Part 49 (2/2)

”Forward,” said the Colonel. ”No, stop. We have plenty of candles, have we not?”

”Yes, sir, heaps,” was the reply.

”Light one, then, and stick it in a crevice of the rock here at the corner.”

While the man was busily executing the order, the Colonel took out his pocket-book, wrote largely on a leaf, ”Gone in search of you. Wait till we return,” and tore it out to place it close to the candle where the light could s.h.i.+ne on the white sc.r.a.p of paper.

Then on they went again, with the experienced miners talking to one another in whispers, as with wondering eyes they took note of the value of the traces they kept on seeing in the rugged walls of the main gallery they traversed--tokens hardly heeded by the two boys in their anxiety to gain tidings of their fathers.

”It's going to be a grand place, my son,” whispered Vores; ”and only to think of it, for such a mine to have lain untouched ever since the time of our great-great-gaffers--great-great-great-great, ever so many great-gaffers, and n.o.body thinking it worth trying.”

”Ay, but there must have been some reason,” said the other.

”Bah! Old women's tales about goblin sprites and things that live underground. We never saw anything uglier than ourselves, though, did we, all the years we worked in mines?”

”Nay, I never did,” said the man who walked beside Vores; ”but still there's no knowing what may be, my lad, and it seems better to hold one's tongue when one's going along in the dark in just such a place as strange things might be living in.”

Hardock stopped where another branch went off at a sharp angle, his experienced eyes accustomed to mines and dense darkness, making them plain directly; and here another shout was sent volleying down between the wet gleaming walls, to echo and vibrate in a way which sounded awful; but when the men shouted again the echoes died away into whispers, and then rose again more wildly, but only to die finally into silence.

Without waiting for an order, Hardock lit and fixed another candle against the glittering wall of the mine pa.s.sage, the Colonel wrote on a slip of paper, and this too was placed where it must be seen; but the Colonel hesitated as if about to alter the wording.

”No,” he said, ”I dare not tell them to make for the sumph, they might lose their way. You feel sure that you can bring us back by here, Hardock?”

The man was silent for a few moments, and then he spoke in a husky voice.

”No, sir,” he said, ”I can't say I am. I think I can, but I thought so this morning. The place is all a puzzle of confusion, and it's so big.

Next time we come down I'll have a pail of paint and a brush, and paint arrows pointing to the foot of the shaft at every turn. But I'll try my best.”

”Ay, we'll all try, sir,” said Harry Vores.

”Forward!” cried the Colonel, abruptly; and once more they went on till all at once, after leaving candle after candle burning, they reached a part where the main lode seemed to have suddenly broken up into half-a-dozen, each running in a different direction, and spreading widely, the two outer going off at very obtuse angles.

Here they paused, unconscious of the fact that they had pa.s.sed the spot, only a couple of hundred yards back, where the boys had made their heroic resolve to go on.

”Let me see,” said the Colonel, excitedly; ”it was the third pa.s.sage from the left that we took this morning.”

Hardock raised his lanthorn and stared vacantly in his employer's face.

”No, sir, no,” he cried breathlessly; ”the third coming from the right.”

”No, no, you are wrong. The third from the left; I counted them this morning--six of these branches. Why, Hardock, there are seven of them now.”

”Yes, sir, seven, and that one running from the right-hand one makes eight. I did not see those two this morning by our one lanthorn. There are--yes--eight.”

”What are we all to do? My head is growing hopelessly confused.”

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