That was his way of telling the story: he "went down and got him." There was nothing more to say; nothing about the two days' perilous search through every tunnel and recess of those rocky walls; nothing about the three thousand excited people who crowded around the quarry's mouth, awaiting the issue, nor the scene when that pitiful burden was hauled up from the depths.
I asked Bean if he had ever been in great danger while under the water.
"Nothing special," he said, and then added, after thinking: "Once I had my helmet twisted off."
PORTRAIT OF A DIVER. DRAWN FROM LIFE.
"What, below?"
He nodded.
"How can a diver live with his helmet off?"
"He can't, usually. 'T was just luck they got me up in time. They say my face was black as a coal." And he had no more to tell of this adventure.