He walked on along the drift, passing several cross-cuts, and once a bank of four ore chutes, thick with dust and long unused.
His uneasiness increased with every step. He knew he was walking into trouble, and the last thing he wanted was trouble underground. In such a place it was always risky to use a gun, for the concussion might bring down some rock, especially in a long-worked area.
It seemed obvious that the two men were guards following a regular patrol, and they might appear again at any time.
He had never seen a working plan of the mine, and had no idea how extensive the workings were. There was now a continual drip of water, and here and there were shallow pools.
Suddenly he came to a cross-cut. A few feet in, on one side, was a heavy plank door, which he found was locked.
This could be a powder room, but he had never seen one built with such care. The heavy planks had been set back into the rock on either side and strengthened by huge twelve-by-twelve posts.
He took hold of the handle of the door, but it was so solid that it could neither be moved nor shaken. And it was fitted so snugly that it offered no place for a bar or wedge. His guess was that the planks were three-by-twelves–and short of a battering ram or dynamite, such a door could not be forced. Half an hour’s work with a good axe might do the job–but even so, there might be a guard posted somewhere on the other side of the door.
This then, had to be the opening into the area from which they were mining the high-grade ore.
The cross-cut beyond the drift on the other side was half filled with waste. The main drift led on into the mountain, and he surmised he was almost halfway through to the side toward Rafter Crossing.
Thoughtfully, Shevlin studied the rock in which the door was framed, but it appeared to be as solid as the mountain of which it was a part. He stood there a moment, reluctant to give up, and attempted to visualize his present position in terms of the two mine shafts. But a man’s movement underground can be deceptive, and he could not be sure.
As he hesitated, he felt a growing sense of uneasiness, a disturbing feeling that he was watched. Was there a peekhole, somehow disguised, in the door itself? He shrugged and turned away, his cap-lamp throwing a feeble glow around him.
He walked back to the main drift and stopped there, wondering if he dared go deeper into the mine.
At the same time, from the corner of his eye, he glimpsed something that sent a chill through him.
On top of the piled-up waste rock in the other side of the cross-cut was a rifle muzzle, and he had no doubt at all that somebody lay behind it, ready to shoot if necessary.
An interesting gleam from the wall of the drift caught his eye, and he stepped over to it, making a pretense of studying the rock. He knocked off a corner with the prospector’s pick he carried in his belt and examined it in the light from his cap-lamp. As he studied it, he tried to think what it was best to do.
The obvious thing to do was to turn and walk back down the drift the way he had come. If he did so, his presence might be passed off as a harmless exploring of an old mine-working. Under the circumstances it was highly improbable, but it just might work. On the other hand, would the hidden watcher allow him to go? Might he not shoot at any moment?
Shevlin started to turn away when he heard, from down the drift, along the way he himself had come, the sound of boots. Someone was coming toward him, someone who could be no great distance away.
Quickly, Shevlin turned and went up the drift toward the main working of the mine, and he had gone no more than fifty feet before he came to another row of four ore chutes and a manway.
There was only time to observe that the dust on the ladder was undisturbed, and then he was climbing, swiftly and silently. Not thirty feet above, he entered a stope where the ore had been mined out and shot down from overhead. Crawling over the heaped-up rock, he crouched down in a small hollow and waited, listening.
The place where he had chosen to hide was right at the top of an empty chute where his slightest movement might be heard below, but where he himself could hear what went on down there. He heard the distant footsteps, then came a pause.
Watching over the rim of the chute, his own light placed on the muck well behind him, he saw the faint movement of the walker’s light, but he heard no voices.
What of the man behind the gun? Was he equally unknown to whoever had come along the tunnel?
Suddenly, he heard a faint gasp, and then the rustle of clothing. Someone whose feet and legs he could see, scurried past the chute and stepped into the space between that chute and the next. Shevlin could hear again the rustle of denim against the framework of the chute. And then, very faintly, he heard still other steps.
This was impossible, and yet it was happening.
Three men were now in hiding in the old mine-working all within a few yards of the great plank door!
The new steps came on, hesitated, then continued on again. They, too, paused when they faced that solidly framed door. Breathing ever so faintly, Shevlin watched over the edge of the chute, watched the reflection of distant light; in a moment whoever it was who held the light came on up the drift that ran past the chutes.
Suddenly, the man below stirred, and stepped quickly out into the tunnel.
“Well, now. Fancy seein’ you here!” That was Ben Stowe’s voice. “A mine is no place for a lady. Would you mind tellin’ me what you’re lookin’ for?” “Oh! You frightened me. Aren’t you Ben Stowe?” It was Laine Tennison who spoke. “I’ve never been in a mine before–there’s so much I’d like to know, and I don’t believe Dr. Clagg would have the time to show me around. Would you tell me about the mine, Mr. Stowe? For instance, what are these things?” She craned her neck and looked up the chute, and there was an instant when Mike Shevlin was sure she had seen him, just an instant before he pulled his head back.
“That’s an ore chute,” Stowe answered. “The rock is shot down off the walls and roof up there in the stope, and then pulled out of that chute into a car and trammed–pushed–outside.” His boots shifted on the rock below.
“Ma’am,” he went on, “what are you doing in this mine? What’s your business here?” “Business? Oh, I’ve no business here, Mr. Stowe. I just saw the tunnel and thought I’d look in. Do they mine gold here? Or is it silver? I don’t know very much about mining, I’m afraid, but it all looks very exciting.” “How do you happen to be out here, anyway?” “Here? Oh, you mean in the canyon? I was looking for Mr. Shevlin. Dr. Clagg wanted to see him; and Mrs. Clagg and I… well, we thought we would invite him for supper. He’s very good-looking–don’t you think so, Mr. Stowe?” “I never noticed.” Ben Stowe was obviously puzzled, and Shevlin could scarcely restrain a chuckle. She was trying, trying hard, but would it work? Would she appear so much the rattle-brained female that Stowe would let her go?
“You’re very handsome yourself, Mr. Stowe. Would you like to come to supper? It’s nothing fancy. I mean, well, after all it’s just supper, not a dinner or anything fancy. So you’d have to take potluck, but I do so admire western men, and I don’t know if I’ll find Mr. Shevlin, but even if I do, you’re welcome. In fact, we’d simply adore having you.” Stowe started to speak, but she gave him no chance. “Why, just the other day Dottie was saying– Dottie, that’s Mrs. Clagg–that she couldn’t understand why some girl hadn’t set her cap for you.
You’re so successful and all.” “Ma’am, where’d you get that candle?” was Ben Stowe’s response. “Looks to me like you came fixed for looking at mines.” “Oh, this? I found it in that cabin there, Burt Parry’s cabin. I didn’t think he’d mind if I–you don’t think he’d mind do you, Mr. Stowe? I mean, I just borrowed it. I’ll put it right back where I found it.” She paused only a moment.
“Mr. Stowe… or may I call you Ben?
Would you take me back to town? I mean, it must be getting dark outside, and if you would take me home I’d be ever so glad… I mean, it wouldn’t be too much trouble, would it?” “No, no trouble,” Stowe answered.