking about till we dropped in a fit. No,” he said softly, “it isn’t like that. People on board ship, when they know it’s going to sink, all behave quite calmly and patiently. There was that ship that was being burned with the soldiers on board. They all stood up before their officers, waiting for the end, and went down at last like men. But I don’t feel despairing like, and as if we were going to die.”Then he began to think of his peaceful home life, and of the days at school till about a year ago, when he had come home to study military matters with his father and Major Jollivet, prior to being sent to one of the military colleges in about a year’s time.“And now this mining has altered everything,” mused Gwyn, “and—”He started violently, sprang up, and looked about him, for his name had been uttered loudly close to his ear.But all was still now, and a curious creepy sensation ran through him and made him shiver with apprehension—a strange, superstitious kind of apprehension, as if something invisible were close to him.“What a cowardly donkey!” he muttered, for his name was uttered again, and plainly enough it came from Joe.“Talking in his sleep; and I was ready to fancy it was something ‘no canny.’ Why I must have been dropping off to sleep, too, and it startled me into wakefulness. This won’t do. Sentries must not sleep at their posts.”He began to do what the soldiers call “sentry go.” But in a few minutes he grew so weary and hot that he was glad to stop by his sleeping companion, and stand looking down at him lying so peacefully there with his head upon his hand.“Just as if he were in a feather bed and with a soft pillow under his cheek. Wish I could lie down and have a nap for half-an-hour. I will, and then he can have another.”Gwyn bent down to waken his companion, who just then burst out with a merry laugh.“Oh, I say, father, you shouldn’t,” he said. “Just as if I didn’t take care. It isn’t—”“Isn’t what, Joe?” said Gwyn, softly.“The wrong bottle. You’re always thinking I give you the wrong medicine, and saying it tastes different. Hah!”He ended with a long deep sigh of content, and lay perfectly silent.“I can’t wake him,” muttered Gwyn; and with a weary groan he seated himself once more, supporting his back against the side of the gallery, for he was too weak and tired to stand, and in an instant he was out in the bright sunshine, with the water making the boat he was in dance and the sail flap, as he glided along out of the cave into the open sea. Then with a violent start he was awake again, drawing himself up and fighting hard against terrible odds, for Nature said that he was completely exhausted, and must rest.And as he set his teeth and stared hard at the faintly glittering wall opposite, where the great vein of milk-white quartz was spangled with grains of tin, his head bowed down and dropped forward till his chin touched his chest.Again he sprang up, to prop his head back against the rock, but it had been hacked away so that it curved over and seemed to join Nature in her efforts to master him and force him to sleep, bending down his head and sending it in the old direction, so that his brow seemed heavier than lead, and he bent it lower and lower, while once more he was out on the glittering waters of the sea, the boat bounding rapidly along and all trouble at an end. For the darkness of the cavernous mine was gone, with all its weary horrors—there was nothing to mind, nothing to do, but sink lower and lower in the boat, and rest.Hard—angular—stony? The granite chipped by hammer and pick felt like the softest down, as Gwyn swayed slowly over to his left, his shoulders rubbing against the wall and his half-braced muscles involuntarily acting in obedience to his will to keep him upright, so that he did not fall, but gently subsided till he was lying prone close to the lanthorn, which shed its faint yellowish light and cast dim shadows which, there in that gloomy spot, looked like a couple of graves newly banked up to mark the spots where the two lads had lain down to die or to be found and live, whichever fate ordained.Joe must have slept for what was guessed to be a couple of hours; but they had passed, and he still slept on, with his rest growing more and more sweet and restful, while for Gwyn there was nothing but profound silence and vacancy. He did not dream—only plunged deeper and deeper into the stupor till six hours had passed away, and then the dream came.A terrible wild dream of being somewhere in great danger—a place from which there was no escape from a dangerous wolf-like beast, which had followed him for hours, and was slowly hunting him down.And every moment the vision grew more real, and the fierce beast came closer and closer in spite of his efforts to escape—mad, frantic efforts—while every limb was like lead, and held him back so that he might be the monster’s prey.He felt that it was a delusion, and that he must soon wake and find relief; but when he did, the relief did not come for the horrors of the dream were continued in the reality, and his lips parted to utter a wild cry; but lips, tongue, and throat were all parched and dry, and he lay there in an agony which seemed maddening.There was no question now of where he was, for though it was intensely dark he knew well enough, for he had awakened into full consciousness with every sense unnaturally sharpened, and making things clear. His limbs were like lead still, but it was not from nightmare, for they were numbed and helpless. There was the unpleasant odour of the burnt-out candle, and the sickly smoke hanging about him, as if the light had but lately gone out, and he could hear Joe’s stertorous breathing as if he too were in trouble; and simultaneously with it came the knowledge that, after all, the cavernous place out of which the water had been drained was inhabited by strange beasts, one of which had attacked him.For the moment he was ready to explain it as a form of nightmare, but it was too real. It was the hard stern reality itself. There was the weight upon his chest, but not the heavy inert mass of a hideous dream, but that of some creature full of palpitating life extended upon him. He could feel the motion as it breathed, the heavy pulsations of its heart, and, worst horror of all, the hot breath from its panting jaws not many inches from his brow.
