A CALL FOR HELP
It was a quiet night in early April, full of the hush which seems to
gather all the creative forces together, before the wild outburst of
prodigal creation begins in wild flower and weed and moorland grasses,
and Robert Sinclair, who had walked and tramped over the moors for
hours, until he was nearly exhausted, his heart torn and his mind in an
agony of suffering, sat down upon a little hillock, his elbows on his
knees and his hands against his cheeks.
The moor-birds screamed and circled in restless flight around him. They
were plainly protesting against his intrusion into their domain. They
shrilled and dived in their flight, almost touching the bent head, with
swooping wing, to rise again, cleaving the air and sheering round again;
but still the lonely figure sat looking into darkness, becoming numbed
with cold, and all unconscious of the passage of time.
Gradually the cold began to tell upon him, and he started to his feet,
plodding up the hill, through the soft mossy yielding soil. Back again
he came after a time, his limbs aching with the long night's tramping;
but yet he never thought of going home or turning towards the village.
"Oh, Mysie!" he groaned again and again, and all night long only these
two words escaped his lips. They came in a low sad tone, like the wind
coming through far-off trees; but they were vibrant with suffering, and
only the moor-birds cried in answer.
"Oh, Mysie!" and the winds sighed it again and again, as they came
wandering down out of the stillness between the hills, to pass on into
the silence of the night again, like lost souls wandering through an
uncreative world, proclaiming to other spheres the doom that had settled
upon earth.
"Oh, Mysie!" groaned a moorland brook close by, which grumbled at some
obstruction in its pathway, and then sighed over its mossy bed, like a
tired child emerging exhausted from a long fever, to fall asleep as
deeply as if the seal of death had been planted upon the little lips.
Occasionally he shifted his position, as his limbs grew cramped, or rose
to pace the moor again to bring himself more exhaustion; but always he
came back to the little knoll, and sat down again, groaning out the sad
plaintive words, that were at once an appeal and a cry, a defiance and a
submission. By and by the first gray streaks of dawn came filtering
through the curtains of the cloudy east, touching the low hills with
gray nimble fingers, or weaving a tapestry of magic, as they brightened
and grew clearer, over the gray face of the morn.
Soon the birds leapt again from every corner, climbing upon the ladders
of light and tumbling ecstasies of mad joy to welcome the day, as if
they feared to be left in the darkness with this strange figure, which
merely sat and groaned softly, and looked before it with silent agony in
its eyes; and now that the light had again come, they shouted their
protest in a louder, shriller note; they mounted upon the waves of light
and swooped down into the trough of the semi-darkness, expostulating and
crying, not so much in alarm now, as in anger. For with the light comes
courage to birds as well as men, and fear, the offspring of ignorance,
which is bred in darkness, loses its power when its mystery is revealed.
But even with the coming of the day the still silent figure did not
move. It continued to sit until the birds grew tired of protesting, and
even the mountain hare wandered close by, sniffing the breeze in his
direction, and cocking its ears and listening, as it sat upon its hind
legs, only to resume its leisurely wandering again, feeling assured that
there was nothing to fear in the direction of this quiet, bent figure of
sorrow, that sat merely staring at the hills, and saw naught of anything
before him. The things he saw were not the things around him. He was
moving in a multitude again. He was walking among them with pity in his
heart--a great pity for their ignorance, their lack of vision; and he
was giving them knowledge and restoring light to their eyes, to widen
their range of vision, so that they could take things in their true
perspective. He was full of a great sympathy for their shortcomings,
recognizing to the full that only by sowing love could love be reaped,
only in service could happiness be found--that he who gave his life
would save it.
The great dumb mass of humanity needed serving--needed love. It passed
on blindly, wounding itself as it staggered against its barriers,
bruising its heart and soul in the darkness, and never learning its
lessons. Saviors in all ages had lifted the darkness a bit, and given
knowledge, and sometimes it had profited for a while till false prophets
arose to mislead.
It was a seething feverish mass, stamping and surging towards every
blatant voice which cried the false message to it, rousing it to anger,
and again misleading, until it often rose to rend its saviors instead of
those who had duped it so shamelessly.
