“Now, you four can keep going, digging straight down and to the eastward,” said Tom.  “I’m going up to get some more men at work, putting in temporary walling.  I don’t want any of you men hurt by saving dirt from the sides of the shaft.”

All four men stopped work at once.

“What’s the matter!” asked Reade.

“Coming down’s easy, sir; we’re waiting to see you go up that rope.”

“Then I’ll endeavor not to keep you long away from your tasks,” smiled the young engineer athlete.

Grasping the rope just above a knot over his head, Tom gave a slight heave, then went rapidly up, hand over hand.  He was soon lost from the little circle of light thrown by the lanterns at the shaft’s bottom.

“Not many men like him,” remarked one of the miners named Tibbets, admiringly.

“I’ve been told that’s what young fellers learn at college,” said another miner, as he spat on his hands and raised his pick.

For two hours Reade attended to the mending of the walling, as the system of laying walls in shafts is termed.  Ladders had to be rebuilt even in order to put temporary walling in place.

Then the young chief engineer deemed it time to run over to the partners’ shack.  He opened the door softly, peeping in.  Feeling the draught Tim Walsh turned and came to the door.

“Mr. Hazelton is doing all right, sir.”

“Has he asked for me?”

“No, sir.”

“If he does, tell him that I’m putting in all night at the mine.  If he gets worse run over and get me.”

Then Tom went back to his labors.

Dolph Gage and his fellow rascals, owing to their haste, and also to the fact that they did not know as much as they thought they did about laying and tamping blasts, had not done as much harm as they had planned.

By the time that the miners had dug down some four feet, sending up the dirt in the hoist-tub, they came to the opening of the tunnel.  Thus encouraged, they worked faster than ever, until a new shift was sent down the repaired ladders to relieve them.

By daylight the men, changing every two hours for fresher details, were well into the tunnel.

Here, for some yards, the tunnel was somewhat choked.  After this semi-obstruction had been cleared away, Tom Reade was able to lead his men for some distance down the tunnel.  Then they came upon the scene of the late big blast.

Here the rock had been hurled about in masses.  A scene of apparent wreck met the eyes of the miners and their leader, though even here the damage was not as great as had been expected by Gage and his rascals.

To the north of the tunnel lay a great, gaping, jagged tear in the wall of rock.  This tear, or hole, extended some ten feet to the north of the tunnel proper.

As Tom entered, a glint caught his eye.  Something in the aspect of that dull illumination, reflected back to him, made his pulses leap.