When the daylight grew strong, it shone upon a smouldering
mass of ruins, and heaps of broken furniture piled upon the down-trodden
grass. The master had grown aged in that one night, and he gazed
helplessly about him, as if for some one to direct and guide him. He no
longer refused to quit the place, only he would not trust himself
anywhere near Botfield; and as soon as a carriage could be procured, he
and Miss Anne were driven off to Longville. There was nothing more to
wait for now; and Stephen went quietly home to breakfast in the
cinder-hill cabin.
It was a good deal later than usual that morning when the engineman at
the works sent down the first skip-load of colliers into the pit. Four
of their number were absent, but that excited no surprise after the
events of the night; and even Bess Thompson supposed her father had gone
off to the public-house with the others. But what was the amazement of
the colliers when they found Tim at the bottom of the shaft, fiercely
hungry after his night's fasting, and as fiercely anxious to hear what
had been taking place overhead. He had the prudence, however, to listen
to their revelations without making any of his own, and would not even
explain how he came to be left behind in the pit.
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