Wheeler glanced down at the black mouth of the tunnel, on which the streaming radiance fell. He fancied that the river flowed into it, and the man’s suggestion did not appeal to him.
“Won’t you tell him that I’d like a talk with him?” he asked.
The man laughed. “Guess that’s not going to bring him. It will be daylight, any way, before he lets up. You’ll have to go right in.”
Wheeler dropped cautiously upon a slippery staging, across which the water flowed, and, crawling into the heading, with a blinking light in his eyes, fell into a sled 311 that was loaded with broken rock. He crept round the obstruction, and a few moments later found himself knee-deep in water before a little dam that had been thrown across the heading. The heading dipped sharply beyond it, which somewhat astonished him, and when he had climbed over the barricade, he descended cautiously, groping towards another light. Big drops of water fell upon him, and here and there a jet of it spurted out. At last he stopped, and saw Nasmyth lying, partly raised on one elbow, in an inch or two of water, while he painfully swung a heavy hammer. The heading was lined with stout pillars, made of sawn-up firs, and Nasmyth appeared to be driving a wedge under one of them. Two or three other men were putting heavy masses of timber into place.
The smoky flame of a little lamp flared upon the rock above, which trickled with moisture, and the light fell upon Nasmyth’s wet face, which was deeply flushed. Nasmyth gasped heavily, and great splashes of sand and mire lay thick upon his torn, drenched shirt. He appeared to see Wheeler, for he looked up, but he did not stop until he had driven the wedge in. Then he rose to his knees and stretched himself wearily.
“The rock’s badly fissured. We’ve got to get double timbers in as soon as we can,” he explained. “I’m going to do some boring. We’ll go along.”
Wheeler crept after him down the inclined heading until they reached the spot where Gordon sat crouched over a machine. Gordon did not move until Nasmyth seized his shoulders.
“You can get back to the wedging, and send two or three boys along to heave the water out. I’ll keep this thing going,” he said.
Gordon, who greeted Wheeler, floundered away, and Wheeler sat down in the dryest spot he could find, while Nasmyth grasped the handle of the machine.