From that hour they both “gave it up”—in other words, resigned themselves in a hopeless weary way to their fate, and went on in an automatic fashion, resting, tramping on again over patches of sand and clean hard places where the rock had been worn smooth. The pangs of hunger attacked them more and more, and then came maddening thirst which they assuaged by drinking from one of the clear pools lying in depressions, the water tasting sweet and pure. From time to time the candles were renewed in the lanthorn, and the rate at which they burned was marked with feverish earnestness; and at last, in their dread of a serious calamity, it was arranged that one should watch while the other slept. In this way they would be sure of not being missed by a body of searchers who might come by and, hearing no sound, pass in ignorance of their position.
Gwyn kept the first watch, Joe having completely broken down and begun to reel from side to side of the passage they were struggling along in a hopeless way; and when Gwyn caught his arm to save him from falling, he turned and smiled at him feebly.
“Legs won’t go any longer,” he said gently; and, sinking upon his knees, he lay down on the bare rock, placed his hand under his face as he uttered a low sigh, and Gwyn said quietly,—
“That’s right; have a nap, and then we’ll go on again.”
There was no reply, and Gwyn bent over him and held the lanthorn to his face.
“How soon anyone goes to sleep!” he said softly. “Seems to be all in a moment.”
The boy stood looking down at his companion for a few moments, and then turned with the light to inspect their position.
They were in a curve of one of the galleries formed by the extraction of the veins of tin ore, and there was little to see but the ruddy-tinted walls, sparkling roof, and dusty floor. A faint dripping noise showed him where water was falling from the roof, and in the rock a basin of some inches in depth was worn, from which he refreshed himself, and then felt better as he walked on for a hundred yards in a feeble, weary way, to find that which gave him a little hope, for the gallery suddenly began to run upward, and came to an end.
“But it may only be the end of this part,” muttered Gwyn; “there are others which go on I suppose, but one can’t get any farther here, and that’s something.”
He walked back to where Joe lay sleeping heavily, after convincing himself of the reason why the turning had come to an end where it did, for the vein had run upward, gradually growing thinner till, at some thirty feet up, as far as he could make out by his dim light, the men had ceased working, probably from the supply not being worth their trouble.
Joe was muttering in his sleep when Gwyn reached his side, but for a time his words were unintelligible. Then quite plainly he said,—
“Be good for you, father. The mine will give you something to do, and then you won’t have time to think so much of your old wounds.”
“And if he has got out safely and they never find us, this will be like a new wound for the poor old Major to think about,” mused Gwyn. “How dreadful it is, and how helpless we seem! It’s always the same; gallery after gallery, just alike, and that’s why it’s so puzzling. I wonder whether any of the old miners were ever lost here and starved to death.”
The thought was so horribly suggestive that the perspiration came out in great drops on the boy’s face, and he glanced quickly to right and left, even holding up his lanthorn, fancying for the moment that he might catch sight of some dried-up traces of the poor unfortunates who had struggled on for days, as they had, and then sunk down to rise no more.
“How horrible!” he muttered; “and how can Joe lie there sleeping, when perhaps our fate may be like theirs?”
But he had unconsciously started another train of thought which set him calculating, and took his attention from the imaginary horrors which had troubled him.
“Wandered about for days and days,” he mused. “It seems like it, but that’s impossible. It can’t be much more than one, or we couldn’t have kept on. We should have been starved to death. We couldn’t have lived on water.”
