He passed through it
and began to trudge along the narrow, winding passage. He had often to
stop and rest, he felt so very weak. A long time he walked, slowly,
unsteadily, but without much pain. Then, suddenly, he came to the end
of the heading. The black, solid wall faced him before he was hardly
aware of it. He had taken the wrong direction when he entered the
gallery, that was all. He had followed the heading in instead of out.
His journey had not been without its use, however, for it settled
definitely the course he ought to take to reach the slope, and that,
he thought, was a matter of no little importance.
He sat down for a few minutes to rest, and then started on his return.
It seemed to be taking so much more time to get back that he feared he
had passed the door-way by which he had entered the heading. But he
came to it at last and stopped there.
He began to feel hungry. He wondered why he had not thought to look
for some one's dinner pail, before he came over into the old mine. He
knew that his own still had fragments of food in it; he wished that
he had them now. But wishing was of no use, the only thing for him
to do was to push ahead toward the surface. When he should reach his
mother's house his craving would be satisfied with all that could
tempt the palate.
He started on again. The course of the heading was far from straight,
and his progress was very slow.
At last he came to a place where there had been a fall. They had
robbed the pillars till they had become too weak to support the roof,
and it had tumbled in.
Pages:
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325