rain and went our four separate ways. That's the third
stage.... Begin to understand a little, do you, Elice?"

"Yes; I begin, just begin, to understand--many things."

Roberts shifted position silently, his arms crossed under his head for a
pillow. But he was still looking straight up, through the gently rocking
leaves at the infinite beyond.

"The next stage found me in a southern Iowa soft-coal mine. The
explanation is simple. I had saved a few dollars; while they lasted I
drifted, and to the north. When they were gone I had to work or starve. I
had no education whatever, no special training even. I was merely a big,
healthy animal, fit only for hard, physical work. I happened to be in a
farming and mining community. It was Winter and there was nothing to do
on a farm, so by the law of necessity I went to work heaving coal.

"I stayed there a little over seven months and during that time I
scarcely saw the sun. I'd go into the tunnel at seven in the morning,
take my lunch with me, and never come out until quitting time. I worked
seven days in the week here too. There wasn't any union and, anyway, no
one seemed to think of doing differently. At first it used to worry me,
that being always in the dark. My imagination kept working, picturing
sunlight and green things; after a bit that stage passed and I used to
dread to come out of the tunnel. The glare hurt my eyes and made me blink
like an owl in the daytime. I felt chilly, too, and shivered so my teeth
chattered. But I stuck to it, and after a few months the thing seemed
natural and almost as though I'd been there always. I began to cease to
think and to work unconsciously, like a piece of machinery. I even quit
counting the days. They were all the same, so what was the use? I just
worked, worked, and the coal dust ground into me and sweated into me
until I looked more like a negro than a white man.

"Time drifted on this way, from Winter until Spring, from Spring until
Summer; at last the something unusual that always comes about sooner or
later happened, and I awoke. It was just after dinner one day and I'd
gone back to the job. I had a lot of loose coal knocked down in the drift
and was shovelling steadily into a car when, away down the main tunnel, I
saw a bunch of lights bobbing in the darkness. It wasn't the time of day
for an inspection, and anyway there were several people approaching, so I
waited to see what it meant.

"They came on slowly, stopping to