All the tragic procession filed past, and he gave them peace and
knowledge. By and by they grew to a long thin stream, feverish and
agitated, seemingly all converging towards a point--pain and anxiety in
every quick movement, and suffering in every gesture. He looked with
still more and more compassion upon them, with a greater love in his
breast, but it did not calm them as before, and at last in desperation
he stretched out his hands in appealing pity for them, his whole being
aglow with the desire to help and pity and love, and he found that the
scene changed. He was on the moor, and there was the discomfort of cold
in his limbs; but--yes, he was looking at the pit, and there was a long
stream of men, women and children, principally women and children,
running frantically across the moor towards the pit, and he could hear
the faint sound of their voices, which clearly betokened suffering,
anxiety and alarm. Something had happened. He must have been looking at
that procession for a long time, he realized, and pulling himself
together, he bounded to his feet and was off in a long striding race
through the moor towards the pit, his heart telling him that something
had happened which was out of the ordinary kind of accident that
regularly happened at a coal mine. He bounded along, knowing as he went
that there was something more of sorrow for his mother in this, whatever
it was. He felt so, but could not account for the feeling, and as this
thought grew in intensity in his mind, he changed his course a bit, and
made for home, to ascertain what had really happened. It was something
big, he felt, but whatever it was, his mother must again be called upon
to suffer, and his alarm grew with his pace, until he arrived breathless
at the house. One look at her face, and he knew his instincts had told
him the truth.
She was white and strained, though tearless, but her eyes were full of
an awful suffering.
"What has happened, mother?" he demanded, as if he could hardly wait for
her to answer.
"The moss has broken in, an' twenty-three men are lost. Jamie an' Andra
are among them. They gaed oot themselves this morning, telling me they
could work fine, even though you werena there. Oh, Rob! What will I do!
Oh, dear! Oh, dear! My bonnie laddies!" and with a sob in her voice she
turned away, and Robert was again out of the house, and running through
the moor to the pit, as hard as desperation could drive him. His two
brothers were down there, and they must be got out. Even as he ran he
wondered what strange freak of fate it was, that had kept him out there
on the moor all night and so saved him from this terrible fate.
He could understand how his brothers would feel at the chance of working
one day by themselves. He had always been their guide and protector.
They had gone into the pit with him when they left school, and had just
continued working with him since, learning their trade from his greater
experience, and trusting always to his better judgment when there was
danger to avoid. They would go out that day with the intention of
working like slaves to produce an extra turn of coal. Even though it
were but one extra hutch, they would fill it, and slave all day with
never a rest, so that they could have the satisfaction of seeing
approval in his eyes, when they told him at night how many they had
turned out, and how well things had gone generally with them in his
absence.
He reached the pit, to find that the moss was already rising in the
shaft, and that there was no possibility of getting down to try and save
these twenty-three men and boys who were imprisoned in the darkness
beneath.
He came across Tam Donaldson, who was the last to get up.
"Tell me aboot it, Tam," he said. "Is there no chance of getting down?
Do you think any of them will be safe so far?" and a whole lot of other
anxious questions were rattled off, while Tam, dripping wet from having
to wade and fight the last fifty fathoms toward the pit bottom, through
the silent, sinister, creeping moss that filled the roadways and
tunnels, stood to give him an account of what had taken place.
"They were a' sitting at their piece, Rob--a' but James and Andra. They
were keen to get as muckle work done as possible, an' they had some coal
to get to fill oot a hutch, when a' at yince we heard Andra crying on us
to rin. Had they a' ran doon the brae we'd a' hae been safe, for we
could hae gotten to the bottom afore the moss; but some ran into the
inside heading, an' hadna time to realize that their outlet was cut off,
an' there they are; for the moss was comin' doon the full height of the
road when I ran back to try an' cry on them to come back. So I had to
rin for't too, an' jist got oot by the skin o' my teeth.
"I kent fine it wad happen," he went on, as Robert stood, the tears in
his eyes, as he realized how hopeless the position was of ever being
able to restore these men and boys again to their homes. There was anger
in Tam's voice as he spoke. "It's a' to get cheap coal, an' they ought
to hae known, for they were telt, that to open oot that seam into long
well workings so near the surface, an' wi' sic a rotten roof, was
invitin' disaster, wi' as muckle rain as we hae had lately. They are a
lot o' murderers--that's what they are! But what the hell do they care,
sae lang as they get cheap coal!"
Robert turned away sick at heart. It was certainly a foolish thing, he
had thought at the time, for the management to change their method of
working the coal; for even though the seam had grown thinner, he felt
that it could have still been worked at a profit under the old system.
