THE SHADOW OF DEATH.
“Why, lads!” exclaimed Rennie; “lads!” Then, flashing the light of his
lamp into the boys’ faces, “What, Tom, is it you? you and the blind
brither? Ah! but it’s main bad for ye, bairnies, main bad--an’ warse
yet for the poor mither at hame.”
When Tom first recognized Rennie, he could not speak for fear and
amazement. The sudden thought that he and Bennie were alone, in the
power of this giant whose liberty he had sworn away, overcame his
courage. But when the kindly voice and sympathizing words fell on
his ears, his fear departed, and he was ready to fraternize with the
convict, as a companion in distress.
“Tom,” whispered Bennie, “I know his voice. It’s the man ’at talked so
kind to me on the day o’ the strike.”
“I remember ye, laddie,” said Jack. “I remember ye richt well.” Then,
turning to Tom, “Ye were comin’ up the fall; did ye find any openin’?”
“No,” said Tom, speaking for the first time since the meeting; “none
that’s any good.”
“An’ there’s naught above, either,” replied Jack; “so we’ve little to
do but wait. Sit ye doon, lads, an’ tell me how ye got caught.”
Seated on a shelf of rock, Tom told in a few words how he and Bennie
had been shut in by the fall. Then Jack related to the boys the story
of his escape from the sheriff, and how his comrades had spirited him
away into these abandoned workings, and were supplying him with food
until such time as he could safely go out in disguise, and take ship
for Europe.
There he was when the crash came.
“Noo ye mus’ wait wi’ patience,” he said. “It’ll no’ be for lang;
they’ll soon be a-comin’ for ye. The miners ha’ strong arms an’
stoot herts, an’ ye’ll hear their picks a-tap-tappin’ awa’ i’ the
headin’--to-morrow, mayhap.”
“An’ is it night now?” asked Bennie.
“It mus’ be, lad. I ha’ naught to mark the time by, but it mus’ be
along i’ the evenin’.”
“But,” interrupted Tom, as the thought struck him, “if they find you
here, you’ll have to go back to the jail.”
“I ha’ thocht o’ that,” answered Jack. “I ha’ thocht o’ that, an’ my
min’s made up. I’ll go back, an’ stan’ ma sentence. I ha’ deserved it.
I’d ha’ no peace o’ min’ a-wanderin’ o’er the earth a-keepin’ oot o’
the way o’ the law. An’ maybe, if I lived ma sentence oot, I could do
some’at that’s better. But I’ll no’ hide any longer; I canna do it!”
Off somewhere in the fall there was a grinding, crunching sound for a
minute, and then a muffled crash. Some loosened portion of the roof had
fallen in.
For a long time Jack engaged the boys in conversation, holding their
minds as much as possible from the fate of imprisonment.
Toward midnight Bennie complained of feeling hungry, and Jack went down
into the old chambers where he had been staying, and came back after
a while with a basket of food and a couple of coarse blankets, and
then they all went up to Bennie’s doorway. Tom’s oil was up there, and
their lamps needed filling. It seemed more like home up there too; and,
besides that, it was the point toward which a rescuing party would be
most likely to work.
Jack’s basket was only partly full of food, but there would be enough,
he thought, to last, by economical use, during the following day. He
ate none of it himself, however, and the boys ate but sparingly.
Then they made up a little platform from the boards and timbers of the
ruined door, and spread the blankets on it, and induced Bennie, who
seemed to be weak and nervous, to lie down on it and try to sleep. But
the lad was very restless, and slept only at intervals, as, indeed, did
Tom and Jack, one of whom had stretched himself out on the bench, while
the other sat on the mine floor, reclining against a pillar.
When they thought it was morning, they all arose and walked around a
little, and the boys ate another portion of the food from the basket.
But Jack did not touch it; he was not hungry, he said, and he went off
into the new chambers to explore the place.
After a while he came back and sat down, and began telling stories of
his boyhood life in the old country, intermingling with them many a
marvellous tale and strange adventure, and so he entertained the boys
for hours.
It must have been well on into the afternoon that Tom took to walking
up and down the heading. Sometimes Jack went with him, but oftener he
remained to talk with Bennie, who still seemed weak and ill, and who
lay down on the blankets again later on, and fell asleep.
The flame of the little lamp burned up dimly. More oil and a fresh wick
were put in, but the blaze was still spiritless.
