The Adair County news. [volume] (Columbia, Ky.) 1897-1987, 1922-01-10
but in the fash of the rendinR explo-

"Now, durn ye," was Daddy Hiran's
mOrOse comment, made with an eye to
a peep-hOle, now, durn We, maybe
you'll let folks sleep peaceable for
little spellw
OF course, in the darkness, made
thicker by the cloud of dust the explO-
sion had kicked up, We couldn't tell
risOn, or whether or no we'd killed all
or any of it, But the immediate re-
suit was perfectly sOul-satisfying.
There were no more roof lombard
ments, and after we had remained on
watch together for perhaps half an
hour, Daddy sent me to the blankets
for my forty w4nks did this and after
ward played a lOw-down trick on me.
For, what with the previous nights
broken rest, and the more or less ex-
citing and strenuous day, slept like
a tired baby, and when l awOke the
sun was shining in at the two high
window holes at something more than
an acute angle, and Daddy Hiram was
making coffee and frying bacon and
baking pan-bread over a chip fire
built on a piece of boiler iron we had
turned down for hearth purposes the
previous evening.
The old angel took my reproach-
full abuse for his unselfishness quite
good-naturedly, as he did most things,
and made his report of the nights
doings. Up to midnight there had
been nothing stirring; but after that
there had been noises on the black
smith shop side, and indications that
the jumpers were at work on some
thing in the boiler shed. Since this
lay beyond our field Of vision, we
couldn't see what was going on, nor
could We apply the dynamite remedy.
Shortly after we had finished break
fast the work noises began again, but
with the blanketing blacksmith shop in
the way we couldn't see thing and
could only make wild guesses at what
the raiders were up to. Along about
the middle of the forenoon they fired
up one or more of the boilers; Whit
of wind coming along the side of the
mountain blew the smoke over so that
some of it drifted into the shaft-house
through the high windows. Still we
were completely lost in the guessing
wilderness.
1t was little after noon, while we
were squatting on the floor to eat
another meal warmed up over the chip
fire, that we found out the answer
to all the guesses and learned what
the mechanical noises of the night
and forenoon had been leading up to.
One of the left-OverS from the work
ing period of the mine was gOOd-sized
steam force pump which, we took it,
had once been installed on one Of the
lower mine levels and had been hoisted
out of the shaft ahead of the advanc-
ing water flood and put under shelter
in a corner of the boiler shed. AS
l was passing my tin cup for more OF
Daddy's excellent coffee the rattle and
clank of a pump began to make itself
heard, together with the coughing
chug-chug of the steam exhaust there
from.
That's that low-level pumpv l ex-
claimed ''They must have connected
it up with the boil"
Whoosh! that was just as far as l
got. In the middle midst of the word
boilers a twO-inch jet of muddy wa
ter came curving up through one of
the window openings to arch over and
fall, splash, all over us as we sat
munching our dinner. Everlastingly
ruined the dinner, put out the fire, up
set the coffee pot, and made drowned
rats of both of us in less time than it
takes to tell it-much less.
So much for that OF course, we ran
and ducked and lodged, like the
drowned rats l speak of hunting for
a hole. But now Bullerton's devilish
engineering ingenuity came into play.
By some means as yet unknown to US,
he had cOntrived a movable nozzle to
his squirt-gun, and In another minute
there wasn't a single dry spot left in
that ShafthOuse. | venture to say that
Daddy and l and the dog ran full
mile trying to get out of range of that
demOniacal sOzzle-machine, but there
wasn't a corner of the place that ii
couldn't, and didn't, reach.
During the night the scOundrels had
laid a pipe line from the pump in the
boiler shed alongside of our prison
fortress; this with an upright exten
n
top of the sandpipe stem there was an
elbow with a short joint Of pipe
screwed into it to point our way; and
on the end of this nozzle there was q
piece of rubber hose. Under the jerky
impulses of the pump strokes this flex
ible extension of the nozzle Topped
up and down and around and side
wise, like the nose of patent lawn
sprinkler; and there you are-or there
we were.
"Gosh-to-SolOmon! !" Daddy splut
tered, 1--WE amt on the water wagon
we're spank inside Of it, Are you re
memberin', Stannie, that they can keeT
this gOsh-dum thing up f'rever? All In
the world they've got to do is to put
a stick o. wood on the fire now and
then! Say, son they got us goin' and
comm; we can't eat, and we CAM
sleep no more whatever"
"By heavens, l own those boilers