  Johnny Thompson started, then stared with dilated pupils at a spot on the aluminum casting before him. The spot, a jagged notch left by imperfect work in the foundry, turned first a dull red, then a bright red, then a glowing white. Mechanically his hand touched the valve of his oxy-acetylene torch. Yes, it was as he had believed, the acetylene valve was closed. The oxygen valve was open, it was true, but the drum which had contained oxygen under a thousand pounds pressure was empty. In fact, he was waiting for the arrival of a new drum. That was what made the thing seem strange, impossible! It was a miracle, only miracles don’t happen in such places—he was working in the heart of a great industrial plant which turned out automobiles in twenty carload lots and airplanes by the hundreds. Johnny scratched his chin and stared at the white spot. True, the nozzle of his torch was aimed at that spot; but five minutes before it had sput-sputted for a few seconds, then died down to an insignificant flame giving too little heat for any sort of welding. He had cut that flame off, yet now, before his very eyes the metal glowed white hot. With a grin which said plainer than words, “I’m dreaming,” he thrust a finger in a can of water, then held it over the glowing spot until a drop of water fell. Instantly he started afresh and stared with wilder eyes. There had come the hiss of water on white-hot metal. “It’s hot—hot enough to weld!—no doubt about it,” he whispered. “What in the name of all that’s good?” Mechanically he lifted a light hammer and struck four deft blows. The metal yielded to the touch of the hammer as wax to the seal. Still as in a dream he selected a bit of metal and dropped it into the niche in the casting. Watching it closely, he saw it, too, turn dull red, bright red, then glow white. Again his hammer fell upon the spot. Deftly he struck it here and there until presently no trace of the weld remained save the glowing white spot. That, too, changed rapidly, first grayish white, then light red, then dull red, then black. For a time he watched it, then with a file he brushed away the black scar, leaving the casting perfect, ready to take its place in a splendid chummy roadster. A chummy roadster! For a moment, at thought of it, Johnny’s mind left the mystery. It was to be his chummy roadster, and was to cost him only a small fraction of what it would cost on the market, for was he not of the salvage department? And had not the head of that department given him permission to salvage a part here, another part there, and another there, a few in the foundry, in the forge room, in the electrical repair shop, here and there all over the factory, until he had all the parts to make a complete car, and was he not to pay for the car just what the total value of the whole number of parts would have been if they had been thrown upon the scrap pile? A chummy roadster! It was the only bright spot that had come upon his horizon since he had returned home at the call of a telegram, and had arrived to find his home draped in black, with noiseless footsteps passing to and fro. His father, the father who had been his boyhood chum, had left him for other lands. He had left, too, through no fault of his, a debt unpaid and no estate from which to pay it. To Johnny Thompson, who had had many adventures but had saved no money, whose soul was a soul of honor, this situation called for but one thing: Adventures for him must cease. He must settle down to hard work and clear off the debt which clouded the family’s good name. Dearly as he loved adventure, much as he longed to be away to some untried wilderness of Russia, Africa, South America, he had set his teeth tight and had said: “It is my duty and I will.” For a half hour he had permitted his mind to dwell upon his thrilling experiences in Russia with the “Reds”; in Alaska with Hanada; beneath the Chicago river with Cio Cio San; with Panther Eye and the wild beasts of the jungle. All these adventures he had dreamed through once more, then he had resolutely turned his back upon them and had gone forth in search of work. Work was not easy to find. Times were dull. At last after five days of fruitless search, through the kindness of an old friend of his father he had secured a place in the salvage department of a great automobile and airplane factory. This department took parts that had been badly forged, or badly cast, and attempted to make them perfect, to put them back into the line of construction. “Cutting costs,” the aged manager had told him. “That’s what we’re after these days. Can’t afford to waste a move. And if you can help us do that you’ll soon be a valuable man.” “Not much chance for adventure in sorting rusty castings, I guess,” Johnny had smiled, “but I’ll take the job; glad to. Thanks!” “Now, see here,” the manager had smiled. “It’s queer about that adventure stuff. You can’t always dope it out, but sometimes I think that if a fellow is destined for adventure he’ll find it; yes, even in the heart of a noisy old industrial plant.” Johnny had smiled and had at once forgotten the remark. He had resigned himself to hard and grimy toil, and for four months had stuck with determination to his job. Now that remark came back to him as if he were hearing it again: “If a fellow is destined for adventure he’ll find it; yes, even in the heart of a noisy old industrial plant.” Was this strange white fire which enabled him to make a perfect weld with no oxygen and with his gas turned off, the mystery which was to provide the adventure destined to come to him? He stared about the deserted room. It was after hours and no one was in the building save Tommy Barr, who had gone for a new tube of oxygen. He could discover no possible clue which would tell him of the origin of the strange white fire. He started as there came a metallic click, click. Then he smiled. It was Tommy rolling the tube over the tile floor. “Tommy,” he said, “the funniest thing,” then he paused and turned the remark to another subject. He had been about to tell of the strange white fire. “The mystery is mine,” was his sudden conclusion. “I’ll solve it alone.” When Tommy had gone for the night, with trembling