"I'll soon get through." Soon after he was clinging to me, hot, panting, and trembling in every limb, after narrowly escaping suffocation, and when I wanted to take up the task where he had left off, he clung to me more tightly and would not let me go from his side.
"Yer can't do it," he said hoarsely.

"Sand comes down and smothers yer.
Faster yer works, faster it comes.

Let Ike bring the shovels." There was no other chance.

I felt that, and sat down beside Shock and talked and tried to cheer him up; and when I broke down he roused up and tried to cheer me.

Then I talked to him about stories I had read, where people had been buried alive, and where they were always dug out at last, and when I was weary he took his turn, showing me that in his rough way he could talk quickly and in an interesting way about catching birds and rats.