“I was bound hand and foot, and I made it my first business to get loose. The sharp corner of a stone helped me, for I sat up and chafed my bonds over it, and soon had my hands free. To get the rope off my ankles, after that, was mere child’s play.
“As soon as I was able to move around, I sounded the barrier between me and the drift. It seemed thick enough, and I reached for a new knife I had bought in Sun Dance, with the idea of using it to dig with. But Lawless had stripped me of knife and guns. Not having the knife, I worked with my hands.
“It was a slow job, Cody, but I wonder if you’ve ever noticed how a man will work when his life is at stake? Well, that was me, just then. I sailed into that wall with my hands and finger-nails, and I would have gone at it with my teeth if I hadn’t had the use of my hands.
“After about fifty years—that’s what it seemed like, anyhow—I noticed that I was getting weak, and that I wasn’t making much of a hole in the barrier. The air was getting bad, too, and I thought I’d better give up my plan as a bad job. If I got out, I thought, the chances were I’d fall right back into the hands of Lawless and his men again.
“So I quit work on the barrier and laid down and went to sleep. When I woke up and realized where I was, the old hope of making my escape took hold of me. I hadn’t the strength to work, so I began to yell, and to tap on the wall.
“I hadn’t much of an idea that any one would hear me but Lawless and his gang, but I was that desperate I felt I must do something.”
Wild Bill fell silent for a space, studying the flickering candles on the wall of the level.
“I wonder,” he resumed finally, “if you fellows know what it means to feel that you are in the last ditch, with a lot of buckaroos throwing in the sand, when, all at once, something snakes you out of what was meant to be your grave, and lands you in safety, with ground to spare? Well, if you’ve ever experienced that, you’ll understand how I felt when I heard an answer to one of my yells, and, a little later, heard blows of a pick.
“I didn’t know who it was out here in the level, but a sneaking idea took possession of me that it was Bingham, the fellow who had come to the Forty Thieves to chip ore-samples. I had that idea when the foul air became too much for me, and I dozed off. So it was something of a surprise when I opened my eyes and saw Pard Cody.
“Well, when all’s said and done, here I am, alive and kicking, and able to tote my guns and face trouble just as I’ve done in the past. All that bothers me now is playing even with Lawless. I’d like mighty well, though, to hear how you fellows came to be in the mine.”