Chapter 2

Once they had eaten, drunk, and used the “facilities” there was nothing to do. Each had a candle, held in place on top of their lanterns by dripped wax, which the end of the candle was stuck in.

The light coming through the vent had deteriorated, meaning it was evening and the night would follow. Their thoughts turned to how they would pass the night.

“Should someone keep watch at the hole?” asked Rex.

“Why? Nobody’s going to wander up to the hole to talk to us in the middle of the night,” said Bob. “They said they’d make contact again in the morning, when they drop us more food.”

“Where will we sleep?” asked Rex.

This question stirred up something in Madeline’s mind that led her further down the garden path of mistakenly presuming these two had an affinity for buggery. The memory of her own husband forcing his erection into her bottom was vivid, which is probably why she thought about this at all.

“I shall sleep between you two!” she blurted.

Her outburst was not thought out. It was just an instinct of some kind, based on her attempts to save these men from their own perversions. That she felt safe doing such a thing at all was because she surmised neither man would lust after her, and that by taking this action she would protect them from their own twisted desires.

It helped that no one would ever know about it.

The reaction of the men was as one might expect it. Neither had thought to suggest that the woman sleep even near to him. She was a lady, after all, a widow who was obviously still in mourning, as she wore black on this trip. Once the “plan” was suggested, though, both men were eager to accept it. Some instinct, though, warned them not to be too effusive in their acceptance.

“It would be warmer that way,” Bob mused. “It could get chilly in here at night.”

“Yes,” Rex agreed. “I’ve had to huddle with others to keep warm before.” In actuality, what he was referring to was when he was ten or so years old and he lived in a sod house with his parents and two siblings. It wasn’t unusual at all for the whole family to sleep together in the winter, like a pile of puppies keeping warm.

He didn’t “unpack” that, though, and all his comment did was add fuel to the fire in Madeline’s heart that the life of the cowboy had nudged these men’s moral compass off of true north. He was obviously referring to sporting with other men on cattle drives, on cold nights. Her resolve to push them back toward the straight and narrow firmed. She didn’t think about how this might be accomplished. She simply resolved to do it.

It was not time to go to bed, however, and no one was sleepy. Adrenaline had washed their blood veins clear of lassitude and they were wide awake.

Thus began passing the time by slowly revealing tidbits of their past lives and their present beliefs and values. Over the next week these three would come to know each other better than any other humans on the face of the planet.

Madeline went first, when Bob asked her how and when her husband had died. When she answered him he was astonished.

“It was that far back and you’re still in mourning togs?”

Had there been more light the two men might have seen her blush.

“I guess I just got used to wearing black,” she said. “I actually feel guilty because his image, in my mind, is beginning to fade.”

“I had a friend who was struck by lightning back home, sitting on his horse,” said Rex. “Kilt him and his horse, both. He was like a brother to me and it’s like that. I cain’t hardly remember what he looked like, now.”

“It’s distressing,” said Madeline.

“Can I ask you a personal question?” asked Bob.

“You already did,” she responded. “You asked me something personal about my husband.”

“Guess I did, at that,” he said. “I didn’t think of that as personal. I suppose, in light of that, pretty much anything I ask you would be personal.”

“It’s fine,” she said. “Under the circumstances, we may as well lay aside normal civil graces. We’re going to be stuck here for a week. It would be tedious in the extreme to try be properly polite.”

“It’s nice of you to see things that way,” said Bob. “Us men have a hard time keeping social niceties in mind under any circumstances.”

“Ask your question,” she said.

“Well ... um ... let’s just say I would have expected a woman such as yourself, to be married again by this time.”

“That’s not a question,” she replied. She didn’t make him actually ask it. “Many men have shown an interest, but all I could think of was Richard. I loved him very much and it seems impossible to think I could feel that way about another man.”

“Ahhh,” said Bob. “I had a dog like that one time. I purely loved that dog, and when she died a little bit of me died with her. I never thought I’d want to get another dog after that.”

“Richard wasn’t a dog,” Madeline said, frostily.

“I didn’t mean no offense,” said Bob. “In my life, it seems to me like love is love, no matter what direction you aim it. I never fell in love with no other human, but if I ever do, and it’s the kind of love I had for that dog, I’d ride through the fires of hell for them.”

Bob’s choice of words in this minor exposition were not thought out. He just spoke. The fact that he chose “no other human” instead of woman and “them” instead of her, was mere happenstance. It was another straw on the camel’s back, though, because Madeline zeroed in on those words ... or rather what she perceived as his choice of words. Her mind assumed he didn’t want to admit he was thinking of falling in love with a man, but it was clear he thought he could do so. This did not galvanize her to action. It simply confirmed the validity of something in her mind that was patently untrue.

“I would gladly have ridden through fire if it meant Richard was still here,” she sighed.

Both men sensed that further discussion about Richard would lead only to sadness, and they had plenty of that on hand already.

Bob steered the discussion in another way and, for the next two hours, they talked softly about a variety of issues, none of particular importance.

