Red Helmet

by Homer Hickam

“But that’s my point,” Song argued. “We can’t depend on him. Do you see how he keeps looking at the fresh SCSRs? And drinking all our water? He’s planning on being here when the rescuers come, Cable, but I don’t think he cares if we’re here or not.”

  Song jumped when there was a roof fall not far away. “It’s okay,” Cable said. “It wasn’t big,”

  But then they heard screams. It was Bum. “Oh Lord, I’m covered up! Please help me!”

  “Bum!” Cable yelled. “What happened?”

  “I was looking for food for us,” Bum shouted, then his voice trailed off into a whimper. “Top fell on me. I’m all busted up. Please help me.”

  Cable turned to Song. “I can’t ask you to go after him again.”

  Song took a breath, then slowly climbed to her feet and picked up the slate bar. “Yes, you can. You just did. And I’m going.”

  Thirty-Six

  10:32 p.m., Tuesday

  Einstein walked into the bathhouse where Bossman was going over the layout of the mine with the rescue teams from Atlas and Fox Run, plus a team from the Amalgam mine who had come up on their own. All three teams had their rescue apparatus neatly laid out on the concrete floor, including stretchers, first-aid kits, gas detectors, and self-contained closed-circuit air packs, each weighing thirty pounds and providing four hours of oxygen under normal load. The air packs were full face-mask units with speaking diaphragms. Each team was also equipped with portable hard-wired mine rescue communication systems. Their equipment was state of the art.

  Einstein addressed them. “People, I recognize most of you. You’ve competed against each other in the rescue contests at the MSHA Academy when I’ve acted as a judge. I know you’re all good men, and you know what to do. Now, I’m in charge of this mine rescue. We’ve established a fresh air base at the bottom and that’s where we’ll begin. Whatever happens, don’t forget your training. Test the roof from rib to rib if you see anything that looks suspicious. Team captains, test for carbon monoxide, methane, and oxygen deficiency at each stop or if you have the slightest suspicion of bad air. Also, test at entrances to sections, faces, walls of overcasts and undercasts, stoppings, ventilation doors, barricades, and seals.”

  “What’s been tested so far?” asked Joe “Cotton Eye” Robinette, the team captain from Amalgam. He was a wiry, hard-looking man with a gleaming eye. The other he kept squinted, a scar above it the apparent result of an old injury.

  “Assume nothing’s been tested,” Einstein replied. “You know the drill. For methane, hold your detector at eye level or higher. Carbon monoxide at chest level, oxygen below the waist. If you see anything out of limits, stop and communicate with the fresh air base at the bottom. Bossman’s going to be in charge there.”

  “What about curtains?” the Fox Run captain asked.

  “You’ll carry curtains and brattices with you. When you curtain up, or change the ventilation in any way, be sure to mark what you did with chalk, including the date and your initials.”

  “Any sign of a fire?” one of the rescuers asked.

  “Not yet, but we’re not discounting it. We’ve got bore holes going down that should tell us.”

  “Well, let’s get going,” Cotton Eye said, and all the rescuers nodded agreement.

  Bossman held up his hands. “Boys, I know you’re impatient, but hold on. Shorty Carter here—you all know him—is our team captain. When the time comes to go in, he’ll lead our team to the first block, then stop and check the air quality. If the air is clear enough, and methane levels are permissible, the Fox Run team—Pritha Mahata’s the lead—how do, Pritha—will follow. We’ll keep hopscotching teams. At each block, everything stops until we take stock of where we are and decide how to push on. Any questions?”

  There were none, except more general grumbling that it was time to get on with the rescue. “Listen to me, men,” Einstein said. “You’re not going to do anybody any good if you rush inside and get yourself killed. Just follow the plan, and stay in communication with your team and the fresh-air base all the way.”

  “All right, Einstein,” Mahata said, speaking for the others. “We hear you very well. We shall proceed slowly and with care.”

  “Thank you, Pritha,” Einstein said. “Now one more thing. One of the men inside—he’s known as Bum around here—is wanted for questioning in a murder case. We don’t know if he’s dangerous or not.”

