“Stay here,” the ganger ordered. “I’ll bring him out.”
Drigg had not the slightest desire to go a step farther and wondered at his loyalty to the company that had brought him this far. Close feet away from him was the bare face of the soil through which the tunnel was being driven.
Gray sand and hard clay. The shovels ripped into it and dropped it down to the waiting machines below. There was something sinister and frightening about the entire operation and Drigg tore his gaze away to follow Fighting Jack who was talking to a tall man in khaki wearing high-laced engineer’s boots. Only when he turned and Drigg saw that classical nose in profile did he recognize Captain Augustine Washington. He had seen him before only in the offices and at Board meetings and had not associated that well-dressed gentleman with this burly engineer. But of course, no toppers here…
It was something between a shout and a scream and everyone looked in the same direction at the same instant. One of the navvies was pointing at the face of dark sand before him that was puckering away from the shield.
“Blowout!” someone shouted and Drigg had no idea what it meant except he knew something terrible was happening. The scene was rapid, confused, with men doing things and all the time the sand was moving away until suddenly a hole a good two feet wide appeared with a great sound like an immense whistle. A wind pulled at Drigg and his ears hurt and to his horror he felt himself being drawn towards that gaping mouth. He clung to the metal in petrified terror as he watched strong boards being lifted from the shield by that wind and being sucked forward, to splinter and break and vanish into oblivion.