one another."]

He smiled, and put out a hand to her.

"A slide of rock has fallen over the mouth of the tunnel," he said, forcing
himself to speak as if it meant little or nothing. "Hold the lantern,
Joanne, while I get busy."

"A slide of rock," she repeated after him dumbly.

She took the lantern, her eyes still looking at him in that stricken way,
and with his naked hands John Aldous set to work. Five minutes and he knew
that it was madness to continue. Hands alone could not clear the tunnel.
And yet he worked, tearing into the rock and shale like an animal; rolling
back small boulders, straining at larger ones until the tendons of his arms
seemed ready to snap and his veins to burst. For a few minutes after that
he went mad. His muscles cracked, he panted as he fought with the rock
until his hands were torn and bleeding, and over and over again there ran
through his head Blackton's last words--_Four o'clock this afternoon!--Four
o'clock this afternoon!_

Then he came to what he knew he would reach very soon, a solid wall! Rock
and shale and earth were packed as if by battering rams. For a few moments
he fought to control himself before facing Joanne. Over him swept the grim
realization that his last fight must be for her. He steadied himself, and
wiped the dust and grime from his face with his handkerchief. For the last
time he swallowed hard. His soul rose within him almost joyously now in the
face of this last great fight, and he turned--John Aldous, the super-man.
There was no trace of fear in his face as he went to her. He was even
smiling in that ghostly glow of the lantern.

"It is hard work, Joanne."

She did not seem to hear what he had said. She was looking at his hands.
She held the lantern nearer.

"Your hands are bleeding, John!"

It was the first time she had spoken his name like that, and he was
thrilled by the calmness of her voice, the untrembling gentleness of her
hand as it touched his hand. From his bruised and bleeding flesh she raised
her eyes to him, and they were no longer the dumb, horrified eyes he had
gazed into fifteen minutes before. In the wonder of it he stood silent, and
the moment was weighted with an appalling silence.

It came to them both in that instant--the _tick-tick-tick_ of the watch in
his pocket!

Without taking her eyes from his face she asked:

"What time is it. John?"

"Joanne----"

"I am not afraid," she whispered. "I was afraid this afternoon, but I am