Jack knew well enough what the trouble was. There were places up in
the new chambers where the deadly carbonic acid gas was escaping into
the prison, adding, with terrible rapidity, to the amount produced by
exhalation and combustion. But he said nothing; the boys did not know,
and it would be useless to alarm them further.
[Illustration]
Bennie started and moaned now and then in his sleep, and finally awoke,
crying. He had had bad dreams, he said.
Jack thought it must be late in the second evening of their
imprisonment.
He took all the food from the basket, and divided it into three equal
parts. It would be better to eat it, he thought, before actual
suffering from hunger began. They would be better able to hold out in
the end.
Nevertheless, he laid his portion back in the basket.
“I haven’t the stomach for it just noo,” he said. “Mayhap it’ll taste
better an’ I wait a bit.”
There was plenty of water. A little stream ran down through the airway,
from which the pail had been repeatedly filled.
The night wore on.
The first sound of rescue had not yet been heard.
By-and-by both boys slept.
Jack alone remained awake and thoughtful. His face gave token of
great physical suffering. Once he lifted the cover from the basket,
and looked hungrily and longingly at the little portion of food that
remained. Then he replaced the lid, and set the basket back resolutely
on the ledge.
“No! no!” he murmured. “I mus’ na tak’ it oot o’ the mou’s o’ Tom
Taylor’s bairns.”
For a long time he sat motionless, with his chin in his hands, and his
eyes fixed on the sleeping lads. Then, straightening up, there came
into his face a look of heroic resolution.
“I’ll do it!” he said, aloud. “It’ll be better for us a’.”
The sound of his voice awakened Tom, who had slept for some hours,
and who now arose and began again his monotonous walk up and down the
heading.
After a while, Jack motioned to him to come and sit beside him on the
bench.
“I ha’ summat to say to ye,” he said. Then, with a glance at the
sleeping boy, “Come ye up the airway a bit.”
The two walked up the airway a short distance, and sat down on a broken
prop by the side of the track.
“Tom,” said Jack, after a moment or two of silence, “it’s a-goin’ hard
wi’ us. Mos’ like it’s near two days sin’ the fall, an’ no soun’ o’
help yet. Na doot but they’re a-workin’, but it’ll tak’ lang to get
here fra the time ye hear the first tappin’. The three o’ us can’t live
that lang; mayhap two can. Ye s’all be the ones. I ha’ fixed on that
fra the start. That’s why I ha’ ta’en no food.”
“An’ we’ve had it all!” broke in Tom. “You shouldn’t a-done it. The
three of us ought to a’ fared alike--’cept, maybe, Bennie; he aint so
strong, an’ he ought to be favored.”
“Yes, Tom, the weakes’ first. That’s richt; that’s why I’m a-givin’
my chances to you lads. An’ besides that, my life ain’t worth savin’
any way, alongside o’ yours an’ Bennie’s. Ye s’all share what’s i’ the
basket atween ye. ’Tain’t much, but it’ll keep ye up as long’s the
air’ll support ye. It’s a-gettin’ bad, the air is. D’ye min’ the lomp,
how dim an’ lazy-like it burns? A mon’s got to ha’ such strength as
food’ll give him to hold out lang in air like this.”
“I wish you’d ’a’ eaten with us,” interrupted Tom again. “’Tain’t right
to let your chances go that way on account of us.”
Paying no attention to this protest, Jack continued:
“But I’ve a thing on ma min’, Tom, that I’d feel easier aboot an’
fitter for what’s a-comin’ if I told it. It’s aboot the father, lad;
it’s aboot Tom Taylor, an’ how he cam’ to his death. Ye’ll no’ think
too hard o’ me, Tom? It wasna the fall o’ top coal that killit him--it
was _me_! Tom! lad! Tom! bear wi’ me a minute! Sit ye an’ bear wi’ me;
it’ll no’ be for lang.”
The boy had risen to his feet, and stood staring at the man in
terrified amazement. Then Jack rose, in his turn, and hurried on with
his story:
“It wasna by intent, Tom. We were the best o’ frien’s; I was his butty.
We had a chamber thegither that time i’ the Carbondale mine. But one
day we quarrelled,--I’ve no call to say what aboot,--we quarrelled
there in the chamber, an’ ugly words passed, an’ there cam’ a moment
when one o’ us struck the ither.
“Then the fight began; han’ to han’; both lamps oot; a’ in the dark;
oh, it was tarrible! tarrible!--doon on the floor o’ the mine, crashin’
up against the ragged pillars, strugglin’ an’ strainin’ like mad--an’
a’ of a sudden, I heard a sharp cry, an’ I felt him a-slippin’ oot o’
ma arms an’ doon to ma feet, an’ he lay there an’ was still.