He wiped his wet brow, and it seemed to him that the gallery they were in was not so stifling and hot, unless it was that he had grown weaker. Still one thing was certain; he could breathe more freely.
“Getting used to it,” he thought; and, putting down the lanthorn, he seated himself with his back close to the wall.
Joe slept heavily, and the lad looked at him enviously.
“I couldn’t sleep so peaceably as that,” he said half aloud. “How can a fellow sleep when he doesn’t know but what his father may be dying close by from starvation and weakness. It seems too bad.”
Gwyn opened the lanthorn and found that the candle was half burned down, and for a moment he thought of setting up another in its place, for fear he should go to sleep and it should burn out.
“Be such a pity,” he said, “we don’t want light while we’re asleep; only to wake up here in this horrible place is enough to drive anybody mad.”
Then he closed the lanthorn again.
“I sha’n’t go to sleep,” he muttered. “In too much trouble.” And he began thinking in a sore, dreary way of his mother seated at home waiting for news of his father and of him.
“It’ll nearly kill her,” he said. “But she’ll like it for me to have come here in search of poor dad. It would have been so cowardly if I hadn’t come, and she would have felt ashamed of me. Yes, she’ll like my dying like this.”
He paused, for his thoughts made him ponder.
“We can’t be going to die,” he said to himself, “or we shouldn’t be taking it all so easily and be so quiet and calm. If we felt that we really were going to die, we should be half mad with horror, and run shrieking about till we dropped in a fit. No,” he said softly, “it isn’t like that. People on board ship, when they know it’s going to sink, all behave quite calmly and patiently. There was that ship that was being burned with the soldiers on board. They all stood up before their officers, waiting for the end, and went down at last like men. But I don’t feel despairing like, and as if we were going to die.”
Then he began to think of his peaceful home life, and of the days at school till about a year ago, when he had come home to study military matters with his father and Major Jollivet, prior to being sent to one of the military colleges in about a year’s time.
“And now this mining has altered everything,” mused Gwyn, “and—”
He started violently, sprang up, and looked about him, for his name had been uttered loudly close to his ear.
But all was still now, and a curious creepy sensation ran through him and made him shiver with apprehension—a strange, superstitious kind of apprehension, as if something invisible were close to him.
“What a cowardly donkey!” he muttered, for his name was uttered again, and plainly enough it came from Joe.
“Talking in his sleep; and I was ready to fancy it was something ‘no canny.’ Why I must have been dropping off to sleep, too, and it startled me into wakefulness. This won’t do. Sentries must not sleep at their posts.”
He began to do what the soldiers call “sentry go.” But in a few minutes he grew so weary and hot that he was glad to stop by his sleeping companion, and stand looking down at him lying so peacefully there with his head upon his hand.
“Just as if he were in a feather bed and with a soft pillow under his cheek. Wish I could lie down and have a nap for half-an-hour. I will, and then he can have another.”
Gwyn bent down to waken his companion, who just then burst out with a merry laugh.
“Oh, I say, father, you shouldn’t,” he said. “Just as if I didn’t take care. It isn’t—”
“Isn’t what, Joe?” said Gwyn, softly.
“The wrong bottle. You’re always thinking I give you the wrong medicine, and saying it tastes different. Hah!”
He ended with a long deep sigh of content, and lay perfectly silent.
“I can’t wake him,” muttered Gwyn; and with a weary groan he seated himself once more, supporting his back against the side of the gallery, for he was too weak and tired to stand, and in an instant he was out in the bright sunshine, with the water making the boat he was in dance and the sail flap, as he glided along out of the cave into the open sea. Then with a violent start he was awake again, drawing himself up and fighting hard against terrible odds, for Nature said that he was completely exhausted, and must rest.
And as he set his teeth and stared hard at the faintly glittering wall opposite, where the great vein of milk-white quartz was spangled with grains of tin, his head bowed down and dropped forward till his chin touched his chest.
Again he sprang up, to prop his head back against the rock, but it had been hacked away so that it curved over and seemed to join Nature in her efforts to master him and force him to sleep, bending down his head and sending it in the old direction, so that his brow seemed heavier than lead, and he bent it lower and lower, while once more he was out on the glittering waters of the sea, the boat bounding rapidly along and all trouble at an end. For the darkness of the cavernous mine was gone, with all its weary horrors—there was nothing to mind, nothing to do, but sink lower and lower in the boat, and rest.
