This life in the earth was not to Joe’s liking, and he had never expected to return to it. Love of Wayne Craighill alone had brought him back to the pit; otherwise the pitcher’s box or a chauffeur’s seat would have claimed him. And to-day, with Jean vanishing into an unknown world and Wayne in Pittsburg, whence--there was no telling--he might not return, Joe’s outlook on life partook of the surrounding gloom, and he was disposed to deal severely with his labourer, a clumsy Austrian who was forever getting in the way and mislaying tools. Joe was a skilled hand, which is to say that he knew the hundred and one things that expert miners know, and the trick of clean, expeditious and safe mining. His “shots” were lucky this morning, and by noon he had shaken down his required tonnage. As he waited for his butty to finish, Joe lounged down the gangway. He was a social being and he found solace in watching the twinkling lamps of other workmen along the black corridor. Craig, the engineer, and the fire boss passed on a round of inspection and asked him if he had seen any fresh traces of squeezing or of gas. Both had been observed lately in the colliery, and it had even been said that a general subsidence was in progress throughout the wide, honeycombed acreage of the Florence property. In every great colliery there are frequent disquieting rumours, and a collapse rarely comes without intimations familiar to the sophisticated eye and ear, and Joe was not alarmed. He confirmed the fears of the engineer to-day by his own testimony. The “working” of the pillars in his own neighbourhood had increased within twenty-four hours, as marked by chipping. The vein above, which was mined simultaneously, was crowding the supports of the lower vein; in remoter places there had been complete subsidence. A car-load of timbers roared by, sent forward to prop the roof at points where the danger had become acute. The explosion of his butty’s last shot boomed dully behind, and Joe continued on a little farther. There was a feeling of panic in the air. Men hurried by in the gloom, talking excitedly, but he felt no fear; his experience of a larger world had made him impatient of the ignorance of many of the men who spent their time delving underground. Most of their accidents were due, he knew, to their own carelessness. He would himself take a look at the farther workings where the squeeze had become critical. A trip of cars bearing a timber gang rumbled by. He hugged the wall to allow it to pass, and yelled at the retreating workmen derisively. His curiosity was now piqued, and he went on, in the conceit of his own superior wisdom, toward the centre of the disturbed area. A foreman with a crowd of men at his heels went by at a run, but he chaffed them on their alarm. They had been ordered out, he had learned, by the engineer. “There’s some men working in the new gangway back there!” one of the panic-stricken miners shouted.