Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/286

 down some fifteen or twenty feet to the ledge where the men were already busy again. "Holy Mac! You've got to look sharp, eh?"

"Oh, I dunno," replied the foreman. "We give 'em plenty of time. When the whistle blows the men hump it. We don't touch the button till the last one is crawlin' over the top of the bank. Then, with the time fuse, there's a minute, lots of time."

Haggerty looked on for awhile, then he turned away, sat down by one of the shanties, and loaded his pipe. The pipe once alight, he settled himself in a more comfortable position by sprawling on his back, his hands under his head. From where he lay, he commanded a view of the other side of the river as well as the work before him. He could see Hale across there talking to one of the bridge engineers. He watched the two men lazily, in drowsy contentment, until he lost sight of them as they started to come over to his side, then his attention became riveted again on his immediate surroundings.

They were getting ready for another blast. Haggerty sat up. It was rather exciting to see the men come scrambling out of the hole. The whistle had just gone three toots. They were coming now, one head after another popping up over the edge, then the shoulders, and finally the men on their feet running like deers for shelter—not far, only a few yards, for the excavation itself afforded protection, once clear of it. Haggerty himself was not fifteen yards away.

He counted the men as they came out. It was the eighteenth who, just as his head and shoulders