fingers Johnny selected a second defective casting and set it in the vise as the other had been. Eagerly he watched to see what would happen. His impatience grew as the moments passed, for no dull red glow answered his invitation to the unseen source of magic fire. “Guess the spell’s broken,” he mumbled. He waited a few minutes longer, then, switching on the valves of his torch, he sent a touch of blue flame against the defective casting and, a few minutes later, threw the now perfect part on the rapidly growing pile by his side. After that he switched off his torch, snapped off the electric light and went home. Long before sleep gave his tired eyes rest, however, he pondered over the strange doings of the mysterious white fire, and well he might, for as the days passed that mystery was destined to become more intricately complicated, more strangely baffling on each succeeding day. Arriving at the factory, as was his custom, a full ten minutes before work for the day, Johnny, next morning, was surprised to find a boy waiting for him with a message from William McFarland, manager of and large stockholder in the plant, his father’s old-time friend. “What’s he want, sonny?” Johnny smiled. “Don’t know; jes’ wants to see you at the office.” “Something to do with that white fire,” was Johnny’s mental comment. “Johnny,” said the industrial leader, motioning him to a chair, “when I gave you a job in our salvage department you said something about adventure.” Johnny smiled and nodded. “You’ve had some adventures,” the magnate scowled, “that ought to have been profitable.” “How—how?” Johnny stammered. “Don’t matter how I found out. The point is you should have saved a lot of money from the proceeds of those adventures. Apparently you haven’t. There was that gold mine in Siberia; I’m told it was a new Klondike.” “It was, but—” The magnate held up his hand for silence. “There was also that bag of diamonds you rescued from the head of the bolsheviki band. Where’d your share of all that disappear to?” “I never had any share,” Johnny answered. “In that Siberian gold mine affair I was pledged to pay over the profits to a relief committee working with the refugees in Vladivostok. In the case of the bag of diamonds, it belonged to a defenseless Japanese woman and her people. I returned it to its rightful owner.” The magnate sat down. He was smiling. “That’s the sort of fellow I thought you were—a son of your father. Know what broke your father?” “Not—not altogether.” “He was too honest, too good to his employes. Sold them stock when things were booming because he thought it would be a good thing for them. Then, when the slump came and the stock went down, down, down, he bought it back at the price they had paid. I think it was a mistake. He thought it a point of honor. He paid them the last cent and it broke him flat.” The capitalist sat staring into space. When he spoke again his voice was husky. “Such men as that are rare. You’re like your father. That’s why I took you into our shop. I didn’t need you in the salvage department. I do need you now for a far more important mission.” He rose and closed the door. “I need you for a secret mission, one about which you must not breathe a word to any living being save myself.” A silence fell over the room; a tense, almost vibrant silence. “Johnny,” he put his hand on the boy’s arm, “we’ve a great discovery within the walls of our factory, a discovery to which the formula, for the time being, is lost. It is a new type of steel. It has the hardness and the flexibility of the Damascus sword blade and, like that wonderful weapon, its owner cannot tell how it was made.” “Then what good will—” Mr. McFarland again held up his hand for silence. “You know, in these days of keen competition, manufacturers of motors for airplanes and automobiles are bending every effort to produce steel that will stand severe tests, that will endure strains and over-drive, and will last, last!” Johnny nodded. “We have such a steel as that, a marvelous steel. The man who discovered it is a genius—one of our mechanics. Unfortunately, after he had produced a few bars of this steel, and before he confided the formula to any other person, or had discovered ways of working it, he broke down from the excitement and over-strain. His mind became a blank—a complete blank.” He paused to stare at the wall, as if in a dream. “And there,” he went on, “are the bars of steel, some only eight inches long, some two feet—eight of them. Up to last night, that is. Now two of the shorter ones are missing. I was very careless. They should have been guarded. Competition is very strong, and doubtless a competitor has a spy in our plant. If that spy makes away with that steel, if the other man discovers the secret formula first and secures a patent, you can see what it will mean to us.” He looked Johnny squarely in the eyes. Johnny returned the gaze, but his knees trembled. He remembered his experience of the previous night. He had been the last man to leave the factory. Was his employer about to accuse him of stealing the precious bars? It was a tense moment. For a full thirty seconds not a sound disturbed the room. At last the magnate spoke in a whisper: “Johnny, from now on it shall be your task to guard the six remaining bars, and to discover the whereabouts of the two that were stolen.” Johnny’s muscles relaxed like a violin string when the bridge falls. “I—I—” he leaped from his chair, “I’ll do my best.” “I know you will. Now sit down there in the corner for fifteen minutes and think out some plans for discovering the lost property. You don’t need to tell me of the plans, but tell me what I can do to aid you.” Eight minutes had elapsed when Johnny sat up with a start. “I have it,” he exclaimed. “I’d like an electro-magnet, a powerful one, leaned against the south doorpost to the east exit. I want it connected up with switches in such a manner that I can operate it at a point where I can watch the doorway and not be seen myself. The electro-magnet should appear to be merely stored there temporarily.” “I’ll have it attended to at once,” said the magnate. “I wish you luck.” |
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