Hard—angular—stony? The granite chipped by hammer and pick felt like the softest down, as Gwyn swayed slowly over to his left, his shoulders rubbing against the wall and his half-braced muscles involuntarily acting in obedience to his will to keep him upright, so that he did not fall, but gently subsided till he was lying prone close to the lanthorn, which shed its faint yellowish light and cast dim shadows which, there in that gloomy spot, looked like a couple of graves newly banked up to mark the spots where the two lads had lain down to die or to be found and live, whichever fate ordained.
Joe must have slept for what was guessed to be a couple of hours; but they had passed, and he still slept on, with his rest growing more and more sweet and restful, while for Gwyn there was nothing but profound silence and vacancy. He did not dream—only plunged deeper and deeper into the stupor till six hours had passed away, and then the dream came.
A terrible wild dream of being somewhere in great danger—a place from which there was no escape from a dangerous wolf-like beast, which had followed him for hours, and was slowly hunting him down.
And every moment the vision grew more real, and the fierce beast came closer and closer in spite of his efforts to escape—mad, frantic efforts—while every limb was like lead, and held him back so that he might be the monster’s prey.
He felt that it was a delusion, and that he must soon wake and find relief; but when he did, the relief did not come for the horrors of the dream were continued in the reality, and his lips parted to utter a wild cry; but lips, tongue, and throat were all parched and dry, and he lay there in an agony which seemed maddening.
There was no question now of where he was, for though it was intensely dark he knew well enough, for he had awakened into full consciousness with every sense unnaturally sharpened, and making things clear. His limbs were like lead still, but it was not from nightmare, for they were numbed and helpless. There was the unpleasant odour of the burnt-out candle, and the sickly smoke hanging about him, as if the light had but lately gone out, and he could hear Joe’s stertorous breathing as if he too were in trouble; and simultaneously with it came the knowledge that, after all, the cavernous place out of which the water had been drained was inhabited by strange beasts, one of which had attacked him.
For the moment he was ready to explain it as a form of nightmare, but it was too real. It was the hard stern reality itself. There was the weight upon his chest, but not the heavy inert mass of a hideous dream, but that of some creature full of palpitating life extended upon him. He could feel the motion as it breathed, the heavy pulsations of its heart, and, worst horror of all, the hot breath from its panting jaws not many inches from his brow.
Chapter Thirty Three.Man’s Good Friend.Gwyn tried hard to cry aloud to his companion for help—to make an effort for life; but for what seemed to him to be a long space of time he could not stir. At last, though, when he could bear the horror no longer, and just as the creature moved as if gathering its legs beneath it like some cat about to spring, the boy made a sudden heave, and threw the beast from his chest, at the same time struggling to rise and make for where he felt that Joe was lying; but with a strange, hollow cry the animal sprang at him with such force that he was driven backwards, while the creature regained its position upon his chest, and Gwyn lay back half paralysed.But not from fear. Astonishment and delight had that effect, and, weak and prostrated as he was for some moments, he could not speak.At last one word escaped from his lips, and in an instant—throb, throb, throb, throb—there was a heavy beating on his ribs, a joyous whining sound greeted his ears, and a cold nose and wet tongue were playing about his face.“Oh, Grip! Grip! Grip!” he sobbed out at last, half hysterical with excitement; and seizing the dog by the neck he held him fast, while Grip burst now into a frantic paroxysm of barking.“You good old dog, then you have found us,” cried Gwyn, as he sat up now and held on tightly to the dog’s collar, for fear he should be left again. “Why, there must be someone with him! Here, Grip, Grip, old chap, your master! Where is he, then?”There was another frantic burst of barking, and Joe’s voice was heard out of the darkness.“What’s that? What does it mean? Hi! Ydoll, are you there?”