  Shorty looked around the rescuers, then spoke for all of them, “Don’t matter what he’s done on the outside, he’s still a buddy of our’n. We’re going to go get him.”

  Einstein allowed a subtle smile while Bossman said, “I want you boys to know I’m grateful you’re here. There ain’t no men in this world better’n miners, and there ain’t no better miners than them on the rescue teams.”

  With a whoop of enthusiasm and confidence, the best men in the world picked up their rescue gear and headed for the manlift and whatever waited for them below. Unnoticed, four more men, also dressed in rescue gear, appeared out of the shadows of the bathhouse and joined them.

  THE AIR WAS still clear outside the curtain, though Song could taste smoke on her tongue and feel it in the back of her throat. Her light flashed around the entry. “Bum?” she called. “Where are you?” She heard nothing but the flapping of a distant curtain.

  Song looked into the first cut where a continuous miner sat, empty and abandoned. Her light played across it and then the face, the raw coal sparkling back at her. Bent beneath the low roof, she walked to the next cut, then the one beyond, which she noticed had not been pinned with roof bolts. She supposed Vietnam Petroski had seen no reason to do it, since the section was going to be shut down anyway.

  There was still no sign of Bum. “Bum, call out!” she yelled.

  Still nothing. She clutched the slate bar, ready to use it as a weapon if Bum was pulling some trick. Her light flashed over a second continuous miner and two shuttle cars. She walked between the shuttles, then let her light sweep along the rib to the curtain that fed the air off the face into the ventilation return. Thin smoke drifted by. The roof was higher here, so she was able to straighten up. She decided to walk to the beltway to see if Bum was there. “Bum? Where are you?” she called.

  Then Song heard footsteps. While she was trying to determine their direction, she was violently tackled and her slate bar went flying. When she crawled to her knees, Bum’s light was shining in her eyes. He was holding the slate bar. He didn’t say anything. He turned the bar around to its sharp point and jabbed it viciously at her chest. She dodged, the point just missing her. Then she leaped to her feet and started running. There was a curtain blocking the entrance to the beltway. She threw herself through it, rolled, got up again, and kept running. Bum careened through the curtain, the slate bar snagging it and pulling it down on top of him. While he was fighting to get free of the plastic material, Song was stopped by the sudden failure of her SCSR. She spat out its mouthpiece and cautiously inhaled the open air. It was foul and she coughed, but at least it seemed to have some oxygen in it. She crouched behind the beltway and turned off her light. Hiding was all she could think to do.

  Bum threw off the curtain and then aimed his light at the beltway. His voice was a maniacal warble. “Come out, come out, girlie girl, wherever you are.”

  Song crawled beneath the belt’s rollers and came up on the other side. Her hand found a cardboard box. Inside it were plastic tubes. Lubricating grease for the rollers.

  Bum walked along the belt, his light flashing across it. “Come on out, girl,” he called again. “I was just funning. Don’t mean nothing. We need to go back and help Cable.” He climbed up on the belt and began to crawl along it, his light flashing from side to side.

  When he got to where she was hiding, Song jumped up and squirted grease into Bum’s eyes. He yelled, dropped the slate bar, and began to paw at his face. Song snatched the bar, clambered over the belt, and ran back to where the curtain was lying in the gob. Bum, still wiping at his face, r
an clumsily after her. She kept going, ran to a shuttle car, and crawled up on its boom. It was turned toward the third cut in the section, the one unpinned.

  Bum saw where she’d climbed and laughed. “Get off that boom, girl,” he said. “You could fall and hurt yourself.”

  “Stay away, Bum, or I’ll use your head for batting practice,” Song warned, holding the slate bar like a baseball bat.

  Bum laughed all the more, then strolled around the shuttle car, contemplating the situation. “Too bad there’s no power,” he said. “I could raise the boom and smear your girl guts all over the roof.”

  Song didn’t say anything. She just watched as Bum stopped beneath the unpinned roof. She turned off her helmet light so Bum wouldn’t notice where she was looking.

  “Well, that’s a stupid thing to do,” Bum said, misinterpreting her purpose. “I already know where you are.”

