Alan Sullivan

“ Slowly along the smooth floor of the chamber came the first breathings of gas. From ruptured fissures and innumerable crevices in the shattered earth it crept. Heavy with portent, it flooded the broken coal about the men's feet. No life-giving breath could penetrate the mountain of fallen rock to dissipate these deadly fumes. At last they both knew it. Don began to ramble, talking now to Nan, now to Jock, and bursting into sudden heartrending appeals for help. Somewhere on the other side of that barrier men were fighting viciously to get at them and drag them up to sunlight. ”

“ Suddenly from the black abyss that lay between their own chamber and the main gangway came a deep cracking that ended abruptly with a dull fall of roof slate. Then silence for a moment, followed by the heavy plunge of tons of splintering shale. After that silence again and the abrupt ceasing of the cool air pressure that had constantly flowed in from the wooden brattices. Jock rolled swiftly over and scuttled out of sight. Don, dazed and trembling, could do nothing but listen. He heard him stop, then go on again. He heard the big man pushing against the sliding face of broken rock. ”

“ Two golf balls meant a day's pay to Jock, and the owner would lose them in the morning, and laugh and order more. And Nan seemed farther away than ever.
At eleven o'clock the two left their chamber and crawled out to the nearest gangway to eat. The Davy lamps burned beside them, spear-heads of flame inside their gauze cylinders. The pit ponies, that never would see daylight, munched contentedly in the long stable at the far end of the gangway. Silence was everywhere, broken only by those indescribable sounds that circulate like ghosts through the hollow . ”