“Yes, yes. Here’s Grip! And—and—they must be—Oh, Joe, Joe, I can’t—”What it was that Gwyn Pendarve could not do was never heard, for he pressed his lips together and clenched his teeth to keep back all sound. He had no longer any control over himself, and in those anguished moments he felt, as he afterwards declared to himself, that he was acting like a girl.Joe was nearly as bad, but it was in the darkness and there was no one to witness their emotion, as he too kept silence, fearing to hear even his own voice; so that Grip had the whole of the conversation to himself—a repetition that at another time would have been monotonous, but which now sounded musical in the extreme.At last Gwyn recovered his equanimity to some extent, and, taking out the matches, struck one, but the moisture of his fingers prevented it from igniting, and he had to try two more before he could get anything but soft phosphorescent streaks on the box; and as the damp matches were thrown down, Grip sniffed at them and whined loudly.Then one flashed out brilliantly, lighting up the darkness, was watched excitedly, and began to blaze up and transfer its illuminating powers to the one candle the boys had left, one which was directly after safely sheltered by the glass of the lanthorn.At this point the joy of the dog was unbounded, and was shown in leaps, bounds and frantic barking, accompanied by rushes and sham worryings of his master’s legs; and when driven off, he favoured Joe in the same way.“Only to think of it,” cried Joe, “that dog following us and running us down in the dark! How could he have done it? I never heard that dogs could see in the dark like cats.”“They can’t,” said Gwyn, going down on his knees to give the dog a hug. “A jolly old chap—they see with their noses; don’t you, old Grip?”“Whuf!” cried the dog; and he made a frantic effort to lick his master’s face.“It’s wonderful!” cried Joe, excitedly.“Yes, makes a fellow wish he had a nose like a dog. Why, Jolly, we could have found our way out, then.”“Don’t see it,” said Joe, who was in a peculiarly excited state, which made him ready to laugh or cry at the slightest provocation.“Don’t see it! Of course you don’t. Couldn’t we have smelt our way out by our own track, same as he did? But bother all that. Why, Jolly, if I could only feel sure that the dads were safe out, I shouldn’t care a bit.”“No; I shouldn’t either. Oh, I say, isn’t it a relief?”“Yes, and so I feel all right. They’re out: I’m sure of it.”“How do you know?”“By Grip being here.”“That doesn’t prove it.”“Yes it does. I know! Father said, ‘I’ll send Grip down; he’ll find them.’”“Well, it does sound likely; but I say, Ydoll, isn’t it queer?”“What, being here?”“No; while I was so miserable and feeling as I did, I was only faint; now I feel so hungry I could eat anything.”“Same here,” said Gwyn; “but it’s all right; they’re out; father sent Grip—didn’t he, Grip?”The dog barked loudly and leaped up at him.“There, hear him? He understands,” cried Gwyn; but Joe shook his head.“I don’t know,” he said. “The dog found us right enough, but that doesn’t prove that he’ll find his way back.”“He’d better,” said Gwyn with mock earnestness; “if he doesn’t we’ll eat him. Do you hear, sir?”The dog barked again.“It’s all right,” said Gwyn, merrily. “Now then, pack up, and let’s go home—do you hear, Grip?”The dog threw up his head and barked loudly.“Ready, Joe?”“Ready—of course.”“Come on, then. Now, Grip, old fellow, lead the way. Go home!”The dog barked again, and trotted in the opposite direction to which they had expected, making for the partly driven gallery where the roof ran up, showing how the lode of tin had ascended; and when he reached the blank end beginning to bark loudly.“Come back, stupid!” cried Gwyn; “we found that out ourselves. That’s the end of the mine. All right. Now, lead the way home.”But the dog barked again loudly; and it was not until Gwyn followed to the end and seized his collar that he gave up. “Now then, off with you, but don’t go too fast. Forward! Quick march!”The lad had straddled across the dog, holding him between his knees, with head pointed as he believed in the direction of the shaft; and at the last sound he unloosed him from the grip of his knees, and the dog started steadily off, and they followed, but in a few minutes had to take to running, for, after looking back several times to see if he was followed, Grip increased his pace, and directly after disappeared in the darkness beyond the glow shed by the lanthorn.“You’ve done it now,” cried Joe. “Why didn’t you make your handkerchief fast to his collar? He’s gone home.”“Think so?” said Gwyn, blankly.“Yes; that’s certain enough; and we’re just as badly off as ever.”“No,” said Gwyn, in a tone full of confidence; “Grip found us, and he’ll come back again for certain.”“But we shall have to stop where we are, perhaps for another day or two.”“Oh, no, he will not be long,” said Gwyn; but there was less confidence in his tones, and he stopped short, and began to call and whistle, with the sounds echoing loudly along the tunnel-like place; but for some moments all was silent, and Joe gave vent to a groan.