“You really mean to sleep between us?” asked Bob, as he saw Madeline yawn.

“I think it would be best,” she replied.

And so passed the first night, during which the men made a sandwich out of one of the most beautiful women they’d ever seen. She was still dressed in just her chemise and both were hard in their pants, but both pulled their organs up to lie against their bellies, lest she feel them and react badly. It started out as a long night for both of them and, to be honest, both thought to steal off down the tunnel and relieve themselves with their hands, but resisted that urge. Eventually they slept and their unruly penises softened.

As for Madeline, she was warm and felt secure. She slept deep and dreamlessly, which was quite remarkable, under the circumstances.

Her ease with these two men, both awake and asleep, was also a harbinger of things to come.

Morning started by internal body clocks waking them up. The men woke first, accustomed to rising before the sun. They each got carefully up and Bob lit a candle, off of which Rex lit a second. This time they did go down the tunnel to relieve themselves, though at different times. At this point, though, the only reason for the erection each had was the usual morning wood, which wilted after their bladders were emptied.

There was nothing to do after that, though -- no morning chores to accomplish, no horse to saddle, and no breakfast to cook. All they could do was sit and look at the still-sleeping woman whose legs were exposed clear to her thighs. Their erections resumed. Bob even stood, intending to go back down the hall, but Madeline stirred, stretched and sat up.

“Remind me never to sleep on bare rock again,” she complained, twisting her body this way and that to ease the cramps she felt in her body.

“I’ll remind you,” said Bob, casually, “But I don’t think it will help, much.” What he was thinking was, “I’d be happy to let you sleep on top of me, and hold you there with my spike in you to keep you from falling off,” but, of course, he didn’t say that.

“Is it light out, yet?” she asked, getting to her feet.

“Not yet,” said Rex, who was sitting under the vent.

“I wish it was light,” she said. “I’m hungry.”

“Anybody awake down there?” came an eerie hollow sounding female voice that seemed to reverberate off the walls.

Rex stood and put his face into the hole.

“We’re up. How’s it going out there?”

“Since two of you are cowboys we thought you’d be up by now. So are we, to tend the team and get them hitched up and such. I have some breakfast for you if you want.”

The fastening wire on the rope was already up and when she yelled for them to pull, she said, “Pull gentle like. I’ve tied a coffee pot on there and it’s full of beans and bacon. I hope it don’t spill.”

Rex pulled slowly and gently, hearing the metallic container bump along. The tube walls were pretty smooth, and someone had tied a cord around the pot in such a way that the top was more or less firmly in place and the coffee pot made it down without upending and spilling its contents. There were three spoons stuck in the contents of the pot. It was messy to extract them, but tongues lapped at warm food on fingers and no napkins were needed. The meal was shared, passing the pot around until a spoon could scoop up nothing more to eat. When the station master’s wife returned and recovered the coffee pot, she sent down three more canteens, giving them each their own source of water to drink.

When they were finished Madeline saw Rex wiping his hands on his shirt.

“Just use my dress for that,” she said. “It’s trash now, anyway.”

“I thought you’d put it back on,” said Bob.

“I was dressed like this for the last eight hours or so,” she said. “I hope they left my luggage here. If they did, I’ll see if she can get into my trunk and send me down something else.”

“Our bedrolls and extra clothes were on that coach, too,” said Bob. “I’m used to wearing the same clothes for a week at a time, but I ‘spect that would offend your nose.”

“You said bedroll,” said Madeline. “If they could get that down through the hole it would be softer to lie on.”

“We can talk to her about that at lunch,” said Bob.

“Are we going to try to dig out while they dig in?” asked Rex. “If we do, we’ll definitely need our other clothes.”

“Yes!” said Madeline. “If we dig in here while they dig out there, we’ll get free sooner! That only makes sense!”

That day passed with the trio working hard, moving rocks, carrying them down the tunnel past the toilet and dumping them there. Only two of them could work at the same time and the third sat under the vent, in case someone tried to talk to them or lower something to them. The station master’s wife did get into Madeline’s trunk and sent down everything except another corset, which Madeline yelled up was not needed. It couldn’t really have been made to fit through the hole, anyway, most likely. After that an experiment with a tightly rolled blanket worked, and two more of those were pulled down, too.

For twelve hours they toiled and talked and Madeline became more and more at ease with the men. She worked in just her chemise, which got filthy. She didn’t want to get the new dress that was sent down dirty. She planned to wear it out when the mine was opened. The new chemise which was sent down was saved to sleep in. She planned to change her underpants that night, too.

They worked past supper, because there was nothing else to do. To be honest, the quiet conversation they had while working together made the time seem to pass more quickly. At the end of the day, they all went with their candles to survey the pile of rock down the tunnel.

“Doesn’t look like much, does it,” sighed Madeline.

“Make it five times bigger in your mind,” said Bob. “That’s what it will look like by the time they break through, I hope.”

He turned to look at Madeline, whose face was now streaked with dirt and sweat, but still looked beautiful to him.

“How you holding up?” he asked.

