The next day in court the fireman, whose name, by the way, was Lars Anderson, and all the other smugglers were held for the higher tribunals of the federal government, under whose jurisdiction their cases, with the exception of Anderson’s, came.

Heavy sentences were prophesied for all of them. Many were the black glances cast at Jack by the gang as they were led away. But these malicious looks did not come alone from the malefactors. Out in the courtroom was gathered a hard-looking crowd.

Coal passers and firemen of the Ajax against whom nothing could be proved, although it was morally certain that they were connected with the gang, had gathered there to see how it fared with their companions. When Jack was giving his testimony he saw many malevolent glances fixed on him, and one man went so far as to shake his fist covertly at the lad.

But Jack did not falter, and gave his story in a manly, straightforward fashion that won him the approval of the court and the respect of the attorneys. He left the courtroom with Mr. Brown, the captain having gone uptown with some friends.

As they passed out of the door the firemen who had witnessed the scene within were gathered about the doorway. They eyed Jack scowlingly and more than one muttered threat was heard.

As soon as they had passed out of earshot, Mr. Brown spoke seriously to Jack.

“I’d be very careful how I went about New York at night after this, if I were you,” he said.

“Why?” asked Jack innocently.

“Simply because those fellows have it in for you.”

“But this is New York City. Surely they wouldn’t dare——”

“They’d dare anything fast enough if they could get you up a dark street,” said the mate sententiously.

“But they’ll be sailing with us again, anyhow,” said Jack.

“They will not!” said Mr. Brown with emphasis. “But recollect that some of them are desperate characters. Firemen, some of them at least, are as bad as they make ’em. You’ve sent their pals to jail. Very well then, their code of justice requires them to avenge themselves on you. So look out for squalls!”

“Oh, I’ll be careful,” laughed Jack as they shook hands and parted.

At the Brooklyn Bridge he paused to buy a paper. The first thing that caught his eye made him flush and then laugh.

There at the top of the page and spread out over two columns was a portrait of himself, drawn by an artist possessed of a vivid imagination, inasmuch as he had never seen Jack.

Then there was a half-tone of the Ajax, labeled “Scene of the Thrilling Battle for Life.”

Underneath came headlines:

“Well, that’s going some, as Raynor would say,” laughed Jack, hardly knowing whether to be amused or indignant.

“There’s one satisfaction,” he thought as he rode over the bridge on a surface car and digested the long interview with himself that he had never given, “nobody would ever recognize me from that picture.”

A few days later Jack received a letter from the company. It enclosed a handsome check “for valuable and appreciated services.” This time Jack did not return the check.

“Still,” he mused, “if it had not been for Captain Braceworth, there might have been a different story to tell.”

The letter, however, delighted him more than he showed. It demonstrated for one thing that the company appreciated what he had done, and that, if all continued to go well, he was in the line of promotion. He dreamed night and day of his next step upward, and longed for a berth on one of the Titan Steamship Company’s coasting vessels that ran to Galveston and Central American and West Indian ports. They carried passengers, and they paid their operators much more than the Ajax class of wireless men received.

“If I can only get some more opportunities to show what I can do,” thought the boy, “I’m bound to get on. ‘Keep plugging,’ my dad used to say, and that is just what I am going to do, no matter how many discouragements or hardships I meet. And then, perhaps, some day——”

Jack went off into a day dream, and it was an odd thing that his reverie led him into a sudden determination to seek out Captain Dennis at the address that had been given him, and to call on the captain. Perhaps there was another member of the captain’s household that Jack was anxious to see, too!