“Oh, why did you let him go, Ydoll? It was madness.”“Well,” said the lad, bitterly, “you were as bad as I—you never said a word about holding him.”“No, I never thought of it,” said Joe, with a sigh. “But how horrid, after thinking we were all right!”“Yet it is disappointing,” said Gwyn, gloomily; “but he’ll soon come back when he finds that we are not following him; and even if he went right back to them, they’d send him in again.”“I don’t believe they did send him in,” said Joe, despairingly.“They must. He couldn’t have climbed down the ladders or got into the skep of his own accord, and, if he had, they wouldn’t have let him down. They sent him, I’m sure.”“No, I’m afraid not,” said Joe, piteously; “they didn’t send him.”“How do you know?”“Because if they had, they would have done what people always do under such circumstances—written a note, and tied it to the dog’s collar. He had no note tied to his collar, I’m sure.”“No, I didn’t see or feel any,” said Gwyn, thoughtfully.“No; we should have been sure to see it if he had one; so, for certain, the dog came of his own will, and I don’t think it’s likely he’ll come again. He may or he may not.”Gwyn did not feel as if he could combat this idea, for Joe’s notion that a note would have been tied to the dog’s collar—a note with a few encouraging words—seemed very probable; so he remained silent, listening intently for the faintest sound.But the silence was more terrible than ever, and, saving the musical dash of water from time to time, and an occasional rustle as of a few grains of earth or sand trickling down from the walls, all was still.“Hear him coming back?” said Gwyn, at last, very dismally.“No, but there is something I keep hearing. Can’t you?”“I? No,” said Gwyn, quickly. “What can you hear?—footsteps?”“Oh, no; not that. It’s a humming, rolling kind of noise, very, very faint; and I can’t always hear it. I’m not sure it is anything but a kind of singing in my ears. There, I can hear it now. Can you?”Gwyn listened intently.“No. Perhaps it is only fancy. Listen again. Oh, that dog must come back.”Joe sat down, with the lanthorn beside him.“Oh, don’t give up like that!” cried Gwyn. “Let’s make a fresh start, and try and find our way out.”“It’s impossible—we can’t without help.”“Don’t I always tell you that a chap oughtn’t to wait to be helped, but try to help himself?”“Yes, you often preach,” said Joe, dismally.“Yes, and try too. Why, I— Ah! hear that?” cried Gwyn, excitedly.“No,” said Joe, after a pause.“Don’t be so stupid! You can— Listen!”They held their breath, and plainly now came the barking of a dog.“There!” cried Gwyn. “Here, here, here!” and he whistled before listening again, when there was the pattering of the dog’s nails on the rocky floor, and almost directly after Grip bounded up to them.“Ah, we mustn’t have any more of that, old fellow,” cried Gwyn, seizing the dog’s collar, and patting him. “Get on, you old rascal; can’t you see we’ve only got two legs apiece to your four?”The dog strained to be off again, barking excitedly; but Gwyn held on while their neckerchiefs were tied together, and then fastened to the dog’s collar.“Now, then, forward once more. Come on, Joe, you must carry the lanthorn and walk by his head. Steady, stupid! We can’t run. Walk, will you? Now, then, forward for home.”The dog barked and went off panting, with his tongue out and glistening in the light as the red end was curled, and he strained hard, as if bound to drag as much as he could behind him, while the boys’ spirits steadily rose as their confidence in the dog’s knowledge of the way back began to increase.
Gwyn tried hard to cry aloud to his companion for help—to make an effort for life; but for what seemed to him to be a long space of time he could not stir. At last, though, when he could bear the horror no longer, and just as the creature moved as if gathering its legs beneath it like some cat about to spring, the boy made a sudden heave, and threw the beast from his chest, at the same time struggling to rise and make for where he felt that Joe was lying; but with a strange, hollow cry the animal sprang at him with such force that he was driven backwards, while the creature regained its position upon his chest, and Gwyn lay back half paralysed.
But not from fear. Astonishment and delight had that effect, and, weak and prostrated as he was for some moments, he could not speak.
At last one word escaped from his lips, and in an instant—throb, throb, throb, throb—there was a heavy beating on his ribs, a joyous whining sound greeted his ears, and a cold nose and wet tongue were playing about his face.
“Oh, Grip! Grip! Grip!” he sobbed out at last, half hysterical with excitement; and seizing the dog by the neck he held him fast, while Grip burst now into a frantic paroxysm of barking.
