t once.

As the lamp spluttered up, after the ducking which had extinguished it,
Wilson gazed down the gallery before him with a touch of new dismay. The
water was flowing over it in a thin, glossy coat, and it was considerably
steeper than on the outer side of the fault. Apparently the only thing to
do was to slide.

Working about into a sitting position, facing down the slope, with feet
spread out, as though steering a sleigh, Wilson allowed himself to go.
The rapidity with which he gained momentum startled him. Soon the gray
damp walls were passing upward like a glistening mist. With difficulty he
kept his feet foremost.

Meantime the voices from below had continued shouting. Onward he slid,
and the sounds became clearer. At last the words came to him. They were,
"The pipe! The pipe! Catch the pump-pipe!" Then Wilson suddenly
recollected that the pipe was but half way down the slope.

Digging with his heels he sought to slow up, gazing first at one flitting
wall, then the other. On the right a vertical streak of black appeared.
He clutched with heels and hands, and sought to steer toward it. He swept
nearer, and reached with outstretched hand. The effort swung him
sideways, his fingers just grazed the iron, and twisting about, he shot
downward head first at greater speed than ever. A moment after there was
a chorus of shouts, a sharp cry in his ears, an impact, a rolling and
tumbling, a second crash, and Wilson felt himself dragged to his feet.

About him, in a single flickering light, was a group of strange faces.
While he gazed, dazed, rubbing a bruised head, all talked excitedly, even
angrily.

"Why didn't you hang on, you idiot?" demanded a voice.

"Who is it, anyway? It's a stranger!"

"And a boy!" said another.

Wilson recovered his scattered wits, and quickly explained who he was and
what he had come for. Immediately there was a joyful shout. "We'll be out
inside of an hour!" cried one.

"But how am I going to get up to the pipe?" demanded Wilson.

"We are cutting footholds up the incline.

"White, get back on the job," directed the speaker, who Wilson later
learned was the fire-boss.

"You brought him down with you," he added, to the boy.

The man spoken to began creeping up the water-covered slope dragging a
pick, and Wilson turned to look about him. The eleven men in the party,
not including the man on the slope, were crowded together on the level
floor of what evidently was the lower fault