kes of a pick; besides, I knew that Jim had left his tools behind.
It couldn't be rescuers, because the sound was near me. Near me? It
was almost at my ear.

"Sometimes breaking timber cracks. It might be a prop gradually giving
way, I thought, just ready to let down a new fall of rock on my head.
But a creaking timber is sometimes loud, sometimes soft, and this
ticking, as I said, was regular, like a big clock.

"Then I guessed!

"It was drops of water falling!

"I could have shouted with relief, but down there, in the dark and the
stillness, the silence was so heavy that I was afraid to shout.

"I felt my way forward, one step and then a second, and the ticking
stopped.

"I took a third step and it began again. I stepped backward, and a
little to one side, and the drop fell on my bare shoulder.

"I took my dinner-pail, moved it forward, backward, this way and that,
until at last I heard the drops falling in the tin.

"I was too thirsty to wait long. As soon as there was a teaspoonful of
water in the pail, I moistened my tongue with it. That was a relief! I
was able to hold out the tin pail, the next time, until there was a
reasonable drink.

"Ugh, it was bitter! It tasted coppery and twisted up my mouth, but it
was liquid, at least. After I had a drink or two, I felt better. My
scare passed away.

"Then I began to think a bit. If water was dropping as quickly as
that, it must be running somewhere. But where? I got down on my hands
and knees and began to feel along the floor. Here it was damp; there,
dry. I crawled along for a few minutes, following the line of the damp
floor, and, sure enough, came to a hollow where a good-sized puddle
had collected. There I was able to half-fill the pail.

"So far, I was all right. I'd found the water. But how was I to get
back to Anton? And where was Jim, if he were still alive? I hadn't any
idea, any more, of which way to turn.

"Then I got a scheme. Suppose I just walked straight ahead, keeping my
right hand against the wall, and turning to the right at every opening
I came to? I knew that we were hemmed in at every point. Therefore, I
figured, we must be inside some kind of an irregular circle. The place
where we had made our beds was in the room where I had been working,
which was in the end gallery, and, at that rate, somewhere on the
circumference of that circle. If I kept on going, long enough, I'd be
bound to strike the place.

"Off I started with the pail h