He knew also that the men were all upset at the time by this change, but
the management had assured them that there was no danger, and that it
would mean more money for the men, as they would be enabled to produce
more coal.
This certainly had happened for a week or two, but the rates were soon
broken, because they were making too high wages; and the men found, as
usual, that their increased output had merely meant increased work for
them, and increased profits for the owners.
Was there nothing to be done? Robert wondered, as he paced restlessly
back and forth, his mind busy, as the mind of every man present, and
anxious to make any sacrifice, to take any risk, if by so doing they
might save those imprisoned in the mine. Even while his mind was
working, he could not help listening to the talk of those around him.
There were strange opinions expressed, and wild plans of rescue were
suggested and discussed and disputed. Everyone condemned the coal
company for what had happened, but over all there were the white-faced
women and the silent children; the muffled sobs, the tears, and the
agony of silent wet eyes that spoke more pain than all the tragedies
that had ever been written.
Robert could not help listening to one man--a big, raw, loosely-built
fellow, who stood in the midst of a group of women laying off his idea
of a rescue.
"I'm rale glad to be out of it," he said, "for Jean's sake, an' the
bairns; but for a' that I'd gang doon again an' try an' get them oot if
there was ony chance o' doin' it."
"Hoo is Jean?" one woman interposed to enquire about his wife, who had
been ill a long time.
"Oh, she's gettin' on fine noo, an' the doctor has a hopeful word o'
her," he answered. "In fact, I was just feeding the birds the last time
he was in, an' asked him hoo she was doin'."
This man, Dugald McIntosh, had one god--his canaries. He read all he
could get to read about them, and studied the best conditions under
which to rear them, sacrificed everything he could to breed better
birds, and this was always a topic for him to discourse upon.
"I was just busy feedin' them when he cam' in, and after he had examined
her, I asked him hoo she was gettin' on."
"Fine," he said, "gi'e her plenty o' sweet milk noo, and fresh eggs, an'
she'll sune be on her feet again. Fresh eggs! mind you, an' me canna get
yin for my canaries! I thocht it was a guid yin!"
Robert turned away; but there was working in his mind an idea, and he
ran round to the colliery office to the manager, who was nearly mad with
grief and anxiety at what had happened.
"Come in, Sinclair," he said simply. "Can you suggest anything to help
us? Whatever is done, it can only be done quickly; for the moss is
rising rapidly in the shaft, and even though some of the men are safe in
the upper workings, it is only a question of a very short time till the
moss will rise and suffocate them, or until the black damp does so. If
you have any idea that can help, out with it and let us make a trial,
for the inactivity is killing me."
"I have been thinking, Mr. Anderson," replied Robert, "that we might go
down the old air-shaft over in the moss there, and run along the top
level, which is not far from the surface, and try and blast it through
on the heading into which the moss broke."
It might be full of moss too, for no one knew the extent of the breakage
in the metals, and even though it were clear, the damp would be lying in
it; but surely they might make an attempt on it. Robert remembered
working this level to within about nine feet from going through on the
heading. If he had plenty of hands, just to go down and drill a hole in
anywhere, and blast out the coal with a shot or two wherever he could
best place them, he might succeed in getting through to the men. It
might be that after the first rush filling the roadways, the flood of
moss had drained off, and was not now running so thickly down the
heading.
"Let me go and try, sir," he pleaded eagerly. "I think I can manage, if
the level is still unbroken. We can work in short turns, so as not to
be overcome with the damp. Will you let me have a try? I believe it's
the only chance we have, and if we do succeed, look what it will mean to
the women in the village. Will you let me try?"
"Yes," replied Anderson, reaching for his lamp, "and I shall be one of
the triers too. Go out and pick seven or eight men. I'll get the
necessary tools and get off over the moor to the old air shaft. It may
still be open. It is a pity we let it go out of repair, but we can have
a trial."
Robert ran out, a hope filling his heart, telling his news to those
round about, and the first man to step forth, before he had finished,
was Dugald McIntosh, the man who had put more value on his canaries than
on his wife's health, who quietly lifted up the drills the manager had
brought, and slinging them lightly over his shoulder, was off across the
moor at a run, with a dozen men at his heels, all eager to get to grips
with the danger, and try to rescue their imprisoned comrades.