  In the darkness, Song visualized the draw rock that made up the surface of the unpinned roof. It had a crack, a place where the tip of the slate bar might fit. She recalled her training. Don’t pry down with a slate bar. Pry up.

  She thrust the flat end of bar toward the crack. It caught. Then she levered up.

  “Hey!” Bum yelled, just as the roof came crashing down on top of him. When it stopped, there was no sign of him, just a pile of sharp-angled brown rock. A grave of rock, Song hoped.

  She crawled off the shuttle boom, then poked the pile of draw rock and sandstone with the slate bar. There was no sound from within.

  Then she heard something she hadn’t heard before. She crept to the curtain she’d hung at the entry. As soon as she pulled it back, a spout of black smoke rolled inside. She dropped the curtain but not before she saw something that looked like a gigantic bright orange and red snake. But it was not a snake. Song recognized it as the worst thing that could happen in a coal mine. She ran back to Cable, pushed through the curtain that still sealed off the little manhole, and found him asleep. She shook him awake.

  “The mine’s on fire!” she gasped. Then, as her message sank into Cable, she said, “That’s the bad news.”

  “What’s the good news?” he asked, still groggy.

  “Bum.”

  Cable blinked a few times. “What about him?”

  Song smiled a grim, satisfied smile, then proudly said, “I killed the son of a bitch!”

  Thirty-Seven

  11:02 p.m., Tuesday

  Trailing their portable communications phone wire, the Highcoal rescue team stopped at the entry to Two block. The team leader called Bossman, who was in charge of the clear air station at the bottom. “CO and methane levels are good in the intake,” Shorty reported. “I poked my head through the mandoor return and took a reading on the beltline. The return has some smoke in it. CO is elevated, but within limits. Methane is acceptable too.”

  Bossman called Einstein and reported the information. “I’m going to send the Fox Run team forward, if you agree,” Bossman said.

  Einstein was in Mole’s control room. “I agree,” he answered.

  Bossman called over Pritha Mahata, the Fox Run captain, and gave him the order to move up. Mahata nodded and waved his men on. Bossman noticed one of the Fox Run men wore coveralls of a different color and wondered what kind of specialty that indicated. Fox Run was a big operation and its miners were known to put on airs. Bossman didn’t ask. He had better things to worry about.

  “WHAT’S THIS ABOUT a fire?” Cable asked. He was fully awake now. “Tell me what you saw.”

  “In the intake entry. Like a snake. It was crawling around the roof. I think the headers are on fire too.”

  Cable was quiet for a moment. “A fire will slow down the rescue,” he concluded.

  “Not to mention it could burn us up,” Song pointed out.

  Cable nodded, then frowned at Song. “Was I dreaming or did you say you killed Bum?”

  “You weren’t dreaming. He tried to kill me first.”

  Song explained how she had levered the roof down at the unsupported face.

  “He was a sorry excuse for a human being, but he was a friend once,” Cable said. “I just couldn’t abandon him.”

  Song was too tired to hold back how she felt. “After I left Highcoal, you abandoned me quickly enough.”

  Cable didn’t respond. Instead, he just kept looking thoughtful.

  Exasperated, Song pressed her aching back against the rib, then slid down it until she was sitting beside him. “That’s right, Cable,” she said bitterly. “Don’t talk about what happened to us. Don’t even think about it. After a while, you’ll forget all about your short-lived, terrible marriage to that runt half-Asian girl from New York City.”

  Cable let out a long breath. “Song . . .”

  “What is it?”

  “I could use some more ibuprofen.”

  She shook her head. “Nurse Song to the rescue.” She dug inside one of her pockets, pulled the bottle out, shook out four tablets, and handed them over along with a bottle of water. After he swallowed, she asked, “What’s going to happen to us? I mean the fire . . .”

  Cable wiped his mouth with his shirtsleeve, then finished off the water. “I won’t lie to you. If the fire gets to us, we don’t have anywhere to go. Let’s just hope it stays where it is. By now, the fans should be off so there’s nothing pushing it our way.”

  “How’s our air?”

