The Iron Boys in the Mines Part 5

Jarvis began to take off his coat.

"Not now, Bob," spoke up the other quickly. "This is the company's time.

We should both be discharged if we were to be caught fighting here and now. We will settle our difficulty some other time."

"So you were only bluffing, eh? I knew you didn't have the s.p.u.n.k to fight anything."

Steve pointed off to the mine shaft.

"There comes the skip with a load of ore. You had better get your car back there or you will have trouble enough without a fight."

Jarvis, with an exclamation, began pus.h.i.+ng the tram car back over the top of the dump, Steve picking up his shovel and beginning his work of clearing the end of the tracks.

All day long the lad toiled industriously. It was hard work and his back ached, yet he kept to his task. When night came Steve had the satisfaction of being told that he had done a man's work that day.

A truce had been declared between the two boys, so far as fighting was concerned, though Jarvis continued his nagging at every opportunity.

Steve took the other's scoffing good-naturedly, turning Bob's jibes with soft answers. For a full week both lads had labored far up on the ore dump. They had been too busy to think of their personal grievances for any great length of time. Sat.u.r.day night had arrived, and when Steve left the dump to start for his boarding house he was told that the general superintendent wished to see him.

"I guess he is going to discharge me," thought the boy. "Well, I have done the best I could."

His surprise was great, therefore, when the superintendent said, as the lad came to a halt in front of the official's desk:

"You have done very well, Rush."

"Thank you, sir."

"Do you still think you would like to work below ground?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then you may begin on Monday."

"On what s.h.i.+ft?"

"The day s.h.i.+ft, going down at seven o'clock. The best I have for you now is a contract job run by a man named Spooner. You will find it pretty hard work. You see, these contracts are given out for so much per ton and the men who take the contracts propose to get as much out of their workmen as possible. You will be worked to your full capacity."

"I can stand it, sir."

"If you do, you should be able to endure anything we have to offer in this business. I have arranged for Spooner to take you on as a miner's helper. Your wages will be a dollar and a quarter a day. Be very careful and guard yourself from accident. Carelessness may cost you your life, for there is danger everywhere below ground."

"I will be very careful, sir."

Steve hurried away full of antic.i.p.ation. He was to be a real miner; he was to start his career as a miner on a level two thousand feet below the surface. The lad had never been below ground before and he was full of antic.i.p.ation of what awaited him on the following Monday morning.

Acting on the suggestion of the boarding-house boss, the lad had purchased a suit of yellow oilcloth, rubber boots, oilcloth hat and candle holder. This latter, as used by the ore miners, is a piece of steel, one end coming to a sharp point, the other having an opening for the candle itself. The whole fastens securely to the hat. When necessary the candle holder may be carried in the hand, or driven into a crevice of rock or ore.

This, with pick and shovel, comprises the miner's outfit and was the outfit of Steve Rush when he presented himself at the mouth of the shaft on the following Monday morning. There were about five hundred men to go down in the cage, the car that carries the miners and other pa.s.sengers down to the various levels, and Steve found himself pushed aside, so that he was among the last to get aboard the steel cage.

"Will you tell me where the Spooner contract is located?" he asked of the cage-tender before getting aboard.

"Seventeenth level."

"Does the car stop there?"

"If it doesn't, you're a goner."

Rush leaped aboard, grasping the rod that he saw above his head to steady himself. The protecting bars in front of the cage fell in place with a noisy clang.

"All clear," announced a voice.

The support beneath the lad seemed to drop from under him. With a rush and a roar, a grinding and crunching the steel cage dropped from sight.

Instantly everything was plunged in inky darkness.

"Do--do they always go like this?" asked the young miner of a man standing beside him.

"This isn't going much. He has slow speed on this morning because the cage has a bigger load than usual. Afraid, are you?"

"No, I am not afraid. I was wondering what would happen if the man forgot to shut off his power when we reached the bottom."

The miner laughed.

"We'd punch a hole in the bottom of the shaft," he said.

"How deep is the shaft, sir?"

"Two thousand feet to the bottom--fifty feet less than that to the last working level. The bottom level is used to drain off the water from the other levels. From there big steam pumps pump the water to the surface."

The two could scarcely hear for noise.

"The Spooner contract is on the seventeenth level, is it not?"

"Yes, on the sub-level above the seventeenth. Is that where you are going to work?"

"Yes, sir; for Mr. Spooner."

"Then I feel sorry for you."

"Why so, sir?"

"Because he is a slave driver. Every man in the mines knows him and none of them wants to work for him. I guess he hasn't a white man on the contract."

"I didn't know there were any colored men employed here."

"There are not. We call a white man one who is not a foreigner," laughed the miner.

"Oh!"

Now and then the car would halt with a jolt; two or three men would leap off and disappear in the darkness, after which the cage would drop down another level or so.

"Here is your level," announced the miner. "Jump off, or you will be carried by."