“I foun’ ma lamp an’ lighted it, an’ when I lookit at him, he was dead.
“I was a coward. I was afraid to say we’d been a-fightin’; I was afraid
they’d say I murdered him. So I blastit doon a bit o’ roof, an’ fixed
it like the top coal’d killit him; an’ I wasna suspeckit. But I could
na stay there; an’ I wandered west, an’ I wandered east, an’ I took to
drink, an’ to evil deeds, an’ at last I cam’ back, an’ I went in wi’
the Molly Maguires--Scotchman as I was--an’ I done desperate work for
’em; work that I oughtn’t to be alive to-night to speak aboot--but I
ha’ suffered; O lad, I ha’ suffered!
“Mony an’ mony’s the nicht, as often as I ha’ slept an’ dreamed, that
I ha’ fought over that fight i’ the dark, an’ felt that body a-slip,
slippin’ oot o’ ma grasp. Oh, it’s been tarrible, tarrible!”
Jack dropped into his seat again and buried his face in his hands.
The man’s apparent mental agony melted Tom’s heart, and he sat down
beside him and laid a comforting hand on his knee.
“I have naught against you,” he said, and repeated, “I have naught
against you.”
After a while Jack looked up.
“I believe ye, lad,” he said, “an’ somehow I feel easier for the
tellin’. But ye mus’ na tell the mither aboot it, Tom; I’ve a reason
for that. I’ve a bit o’ money here, that I’ve saved along through the
years, an’ I’ve neither kith nor kin that’s near enow to leave it
wi’--an’ I want she should have it; an’ if she knew she might not tak’
it.”
As he spoke he drew, from an inner pocket, a folded and wrapped
package, and gave it to Tom.
“It’s a matter o’ a thousan’ dollars,” he continued, “an’ I’d like--I’d
like if a part o’ it could be used for gettin’ sight for the blin’ lad,
gin he lives to get oot. I told him, one day, that he should have his
sight, if money’d buy it--an’ I want to keep ma ward.”
Tom took the package, too much amazed, and too deeply moved to speak.
The grinding noise of settling rock came up from the region of the
fall, and then, for many minutes, the silence was unbroken.
After a while, Jack said, “Put the money where they’ll find it on ye,
gin ye--gin ye don’t get oot.”
Then he rose to his feet again.
“You’re not goin’ to leave us?” said Tom.
“Yes, lad, I mus’ go. It’s the way wi’ hunger, sometimes, to mak’ a man
crazy till he’s not knowin’ what he does. Ye s’all no ha’ that to fear
fra me. Tom,” grasping the boy, suddenly, by both hands, “don’t come up
into the new chambers, Tom; promise me!”
Tom promised, and Jack added, “Mayhap I s’all not see ye
again--good-by--keep up heart; that’s the gret thing for both o’
ye--keep up heart, an’ never let hope go.”
Then he loosed the boy’s hands, picked up his lamp, and, with a smile
on his face, he turned away. He passed down the airway, and out by
the entrance where blind Bennie lay, still sleeping, and stopped and
looked tenderly down upon him, as men look, for the last time in life,
on those whom they love.
He bent over, holding his heavy beard back against his breast, and
touched the tangled hair on the child’s forehead with his lips; and
then, weak, staggering, with the shadow of his fate upon him, he passed
out on the heading, and up into the new chambers, where the poisoned
air was heavy with the deadly gas, and the lamp-flame scarcely left the
wick; and neither Tom Taylor nor his blind brother ever saw Jack Rennie
again, in life or in death.
When Tom went back to the waiting-place, Bennie awoke.
“I had such a nice dream, Tom,” he said. “I thought I was a-lyin’ in
the little bed, at home, in the early mornin’; an’ it was summer, an’
I could hear the birds a-singin’ in the poplar tree outside; an’ then
Mommie she come up by the bed an’ kissed me; an’ then I thought, all
of a sudden, I could see. O Tom, it was lovely! I could see Mommie
a-stannin’ there, an’ I could see the sunlight a-comin’ in at the
window, an’ a-shinin’ on the floor; an’ I jumped up an’ looked out, an’
it was all just like--just like heaven.”
There was a pause, and then Bennie added, “Tom, do you s’pose if I
should die now an’ go to heaven, I could see up there?”
