CHAPTER XXIII

BURIED ALIVE

Tom had accompanied Shepley, to help him direct the scene of the fight with the bandits. Tom’s advice on fighting tactics was always worth listening to and Shepley was glad of any assistance he might give in handling the extras. There was another point to be gained--and this was quite a personal one with Tom--he would be with Ruth during the course of the avalanche.

Now he seized her arm and half-carried, half-pushed her into the cave. The place was pretty well filled when they got there and Ruth was more than ever glad that the cave was a large one.

There was a moment of tense excitement. One of the boys put his hands over his ears as though to shut out the expected sound of exploding dynamite.

Ruth tucked her hand within Tom’s arm. The boy put his big one over it, holding her fingers firmly.

“Aren’t you glad I’m here?” he whispered. “Honest?”

“Honest, I am,” she whispered in return.

The next moment it came--what they had been waiting for with held breath. A sharp explosion, and the rumble and roar of dislodged rock and dirt starting on its downward slide.

“Here it comes!”

“Oh boy, I wish we were out there with the cameramen to watch it!” some one yelled.

Then, suddenly, cutting off the exclamations of those within the cave, came a second explosion, so loud, so deafening, that the first might have been the popping of a child’s toy pistol.

It seemed as though the whole mountain shook, rocked on its base. There was a rending, tearing, grinding sound as tons of the dislodged mountainside swept downward to the valley.

All those in the cave backed instinctively away from the opening. It was well that they did, for at the moment, the light of day was shut out for them, tons of rock and dirt piling up before the mouth of the cave, barring their way to freedom!

It was a second or more before the extent of the calamity appeared to them.

It was Ruth who spoke first, her voice sounding faint and eerie in that intense gloom.

“Tom, do you realize? We’re buried alive in here! What do you suppose happened? That second explosion----”

“Wasn’t in the picture at all,” Tom finished grimly. “Don’t you suppose I know it?”

“Then what----”

“The dynamite house,” Tom explained briefly. “I told them to take it all away--what we didn’t need of the dynamite. The fools evidently forgot----”

“And we pay for it, mister,” drawled one of the boys from the dark. “Looks like we’d been buried good and proper without any expenses of the funeral.”

“Easy there!” Layton Boardman’s voice came cool and grim. “Remember, if we’re in jeopardy here, our part from now on is to work hard and say little.”

“Do you think there’s a chance to tunnel our way out?” Ruth asked eagerly.

“We can try. And it’s safe to say that those outside won’t sit around and twiddle their thumbs. Don’t worry, Miss Fielding. We’ll get out some way.”

Tom could not but admire Boardman’s poise and cool courage. What he said sounded almost convincing, but Tom knew that in his heart Boardman, like himself, had little hope of escape for any of them.

Blocked as their retreat was by tons of débris, how could they hope to dig a way out from within with only their bare hands for tools?

On the other hand, even though those on the outside who had witnessed the catastrophe set to work at once with all energy--as of course they would do--the chances were that they would not be able to burrow a way into the cave in time to save the company from smothering to death in those close quarters. Even now the air was getting hot, devitalized.

While Layton Boardman, some of the boys, and even Ruth, set to work at the gigantic task of tunneling a way to the outer air, Tom worked his way silently and unnoticed to the rear of the cave. He had no idea what he would find there--if indeed he found anything save the blank damp wall of dirt in which it had seemed to terminate. But, after all, exploration seemed worth while, the chance no more forlorn than that the others were taking.

He groped his way through the blackness. At last his fingers touched the earthy wall at the rear of the cave.

He felt his way cautiously along this and came at last to a spot where the earth wall seemed to end.

His breath caught in his throat. Was the rear of the cave not a solid wall then? Was this break a possible entrance to a second cave or a tunnel that they had not observed before?

He felt in his pocket for matches, found a box and cautiously struck one, shielding its flame with his hand. It was a moment before his eyes could make out anything beyond the tiny flickering light of the match. Then he uttered a low exclamation.

There was a break, an opening through which, by ducking his head, he could go.

The match was burning his fingers. Tom dropped it and cautiously entered the tunnel, progressing by the sense of touch. He did not strike another match for fear those in the main body of the cave might discover what he was about and convey the knowledge to Ruth. He had a horror of giving her false hope. This tunnel might lead anywhere or nowhere. It seemed, just now, to be leading directly into the heart of the mountain.

He groped his way along, carefully testing the walls of the tunnel on both sides of him for any sign of another opening.

But there was none. The walls of the passage presented a blank damp surface, and as Tom progressed he felt certain that these walls were closing in on him.

He was coming to the end probably, a converging of the tunnel into the solid wall of the mountainside, which meant defeat and hopelessness.

Tom’s heart sank. A great horror rose in him. Not until that moment did he realize how much he had hoped for from this unexpected tunnel. With the snuffing out of that hope went his last shred of cheerfulness.

Buried alive! Shut in the horror and blackness of that cave! Such an end--and for Ruth!

What was that! Tom’s hand, groping against the narrowing walls of the tunnel, suddenly slipped off into emptiness!

No wall there! Another break! Perhaps another tunnel!

Tom lighted a second match, and with trembling fingers held it aloft, shielded its feeble flame, peered, half in hope and half in dread, into the shadows beyond the light.

There was a break--another tunnel branching off into darkness. Tom lighted another match and advanced toward the opening. The flame flickered and went out, a curious thing in that airless place.

Swift hope rushed up in him. He stood a moment collecting himself, striving to think calmly.

There must be a current of air in that stifling place, otherwise the match would not have gone out! And a current of air meant only one thing--that there must be another exit from the cave, another opening into the outer air.

Not daring to let himself hope too much, Tom went forward and around the break in the tunnel wall, inch by inch, feeling his way.

Suddenly he stopped, head up. Before him, dim and far away, but undeniably there, gleamed a tiny ray of light.

With a hoarse cry Tom turned and stumbled back the way he had come.

“Light! I see daylight!” he cried.