The world began to whirl, to drop suddenly, to rise, to twist. He bit his lips and pressed his knuckles hard against his temples.
“Must sober up!” he kept repeating to himself.
Sweat broke out all over him. He became ghastly ill. Lying at full length in the muddy road, before the steps, he did not notice the rain that beat down upon him. Gradually he began to lose consciousness.
The whistle blew dull and discordant for the eleven o’clock shift.
CHAPTER VIII
As the echo of the whistle died away, Loring raised himself, and staggered to his feet. Not realizing what he did, he groped his way onward up the hill. As he passed the men hurrying home from the last shift, he noticed, as in a dream, the way in which the wet clothes clung to their skins, the heavy folds accentuated by the glare of the occasional electric light.
Hughson, in the hoist shed, was cursing volubly at his delay in coming. As soon as he saw Loring he grabbed his coat, and calling out a hurried imprecation, started down the hill.
Stephen had scarcely stepped to his place by the drum, when the indicator clanged sharply one bell. Mechanically he threw his weight against the lever, and shot the first bucket of ore mined by the shift high into the dim light, almost into the tripod framework upon which the cable hung.