"Is everyone okay?" asked Kinch, his voice thickened by the dust he'd swallowed.
He straightened up from the crouching position he had fallen into, and turned to see what fresh damage had occurred. The place where LeBeau had been working was still visible, with the radio cable emerging from it to fall in coils on the floor.
Newkirk helped LeBeau to his feet. The Frenchman had ended up underneath the other two, and was slightly winded, but somehow none of them had been hurt.
"What about Carter?" said Newkirk. He came up beside Kinch, and stared at the collapse; then, raising his voice, "Andrew? Can you hear me?"
There was no response, only the soft whispering of the soil as it settled. Kinch held his breath, the better to hear any sound, no matter how slight, and LeBeau crept forward and put one hand on the earth wall as if he thought his fingers might detect Carter's answering call.
Nothing. For several seconds, nothing at all.
Then the wire gave a twitch, and began to unwind as it was drawn through the barrier towards the other side.
Three separate gasps of relief sounded at once. Newkirk darted forward, and picked up the ladder from where it had fallen, propping it against the mass of debris. As he ascended, with more haste than care, Kinch ran to steady him. The last thing they needed was another accident.
Newkirk took a deep breath, and called as loudly as he could. "Carter!"
The cable stopped moving. He leaned as far forward as he could, eyes screwed shut in concentration as he listened. Kinch and LeBeau waited tensely.
"I can hear him," said Newkirk after a few seconds.
On the other side, Carter was struggling to regain his composure. He had thrown himself at the barrier on hearing Newkirk's voice; for just a couple of minutes, he had been convinced that LeBeau was buried, that they all were, and that he was completely alone. He leaned against the unstable mass, his face buried in his hands as he got himself under control again. Then he scrubbed his eyes with the back of his hand, and looked up. He could still see the opening in the surface at the top of the barrier, just where the wire came through. He gripped the cable and gave it a firm tug, and was rewarded with a shower of dirt, and a visible shifting of the entire mass, followed by an irritable "Bloody hell, Carter!" from beyond.
"Sorry," he called back.
Something within the barrier must have been jerked loose, because the fall of earth continued for some time, a slow, relentless accompaniment to the conversation.
"You alright, Andrew, old son?" Newkirk's voice was now much clearer; the obstruction within LeBeau's mini-tunnel seemed to have cleared with that sudden yanking of the cable.
"Yeah." Not quite true, but close enough. He didn't bother telling Newkirk about the loss of the emergency tunnel. He wanted to ask about LeBeau, but he didn't. He knew Louis must be okay; Newkirk would be absolutely frantic if he wasn't. But still, Carter didn't ask, just in case...
He tried to concentrate on the task he'd set himself: "I've nearly got the radio connected."
"A lot of good that'll do," muttered Kinch. "The code's still on this side, and after what just happened, there's no way I'm letting LeBeau crawl through there again."
Newkirk sighed. "I've been thinking about that," he said, very quietly. "There's no help for it. I'll have to read it out to him through the gap."
There was a moment of silence as Kinch considered the suggestion; a longer silence while he factored in the risk. "That could work," he admitted. "But I'll do it. You and LeBeau get some of the others and go see if you can reach Carter through the recreation hall tunnel."
"Begging your pardon, Kinch, but you've got it wrong," observed Newkirk, with a tilt of the head and a rueful smile. "Because we already know my voice carries better down here than yours. So I'll stay here, and you and LeBeau can go and start work in the rec. hall."
"Newkirk..." began Kinch, but LeBeau interrupted him.
"He's right, Kinch. If someone is to stay, it should be him." His voice was quite steady, but the expression on his face, as he looked up at the still-moving surface of the earthfall, gave him away.
"Glad you see it my way, LeBeau, me old chum," said Newkirk, in a would-be cheerful tone. "Now, just fetch those photos of the code book, and then nip over and dig Carter out of there."
LeBeau ran off to the radio room to find the prints.
"You know I could make it an order, Newkirk." Kinch spoke very softly.
"I know that. You won't, though, because you know I'm right."
"Yeah." Kinch looked at the mass of earth again. "I wonder if he's got any idea how much trouble he's landed us all in?"
With a half-smile, Newkirk shook his head. "Kinch, he probably hasn't even given it a thought."
He was mistaken. If Carter hadn't realised previously, the latest collapse had brought home to him how dangerous the situation had become, not just for himself, but for everyone concerned. He soon finished attaching the wire to the radio, and was ready to start sending the code as soon as he had it in his hands. But his resolve had been as badly bruised as his body in that last fall.
He limped back to the barrier. "You there, Kinch?"
Newkirk's voice answered. "Just me, Carter. Kinch and LeBeau have gone to the recreation hall, to start digging there. They'll probably pop out behind you any minute."
"Yeah, sure." Carter had no expectation of ever seeing them, but at least they'd be safer there than here. "Maybe you should go and give them a hand."
His heart sank as he spoke. The thought of being left alone, without any human voice to keep him company, filled him with dread. He leaned against the side wall of the tunnel, his breathing slightly laboured.
The reply to his suggestion came quickly, and was uncompromising. "Not a chance."
"But..."
Newkirk interrupted him ruthlessly. "Look, you wanted to get this bleedin' code to London, didn't you? Well, I've got it right here. Now, you get on that radio, and start sending it as I read it to you."
Carter shook his head. "You can't..."
"Well, how else are we supposed to manage, Carter? You're on that side, the code's on this side."
"Well, maybe..." Carter's voice wavered. "Maybe it wasn't such a good idea, after all. Maybe we should just give up for now. You guys'll think of something else."
You guys. Newkirk took note of that, and his voice sharpened with anxiety as he replied. "Carter, after all we've gone through to get that flipping radio working, if you turn around and lose interest now, I swear I'll..."
"You won't," Carter snapped back, "because you can't reach me."
"Oh, I'll reach you, all right. Don't you worry about that."
Neither of them spoke for half a minute, while the earth between them continued its tiny irregular movements.
"Listen, Andrew," said Newkirk at last, "I'm not leaving till you do. So we might as well keep ourselves busy, and get this code sent to London."
He was more nervous than he let on, as he waited for the reply. In general Carter gave in to any stronger will than his own, but occasionally he turned stubborn, as he had earlier. And if that happened, nothing would shift him.
Carter remained where he was for a few moments. Then he straightened up, and went to the radio. He'd set it up beneath the only available light, the one lamp which remained burning. With a shaking hand, he switched it on.
"Okay," he said. "Let's get on with it."