“I guess so,” answered Tom; “but you aint goin’ to die; we’re goin’ to
get out--both of us.”
But Bennie was still thinking of the heavenly vision.
“Then I wouldn’t care, Tom; I’d just as lieve die--if only Mommie could
be with me.”
Again Tom spoke, in earnest, cheerful tones, of the probability of
rescue; and discussed the subject long, and stimulated his own heart,
as well as Bennie’s, with renewed hope.
By-and-by the imperious demands of hunger compelled a resort to the
remnant of food. Tom explained that Jack had gone away, to be by
himself a while, and wanted them to eat what there was in the basket.
Bennie did not question the statement. So the last of the food was
eaten.
After this there was a long period of quiet waiting, and listening for
sounds of rescue, and, finally, both boys lay down again and slept.
Hours passed by with no sound save the labored breathing of the
sleepers. Then Tom awoke, with a prickling sensation over his entire
body, and a strange heaviness of the head and weakness of the limbs;
but Bennie slept on.
“He might as well sleep,” said Tom, to himself, “it’ll make the time
shorter for him.”
But by and by Bennie awoke, and said that he felt very sick, and that
his head was hurting him.
He fell asleep again soon, however, and it was not until some hours
later that he awoke, with a start, and asked for water. After that,
though oppressed with drowsiness, he slept only at intervals, and
complained constantly of his head.
Tom cared for him and comforted him, putting his own sufferings out of
sight; sleeping a little, straining his ears for a sound of rescue.
The hours crept on, and the flame of the little lamp burned round and
dim, and the deadly gas grew thicker in the darkness.
Once, after a longer period of quiet than usual, there came a whisper
from Bennie.
“Tom!”
“What is it, Bennie?”
“Where did Jack go?”
“Up in the new chambers.”
“How long’s he been gone?”
“Oh, a day or two, I guess.”
“Hark, Tom, is that him?”
“I don’t hear any thing, Bennie.”
“Listen! it’s a kind o’ tappin,’ tappin’--don’t you hear it?”
But Tom’s heart was beating so wildly that he could hear no lesser
noise.
“I don’t hear it any more,” said Bennie.
But both boys lay awake now and listened; and by and by Bennie spoke
again, “There it is; don’t you hear it, Tom?”
This time Tom did hear it; just the faintest tap, tap, sounding,
almost, as though it were miles away.
There was a little crowbar there, that had been brought down from the
new chambers. Tom caught it up, and hurried into the heading, and beat,
half a dozen times, on the wall there, and then, dropping the bar from
sheer exhaustion, he lay down beside it and listened.
It was hard to tell if they heard his strokes, though he repeated them
again and again, as his strength would permit.
But the faint tapping ceased only at intervals, and, once in a long
while, a scarcely perceptible thud could be heard.
Tom crept back to Bennie, and tried to speak cheeringly, as they lay
and listened.
But the blind boy’s limbs had grown numb, and his head very heavy and
painful. His utterance, too, had become thick and uncertain, and at
times he seemed to be wandering in his mind. Once he started up, crying
out that the roof was falling on him.
Hours passed. Echoing through the fall, the sound of pick and crowbar
came, with unmistakable earnestness.
Tom had tapped many times on the wall, and was sure he had been heard,
for the answering raps had reached his ears distinctly.
But they were so long coming; so long! Yet Tom nursed his hope, and
fought off the drowsiness that oppressed him, and tried to care for
Bennie.
The blind boy had got beyond caring for himself. He no longer heard the
sounds of rescue. Once he turned partly on his side.
“Yes, Mommie,” he whispered, “yes, I see it; ain’t it pretty!” Then,
after a pause, “O Mommie, how beautiful--how beautiful--it is--to see!”
Tap, tap, thud, came the sounds of rescue through the rock and coal.
Tap, tap, thud; but, oh, how the moments lagged; how the deadly gas
increased; how the sharp teeth of hunger gnawed; how feebly burned the
flame of the little lamp; how narrow grew the issue between life and
death!
A time had come when Bennie could be no longer roused to consciousness,
when the brain itself had grown torpid, and the tongue refused to act.
Tap! tap! louder and louder; they were coming near, men’s voices could
be heard; thud! thud! the prison-wall began to tremble with the heavy
blows; but the hours went slipping by into the darkness, and, over
the rude couch, whereon the blind boy lay, the angel of death hung
motionless, with pinions poised for flight.
“O God!” prayed Tom; “O dear God, let Bennie live until they come!”