“If I had to be trapped underground, I couldn’t have chosen two better men to be trapped with,” she said.

“I wouldn’t wish this on any woman,” said Bob. “I have to admit you’ve got grit, Miss Madeline. You’ve surely pulled your weight.”

“Thank you,” she said. “Richard would never let me do any real work. He said a woman’s place was in the home.”

“Well, I expect he was right about that, but I’ve known some women who could work just as hard as a man, and you’d be included in that number.”

“I am purely tuckered out, as a man would say,” said Madeline, with a smile. “I must look a mess.”

“As do we,” said Bob, instead of telling her she could improve her look by taking off that dirty chemise.

“You should have had them send down clothes for you,” she said. “I have something clean to change into, but you poor boys are stuck in dirty, sweaty clothes.”

“I didn’t bring enough for a new set every day,” said Bob.

“Me, neither,” said Rex. “We can take a whore’s bath if we have them send down extra water, though.”

“A what?” Madeline’s eyes were round and white in the candle light.

“Oh. Sorry, Ma’am,” said Rex, automatically. “I need to watch my mouth, more.”

“He just meant washing off with a rag,” said Bob. “It’s said that the girls who work in the saloons do that.” He didn’t want to admit he’d watched them do that on more than one occasion.

“Oh,” she said. “Well, to be honest, other women do the same thing. I just never heard it referred to as that.”

“Cowboys use rough language,” said Bob.

“My opinion of cowboys has risen dramatically over the last two days,” said Madeline. “Don’t fault yourself for the way you speak.”

“Thanks,” mumbled Rex.

“A whore’s bath is in order for all of us,” declared Madeline, firmly. “We’ll all sleep better for it and be ready to get back at it, tomorrow.”

“They’ve already passed down supper,” said Rex. “They won’t be coming back to the hole before morning, don’t you think?”

“How much is left in the canteens?” asked Madeline.

“If we save one swallow before we go to bed my canteen has enough for all three,” said Bob.

Ten minutes later Madeline was down the tunnel, by their new pile of rocks, with her fresh chemise and her canteen. She had Bob’s pocket knife with her and when she took off her dirty chemise, she used the knife to cut a six inch width off of the bottom of it. Then she cut that into three strips. Using one, she dampened it with water and scraped the sweat and grime off of her body, starting with her face. She had removed the pins from her hair and stashed them on a little rock shelf while she worked. Now she used the knife to cut another thin strip from her old chemise and used it to tie her hair back in a long ponytail. Feeling much better she put on her clean shift and returned to the men. Their eyes were now used to the dark, lit by only three candles, and the men’s gaze centered on the vision of loveliness that emerged from the darkness, like some fairytale creature coming toward them. She held out what was now a rag to each man.

“We’d best get done,” said Bob. Both men started forward, lest she observe the lumps in the front of their pants.

“Wait,” said Madeline, putting a restraining hand on Bob’s elbow. “Just because we’re in this situation doesn’t mean we can’t give each other privacy. You should go one at a time.”

Her thought was based on the fact that both had almost eagerly jumped to go off and be in private, away from her eyes, as they took their clothes off. Her duty, as she saw it, was to enforce normalcy on them. She didn’t follow that thought process to its normal conclusion, meaning the normalcy of a man being with a woman when naked. Her brain just nudged her to retain propriety as much as possible.

“Oh, yeah,” said Bob, swallowing. “Sure. Rex, you go ahead. I’m just going to check the pile one last time.”

Rex went down the tunnel with the piece of what he thought of as a woman’s underwear and his canteen. He got clean and he managed to jerk a load out of his stiff penis at the same time.

Meanwhile Bob went to the blockage and held his candle high, peering at the top of the pile. “Anybody out there?” he yelled. He got no response, but he didn’t really expect one.

While he was doing that Madeline took her blanket and laid it out on the floor, where she planned to lie on top of it. It wouldn’t protect her from the sharp edges of the rocks, but at least it would insulate her from the cold rocks, a bit. The men had kept her warm the night before, so she thought that would happen again. Plus they had two more blankets.

Rex got back, looking much calmer, if not really much cleaner, and Bob left to go do pretty much exactly what the teenager had done. When he got back Rex was telling Madeline about how a good cutting horse could separate a single cow out of a herd while the rider used only his knees to give the horse directions.

“That’s just the most fascinating thing I think I ever heard,” she said, as Bob’s tall form emerged from the darkness. She looked at him and her eyes fell to his groin by happenstance. Madeline had been around men enough, or at least one man, to know how often they got hard. She’d learned what to look for with her husband, and seen it in other men, as well. She knew she was wearing very little and, while she was comfortable with that, meaning she felt safe, the fact that there was no lump in the front of Bob’s pants just confirmed her suspicions. Rex hadn’t had one, either, when he got back and saw her in next to nothing. She fretted about how to help them see the light and change their ways. She wasn’t a very religious woman, but she did believe in the concept of heaven and hell. She liked both of these men and it would pain her to see them languishing under Satan’s fiery lash.

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