“You good old dog, then you have found us,” cried Gwyn, as he sat up now and held on tightly to the dog’s collar, for fear he should be left again. “Why, there must be someone with him! Here, Grip, Grip, old chap, your master! Where is he, then?”
There was another frantic burst of barking, and Joe’s voice was heard out of the darkness.
“What’s that? What does it mean? Hi! Ydoll, are you there?”
“Yes, yes. Here’s Grip! And—and—they must be—Oh, Joe, Joe, I can’t—”
What it was that Gwyn Pendarve could not do was never heard, for he pressed his lips together and clenched his teeth to keep back all sound. He had no longer any control over himself, and in those anguished moments he felt, as he afterwards declared to himself, that he was acting like a girl.
Joe was nearly as bad, but it was in the darkness and there was no one to witness their emotion, as he too kept silence, fearing to hear even his own voice; so that Grip had the whole of the conversation to himself—a repetition that at another time would have been monotonous, but which now sounded musical in the extreme.
At last Gwyn recovered his equanimity to some extent, and, taking out the matches, struck one, but the moisture of his fingers prevented it from igniting, and he had to try two more before he could get anything but soft phosphorescent streaks on the box; and as the damp matches were thrown down, Grip sniffed at them and whined loudly.
Then one flashed out brilliantly, lighting up the darkness, was watched excitedly, and began to blaze up and transfer its illuminating powers to the one candle the boys had left, one which was directly after safely sheltered by the glass of the lanthorn.
At this point the joy of the dog was unbounded, and was shown in leaps, bounds and frantic barking, accompanied by rushes and sham worryings of his master’s legs; and when driven off, he favoured Joe in the same way.
“Only to think of it,” cried Joe, “that dog following us and running us down in the dark! How could he have done it? I never heard that dogs could see in the dark like cats.”
“They can’t,” said Gwyn, going down on his knees to give the dog a hug. “A jolly old chap—they see with their noses; don’t you, old Grip?”
“Whuf!” cried the dog; and he made a frantic effort to lick his master’s face.
“It’s wonderful!” cried Joe, excitedly.
“Yes, makes a fellow wish he had a nose like a dog. Why, Jolly, we could have found our way out, then.”
“Don’t see it,” said Joe, who was in a peculiarly excited state, which made him ready to laugh or cry at the slightest provocation.
“Don’t see it! Of course you don’t. Couldn’t we have smelt our way out by our own track, same as he did? But bother all that. Why, Jolly, if I could only feel sure that the dads were safe out, I shouldn’t care a bit.”
“No; I shouldn’t either. Oh, I say, isn’t it a relief?”
“Yes, and so I feel all right. They’re out: I’m sure of it.”
“How do you know?”
“By Grip being here.”
“That doesn’t prove it.”
“Yes it does. I know! Father said, ‘I’ll send Grip down; he’ll find them.’”
“Well, it does sound likely; but I say, Ydoll, isn’t it queer?”
“What, being here?”
“No; while I was so miserable and feeling as I did, I was only faint; now I feel so hungry I could eat anything.”
“Same here,” said Gwyn; “but it’s all right; they’re out; father sent Grip—didn’t he, Grip?”
The dog barked loudly and leaped up at him.
“There, hear him? He understands,” cried Gwyn; but Joe shook his head.
“I don’t know,” he said. “The dog found us right enough, but that doesn’t prove that he’ll find his way back.”
“He’d better,” said Gwyn with mock earnestness; “if he doesn’t we’ll eat him. Do you hear, sir?”
The dog barked again.
“It’s all right,” said Gwyn, merrily. “Now then, pack up, and let’s go home—do you hear, Grip?”
The dog threw up his head and barked loudly.
“Ready, Joe?”
“Ready—of course.”
“Come on, then. Now, Grip, old fellow, lead the way. Go home!”
The dog barked again, and trotted in the opposite direction to which they had expected, making for the partly driven gallery where the roof ran up, showing how the lode of tin had ascended; and when he reached the blank end beginning to bark loudly.
“Come back, stupid!” cried Gwyn; “we found that out ourselves. That’s the end of the mine. All right. Now, lead the way home.”
But the dog barked again loudly; and it was not until Gwyn followed to the end and seized his collar that he gave up. “Now then, off with you, but don’t go too fast. Forward! Quick march!”
