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Page 47
"Now we've gone and done it!" exclaimed Will. "After all the trouble
we've taken to make that fellow think we've left the country, we've
let him bump right into us. I wonder if he really has fired the
fuse?"
"Stand clear! Stand clear!" shouted the voice. Almost before the
words had died out, the explosion came, tearing more than one pillar
out of position and dropping a great mass of slate down on the floor of
the cross-cutting.
For a moment the gases which filled the chambers were overpowering.
The only wonder was that they were not ignited. The electric lights
carried by the boys shone dimly through the smoke of the confined
place.
"There goes Ventner," whispered Will, pointing to a figure moving
swiftly through the half-light of the place.
"He's going to see what the shot brought down!" suggested Tommy.
The Boys rushed forward in a little group. When they gathered at the
scene of the explosion, the detective was not there.
"If he got hold of the cash, he knew what to do with it all right!"
exclaimed Tommy. "He got away with it before we got a chance to see
what he had. Now we've got to catch him!"
"May as well look for a needle in a load of hay!" grumbled Sandy.
"Look here," Jimmie exclaimed. "There's away to keep him shut up in
the mine if we do the right thing. This cross-cutting runs out to a
gangway on the north, and that, in turn, leads, of course, to the
shaft. Now, one of you boys duck out to the shaft and see that he
doesn't get up. You'll have to go some on the way there, because a
man with two hundred thousand dollars in his pocket will put up some
running match!"
"I'm off!" shouted Tommy. "I know I can get to the shaft before he
can! He's too fat-bellied to run, anyway!"
Tommy started away at a swift pace, and the other boys closed in on
the gangway, Will alone stopping at the scene of the explosion.
"This gangway," Dick explained, "runs back into the mine for some
distance, but there are no cross passages. I guess the coal wasn't
very good here. At least, they never spread out the drive."
"Then we've got him bottled up unless he got out of the shaft!"
declared Sandy. "We'll soon know whether he got out or not!"
"I don't believe he would try to get out," suggested Elmer. "The
chances are that he'd make for the back of the mine, thinking to hide
away with the plunder, provided he had any plunder to hide away with."
"I'm afraid he found the hidden money," Will said, taking a scorched
ten-dollar bill from a pocket. "I found this back there, where the
pillar fell. I guess he found the cash all right!"
"And that's a nice thing, too!" exclaimed Sandy. "You boys kept
saying that Ventner was helping you find the coin. You were right
about that, for he did find the coin. And now the trick is to get it
away from him!"
"I'd like to know whether Ventner got up the shaft or not,"' suggested
George, "and I believe I'll take a run up there and see."
"That's a good idea!" advised Will. "If he didn't get up the shaft
he's surely imprisoned in the gangway. He may be between this
cross-cutting and the shaft, or he may have gone further in!"
"It'll take a long time to find out about that," suggested Jimmie.
Directly Tommy and George were heard returning from the shaft. They
came through the gangway flashing their lights in every direction.
"He never went up the shaft!" Tommy exclaimed as they came near.
"We've got him canned in the mine all right. If he's got the money,
we'll take it away from him! He wouldn't know what to do with it
anyway!"
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