  Cable checked his detector. “Carbon monoxide is up a tick. We’ll have to go on the SCSRs again soon. But not yet. Are you feeling sleepy?”

  “No. But I’ve been a little busy, so I guess I’m pumped full of adrenalin.”

  “How about banging on the roof bolt again?”

  “Yes, sir, Mister Superintendent. Oh, I forgot. You quit.”

  “Not until the end of the week,” he reminded her again.

  Wearily, Song picked up the slate bar and started thumping it against the metal plate. She did it for as long as she had the strength, then sat down again. “If they heard us, how would they let us know?”

  “They’re supposed to fire three surface shots as a signal. Then I would expect to hear them drilling a bore hole down to us. That would be to get air into us and possibly a microphone.”

  “Oh good. I’ll sing ‘Destiny.’ Jim Brickman would like that.”

  Cable smiled. “I sure do like his songs.”

  “You have no clue when I’m being ironic, do you?

  “When you’re being what?”

  “Thought so.”

  Song leaned against Cable’s shoulder. “Now I’m feeling sleepy.”

  “Breathe through your SCSR. Get some oxygen in your lungs.”

  “What I really need is a cup of coffee.”

  “Fresh out, I’m afraid.” He shook his head, trying to clear his thoughts. “What’s next for you?” he asked. “Where do you go from here?”

  “Besides heaven? Or, since I killed Bum, hell?”

  “You’re not going to hell. You’re not going to die either. At least not for a long time. What I mean is where are you going after Highcoal? Back to New York?”

  Song stared ahead. “I don’t know. Considering our situation, you may be surprised to learn I sorta like mining coal.”

  “Good thing you own a coal mine, then.”

  “No, it isn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  Song shook off the cobwebs that seemed to be slowly covering her thoughts. “I need a mine superintendent. The one I had quit as of the end of the week. You wouldn’t happen to know good one, would you?”

  “Are you being ironic?”

  “No. I’m too tired.”

  “Well, I’ll keep my eye out,” he said. He studied her. “You’re trembling. Are you cold?”

  “No, I’m mad.”

  “What about?”

  “You. Me. Everything.”

  “I think you’re cold.” He put his arm around her shoulders and drew her in. “You feel good,” he said.

  “I’m filthy and I stink.”r />
  “You smell like a coal miner. I like that in a woman.”

  She put her hand on his chest, then looked up at him. “How’s your leg?”

  “It hurts like the devil, but I still want to kiss you.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Yes, I do.” And he proved it.

  Song met his gritty lips with hers. As exhausted as she was, kissing him was still wonderful. “Cable . . .”

  That was when the curtain was drawn back. A helmet light flashed across them. Bum, carrying a shovel, walked bent beneath the low roof of the little hole.

  “Hidy folks,” he said, grinning his awful grin. “I’m ba-a-a-a-a-ack. And this time I’m in a really bad mood.”

  Thirty-Eight

  12:21 p.m., Wednesday

  Fox Run is at the Three block entry,” Mahata reported.

  “How’s the air?” Einstein asked.

  “The smoke is a little thicker,” the Fox Run team leader said. “Methane percentage is steady, and the carbon monoxide is acceptable.”

  “Okay, tell Highcoal and Amalgam to move up.”

  “They have already started.”

  “That’s not by the book,” Einstein sniped. “Each team is supposed to wait until I tell them to move.”

  Mahata clicked off the phone and looked around at the rescue teams. He hadn’t been entirely honest with Einstein. The hopscotching had stopped and all three teams were together, acting now as one unit. “I fear Einstein will not be pleased with us,” Mahata said in his clipped Indian accent.

  “Screw Einstein,” somebody replied.

  Mahata peered at the team member who’d made the comment. He was in rescue garb, but his heavy tan coveralls did not match the others. The Fox Run team wore smart navy blue coveralls with an American flag stitched to their shoulders. The Highcoal team wore forest green; the Amalgam team were in red. This man’s tan coveralls looked somehow retro, as if they belonged to a rescue team of twenty years ago. “You are not a member of my team,” Mahata accused. “Or any of these teams. Who are you?”

  “I’m on my own team,” the man said.