After a moment's reflection, the boy stuffed a handkerchief in his mouth, permitting it to cover his nose, to keep out the full strength of the powder smoke. This done, he got to his feet again, and began feeling his way about the chamber in which the accident had occurred.
"Ah, this is it!"
His hands paused when they came in contact with a heap of crushed timber, and his feet struck a mass of ore piled against the foot-wall of the drift.
For a moment Rush stood motionless, reflecting on the situation. He could hear no sounds on the outside.
"Either they are all killed out there, or else we are buried so deep that I cannot hear them. I do not know which it is, but I think it must be the latter," the boy decided. "We are imprisoned in the drift; that is certain."
The lad, after some searching about, found a shovel, and with this he began throwing the dirt back from the place where the opening had been. The effort was too much for him. Strong as he was, the shock of the explosion had weakened him and the powder smoke choked him until he went off into another fit of coughing. To relieve himself he lay down again.
The fresh air along the floor of the drift strengthened him somewhat, and once more he turned his attention to the powder-man. He lifted the miner's head gently, placing it in his own lap, after which he chafed the man's hands and forehead. The miner drew a long, deep sigh and stirred uneasily. Perhaps something of the lad's tender sympathy touched his inner consciousness.
"Poor fellow!" murmured Steve, forcing back the lump that rose in his throat. "This is not a life for the weak or the timid. It is a man's work and I'm going to be a man."
Steve continued to stroke the face and hands of the powder-man until, becoming dizzy from inhaling the powder smoke, he lay down again until somewhat revived.