He was beginning to feel chilled. Steve tried to recall what the map of the lower level looked like, but try as he might he could not recall a single detail of the map filed in the engineer's office. By this time he did not know where he was. He had lost all sense of direction.
"I guess I am a goner. They've got me this time," he said aloud. "I hope that Mr. Penton will find out how it happened."
The boy was now shivering violently. His teeth were chattering and he began to wonder if he were freezing to death, for the sense of feeling seemed to have left his legs and arms. A numbness was slowly creeping over him.
"I must keep going, or I shall surely be drowned," he cried, once more striking out and swimming as fast as he could, hoping thereby to restore his circulation to its former condition. But the water was too cold and the young miner's efforts grew weaker as the moments passed.
Though he did not know it, the drift of the water on the lower level was toward the large pipes, where it was being sucked to the surface by the powerful pumps above.
As Steve reached over and over in a slow over-hand stroke, which now and then he varied by falling into the frog stroke, he forged slowly ahead until his hands suddenly struck some object that was not the rocky side of the level. The lad grasped it quickly.
"A plank. Thank goodness!" he cried.
The plank had floated off either from the platform or from the lagging somewhere on that level. It made no difference to the swimmer where it had come from. He threw both arms about the plank and lay there resting for some time, breathing heavily. Finally he pulled himself over on the plank, stretching out lengthwise on it. The piece of wood held him up very well. Now and then he would paddle a little with his hands, propelling himself in one direction until it bumped against a wall, floating off with the current again.
While the lad realized that the chances were against his ever getting out of the level alive, he felt little fear. He was one of those rare beings in whom the emotion of fear had not been fully developed.