CHAPTER V.

MINING AND COUNTERMINING


Fred expected every moment to catch the dull crack of the rifle from the
subterranean regions as a signal that Mickey O'Rooney had neither closed
his eyes to the impending peril, nor had given way to despair at the
trying position in which he was placed. But the stillness remained
unbroken, while the lasso was steadily paid out by the dusky hands of the
swarthy warrior, whose motions were closely watched by the others.

Lower and lower it descended as the coils lying at his knees were steadily
unwound, until the disturbed lad was certain the bottom of the cavern was
nearly reached, and still all was silent as the tomb.

"I'm sure I would hear his gun if he fired it," he said, worried and
distressed by what was taking place before his eyes; "and if I did not, I
could tell by the way they acted whenever he pulled trigger. What can he
be doing?"

The lad thought it possible that his friend was absent in some distant
part of the cave hunting for him, and was, therefore, totally unaware of
the flank movement that was under way. It could not be that he was still
asleep; he had no fears on that score. It might be, too, that the Irishman
had arrived at the conclusion that the situation had grown so desperate as