These brave words comforted Grace, as they were intended to do, and she accompanied her father down the one passage which was left open after the explosion. Fortunately this led to a new working, and before he had gone many yards Hope found a lamp that had been dropped by some miner who had rushed into the hall as the first warning came. Hope extinguished the light, and gave it to Grace.
"That will be twenty-four hours' light to us," said he; "but, oh, what I want to find is food. There must be some left behind."
"Papa," said Grace, "I think I saw a miner throw a bag into an empty truck when the first alarm was given."
"Back! back! my child!" cried Hope, "before that villain finds it!"
He did not wait for her but ran back, and he found Ben Burnley in the neighborhood of that very truck: but Burnley sneaked off at his approach. Hope, looking into the truck, found treasures--a dozen new sacks, a heavy hammer, a small bag of nails, a can of tea, and a bag with a loaf in it, and several broken pieces of bread. He put his lamp out directly, for he had lucifer-matches in his pocket, and he hid the bag of bread; then he lighted his lamp again and fastened it up by a nail in the centre of the hall.
"There," said he to Burnley, "that's to light us both equally; when it goes out you must hang up yours in its place."
There were two trucks on Hope's side of the hall--the empty one in question, and one that was full of coal. Both stood about two yards from Hope's side of the hall. Hope turned the empty truck and brought it parallel to the other; then he nailed two sacks together, and fastened them to the coal truck and the débris; then he laid sacks upon the ground for Grace to lie on, and he kept two sacks for himself, and two in reserve, and he took two and threw them to Ben Burnley.
"I give you two, and I keep two myself," said he. "But my daughter shall have a room to herself even here; and if you molest her I'll brain you with this hammer."
"I don't want to molest her," said Burnley. "It ain't my fault she's here."
Then there was a gloomy silence, and well there might be. The one lamp, twinkling faintly against the wall, did but make darkness visible, and revealed the horror of this dismal scene. The weary hours began to crawl away, marked only by Hope's watch, for in this living tomb summer was winter, and day was night.