He charged his shots and called them to go back, telling them the number
of his charges, then lit his fuse and ran out of the old level to wait
in a place of safety while the explosion took place.
Soon they boomed out and the concussion put them all in darkness; but
they soon had the lamps re-lit and were back in among the thick volumes
of powder smoke, groping about and shading their lamps and peering in to
see what their shots had done to lessen the barrier between them and
their imprisoned comrades.
Then the shovels set to work and tossed the coal which the shots had
dislodged back into the roadway and soon the boring machines were busy
again, eating into the coal; for those tireless arms of Robert's never
halted. He swung the handle or wielded the pick or shovel, never taking
a, rest, while the sweat streamed from his body working like some
mechanical product for always in his mind he was calculating his chances
for being able to blast it through the barrier before the moss rose.
"It has only a stoop length an' a half to rise now," reported one of the
men. "It's creeping up like the doom o' the day o' judgment. But I think
we'll manage.
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