The lad had straddled across the dog, holding him between his knees, with head pointed as he believed in the direction of the shaft; and at the last sound he unloosed him from the grip of his knees, and the dog started steadily off, and they followed, but in a few minutes had to take to running, for, after looking back several times to see if he was followed, Grip increased his pace, and directly after disappeared in the darkness beyond the glow shed by the lanthorn.
“You’ve done it now,” cried Joe. “Why didn’t you make your handkerchief fast to his collar? He’s gone home.”
“Think so?” said Gwyn, blankly.
“Yes; that’s certain enough; and we’re just as badly off as ever.”
“No,” said Gwyn, in a tone full of confidence; “Grip found us, and he’ll come back again for certain.”
“But we shall have to stop where we are, perhaps for another day or two.”
“Oh, no, he will not be long,” said Gwyn; but there was less confidence in his tones, and he stopped short, and began to call and whistle, with the sounds echoing loudly along the tunnel-like place; but for some moments all was silent, and Joe gave vent to a groan.
“Oh, why did you let him go, Ydoll? It was madness.”
“Well,” said the lad, bitterly, “you were as bad as I—you never said a word about holding him.”
“No, I never thought of it,” said Joe, with a sigh. “But how horrid, after thinking we were all right!”
“Yet it is disappointing,” said Gwyn, gloomily; “but he’ll soon come back when he finds that we are not following him; and even if he went right back to them, they’d send him in again.”
“I don’t believe they did send him in,” said Joe, despairingly.
“They must. He couldn’t have climbed down the ladders or got into the skep of his own accord, and, if he had, they wouldn’t have let him down. They sent him, I’m sure.”
“No, I’m afraid not,” said Joe, piteously; “they didn’t send him.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if they had, they would have done what people always do under such circumstances—written a note, and tied it to the dog’s collar. He had no note tied to his collar, I’m sure.”
“No, I didn’t see or feel any,” said Gwyn, thoughtfully.
“No; we should have been sure to see it if he had one; so, for certain, the dog came of his own will, and I don’t think it’s likely he’ll come again. He may or he may not.”
Gwyn did not feel as if he could combat this idea, for Joe’s notion that a note would have been tied to the dog’s collar—a note with a few encouraging words—seemed very probable; so he remained silent, listening intently for the faintest sound.
But the silence was more terrible than ever, and, saving the musical dash of water from time to time, and an occasional rustle as of a few grains of earth or sand trickling down from the walls, all was still.
“Hear him coming back?” said Gwyn, at last, very dismally.
“No, but there is something I keep hearing. Can’t you?”
“I? No,” said Gwyn, quickly. “What can you hear?—footsteps?”
“Oh, no; not that. It’s a humming, rolling kind of noise, very, very faint; and I can’t always hear it. I’m not sure it is anything but a kind of singing in my ears. There, I can hear it now. Can you?”
Gwyn listened intently.
“No. Perhaps it is only fancy. Listen again. Oh, that dog must come back.”
Joe sat down, with the lanthorn beside him.
“Oh, don’t give up like that!” cried Gwyn. “Let’s make a fresh start, and try and find our way out.”
“It’s impossible—we can’t without help.”
“Don’t I always tell you that a chap oughtn’t to wait to be helped, but try to help himself?”
“Yes, you often preach,” said Joe, dismally.
“Yes, and try too. Why, I— Ah! hear that?” cried Gwyn, excitedly.
“No,” said Joe, after a pause.
“Don’t be so stupid! You can— Listen!”
They held their breath, and plainly now came the barking of a dog.
“There!” cried Gwyn. “Here, here, here!” and he whistled before listening again, when there was the pattering of the dog’s nails on the rocky floor, and almost directly after Grip bounded up to them.
“Ah, we mustn’t have any more of that, old fellow,” cried Gwyn, seizing the dog’s collar, and patting him. “Get on, you old rascal; can’t you see we’ve only got two legs apiece to your four?”
The dog strained to be off again, barking excitedly; but Gwyn held on while their neckerchiefs were tied together, and then fastened to the dog’s collar.
“Now, then, forward once more. Come on, Joe, you must carry the lanthorn and walk by his head. Steady, stupid! We can’t run. Walk, will you? Now, then, forward for home.”
The dog barked and went off panting, with his tongue out and glistening in the light as the red end was curled, and he strained hard, as if bound to drag as much as he could behind him, while the boys’ spirits steadily rose as their confidence in the dog’s knowledge of the way back began to increase.