foot of it when Ralph arrived with his trip of lights;
so that he had only to run the empty car up into the air-way a few
feet, take on the loaded one, and start back toward the plane.

But one afternoon, when he came up with his last trip for the day, he
found no load at the foot of Conway's chamber, and, after waiting a
few minutes, he went up to the face to investigate. He found Conway
there alone. The miner for whom the young man worked had fallen sick
and had gone out earlier than usual, so his laborer had finished
the blast at which the employer had been at work. It was a blast of
top-coal, and therefore it took longer to get it down and break it up.
This accounted for the delay.

"Come up here with ye," said Conway to the boy; "I want to show ye
something."

Ralph climbed up on to the shelf of coal at the breast of the chamber,
and the man, tearing away a few pieces of slate and a few handfuls of
dirt from a spot in the upper face, disclosed an opening in the wall
scarcely larger than one's head. A strong current of air coursed
through it, and when Conway put his lamp against it the flame was
extinguished in a moment.

"Where does it go to?" asked Ralph.

"I don't just know, but I think it must go somewhere into the workin's
from old No. 1 slope. The boss, he was in this mornin', and he said he
thought we must be a-gettin' perty close to them old chambers."

"Does anybody work in there?"

"Oh, bless ye, no! They robbed the pillars tin years ago an' more; I
doubt an ye could get through it at all now. It's one o' the oldest
places in the valley, I'm thinkin'. D'ye mind the old openin' ye can
see in the side-hill when ye're goin' up by Tom Ballard's to the
Dunmore road?"

"Yes, that's where Uncle Billy worked when he was a miner."

"Did he, thin! Well, that's where they wint in. It's a long way from
here though, I'm thinkin'."

"Awful strong wind goin' in there, ain't they?"

"Yes, I must block it up again, or it'll take all our air away."

"What'll your miner do to-morrow when he finds this place?"

"Oh, he'll have to get another chamber, I guess."

The man was fastening up the opening again with pieces of slate and
coal, and plastering it over with loose wet dirt.

"Well," said Ralph, "I'll have to go now. Jasper's gettin' in a hurry.
Don't you hear 'im?"

Conway helped the boy to push the loaded car down the chamber and
fasten it to his trip.

"I'll not be here long," said the man as he tu