s creaking sounded over their heads.

Clem caught his comrade by the arm and pulled him into a narrow entry
near by.

"Go slow! We don't want to get smashed!"

He held up his safety-lamp.

"Look at that prop!"

The heavy timber was bending like a twig.

"Get on quick!" cried Anton, struggling against the grasp, but the
young fellow held him fast.

"Don't lose your head!" he warned. "The current of air has stopped,
sure sign that the way to the shafts is blocked. The nearer we get to
the goaf (waste ground), the more likely we are to get crushed.
Listen!"

The creaking grew louder, and then, suddenly, with a rush of sound,
the gallery in front of them, into which Anton had been about to
plunge, sagged. The bending prop went into splinters, and, with a
roar, the whole roof fell, the broken rock coming to within a few
yards of where they were standing.

"Close shave, that!" remarked Clem coolly.

Anton made no answer, but shivered as he looked. He realized that his
comrade's warning had saved his life.

The trembling and the creaking recommenced, but farther away; then,
with a gigantic noise of tearing, there came a rending crash, followed
by utter silence.

"Now!"

He let go the boy's arm and turned sharp off to the right.

"That's not the way to the shaft," protested Anton.

"We'll try the North Gallery," answered Clem. "Likely enough the fall
has followed the line of the fault."

A sharp run of a hundred yards brought them to a pile of rock blocking
up the passage. Clem licked his hand to make it moist, and then slowly
passed it across the entire face of the obstruction.

"No!" he said. "There's not a breath of air coming through. That way's
blocked."

He turned in another direction. With all the ventilation stopped, the
air was growing heavy. Fifty yards' run, and then--

Blocked again!

This time Clem made no comment. He turned back to try the farther side
of the mine. As they wheeled round a corner, and saw a gleam of light
he cried, with a note of relief:

"There they are! I knew they'd send in a rescue party, right away!"

Then his voice dropped.

"No," he added, "there's only one lamp."

A single miner came running towards them.

"The North Gallery?" he queried.

"No good, Jim," Clem answered, who recognized him as a new-comer in
the mine. "Blocked solid!"

"So's the entries to the goaf! I've been there! How about the old
workings I've heard the boys talk of?"

The student m