The timbering of the broken-down portion of the tunnel just behind the shaft had been repaired, and Harry flipped the sweat away from his broad forehead with an action of relief.
"Not that it does us any particular good," he announced.

"There ain't nothing back there that we can get at.

But it's room we 'll need when we start working down below, and we might as well 'ave it fixed up--" He ceased suddenly and ran to the pumps.

A peculiar gurgling sound had come from the ends of the hose, and the flow depreciated greatly; instead of the steady gush of water, a slimy silt was coming out now, spraying and splattering about on the sides of the drainage ditch.
Wildly Harry waved a monstrous paw.
"Shut 'em off!" he yelled to Fairchild in the dimness of the tunnel.
"It's sucking the muck out of the sump!" "Out of the what ?" Fairchild had killed the engines and run forward to where Harry, one big hand behind the carbide flare, was peering down the shaft.
"The sump--it's a little 'ole at the bottom of the shaft to 'old any water that 'appens to seep in.

That means the 'ole drift is unwatered." "Then the pumping job 's over ?" "Yeh." Harry rose.