“Ralph,” he said, “Ralph, lad, dinna ye see me?  It’s your Uncle Billy, Ralph, your Uncle Billy.”

The boy did not open his eyes, but his lips moved.

“Did you call me, Uncle Billy?” he asked.  “Is it mornin’?  Is it daylight?”

“It’ll soon be daylight, lad, verra soon noo, verra soon.”

He had fastened his lamp in his cap, placed his arms gently under the child’s body, and lifted him to his breast.  He stood for a moment then, questioning with himself.  But the slope was the nearest and the way to it was the safest, and there was no time to wait.  He started down the air-way on his journey to the outer world, bearing his burden as tenderly as a mother would have borne her babe, looking down at times into the still face, letting the tears drop now and then on the paper pinned to the boy’s breast.

He stopped to rest after a little, holding the child on his knees as he sat, and looking curiously at the letter, on which his tears had fallen.  He read it slowly by the light of his lamp, bending back the fold to do so.  He did not wonder at it.  He knew what it meant and why the boy had fastened it there.

“Ye s’all gae to her, lad,” he said, “ye s’all gae to the mither.  I’m thankfu’, verra thankfu’, that the father kenned the truth afoor he deed.”

He raised his precious burden to his heart and began again his journey.

The water in the old sump had risen and flowed across the heading and the air-way and far up into the chambers, and he was compelled to go around it.  The way was long and devious; it was blocked and barred; he had often to lay his burden down and make an opening through some walled-up entrance to give them room for passage.

There were falls in his course, and he clambered across rough hills of rock and squeezed through narrow openings; but every step brought him nearer to the slope, and this thought nerved him to still greater effort.  Yet he could not wholly escape the water of the sump.  He had still to pass through it.  It was cold and black.  It came to his ankles as he trudged along.  By and by it reached to his knees.  When it grew to be waist-deep he lifted the child to his shoulder, steadied himself against the side wall of the passage and pushed on.  He slipped often, he became dizzy at times, there were horrible moments when he thought surely that the dark water would close over him and his precious burden forever.  But he came through it at last, dripping, gasping, staggering on till he reached the foot of the old slope.  There he sat down to rest.  From away back in the mine the echoing shouts of the rescuing party came faintly to his ears.  Conway had returned with help.  He tried to answer their call, but the cry stuck in his throat.

He knew that it would be folly for him to attempt to reach them; he knew also that they would never trace his course across that dreadful waste of water.

There was but one thing to do; he must go on, he must climb the slope.