  Johnny Thompson was as nearly as possible a perfect physical being. Having been taught from childhood the necessity of physical well-being and muscular prowess to the business man as well as to the mechanic or professional athlete, he had kept himself fit and had never neglected an opportunity to learn some new trick or turn on the wrestling mat or gymnasium floor. In the struggle that followed the collision there in the dark aisle of the factory neither Johnny nor the stranger had the advantage of anticipating attack. Both had been surprised. Johnny soon learned that his antagonist was no ordinary person. Seizing the man by the feet, Johnny clamped on with a grip of iron. But to his utter surprise the man gave the sudden twist of a professional contortionist, and came up between his own knees, clawing at Johnny’s face like a cat. Loosing his hold Johnny made a sudden grab for the other’s waist, but in that fraction of a second the man took a sudden double backward somersault, and leaping to his feet, dashed away. Instantly Johnny was up and after him. He was dashing along at full speed, making a good gain at every leap, when of a sudden he banged into a perpendicular wall. The wall was rising. It lifted Johnny some four feet in air to dash him to the floor again. “The fake wall!” he muttered, astonished. Had the other runner known of this trap and had he sprung it? Or had it been an accident? There was not a moment to lose. Dashing back the way he had come, he rounded a pillar and was again in full pursuit. The stranger was now far ahead of him, just rounding a corner to enter the loading-room. Through this loading-room, which was a full block in length and two hundred feet in width, there ran a double railway switch. This switch was filled with freight cars, some empty, many loaded with raw material, bales of rubber-cloth, bars of steel, bundles of wire. If the man chose to lose himself among these cars the pursuit was at an end. Johnny pressed on; there was a chance that the great doors at the farther end stood ajar, and that the man would attempt escape at once. As he rounded the corner, Johnny saw that the doors were ajar and that, a third of the way down the long unloading platform, a slim figure was fleeing. “Can’t do it. Got to try, though,” he panted, as he sped along. Suddenly he became conscious of a chain dangling just before him. It seemed to him that there came a slight jangle from that chain. Yes, now he saw it lift, then drop a foot or two. What could it mean? Now it moved forward a yard and stopped. The chain was within his reach. Acting from instinct rather than reason, he grasped it, thrust his foot in the loop at the bottom, and the next minute, with a grinding roar sounding above him, he felt himself shoot forward at a terrific speed. The chain was attached to a huge traveling crane. This crane, which was a steel beam swung from wall to wall of the structure and running on iron wheels along a steel rail set at the very top of the wall, fifty feet above, was electrically operated from a small cab that hung just beneath it. Johnny looked up at the cab. He could see no person there. Darkness might account for that, but all the same he felt a cold chill creep up his spine. Was this, after all, a charmed factory? Had he, all unknown to himself, been moved to some enchanted city where heat, with no apparent origin, melted metals, and where giant cranes ground their way at express-train speed with no one to guide them? He was tempted to think so. But cold reality brought him back to his senses. Dangling from a chain, he was rapidly approaching a man who was doing his utmost to escape. What if that man were armed? A wonderful target he would make, dangling there in mid-air! Cold perspiration stood out on his furrowed brow. His knees seemed about to sink from beneath him. He swung one foot free, and began whirling about to give the chain a side-wise pendulum motion that he might prove a poorer target. Meanwhile, the stranger did not turn to look back. The very thunder of the traveling crane appeared to lend new speed to his limbs. Perhaps he imagined the entire place to be swarming with men engaged in pursuing him. A surprised look overspread his face, as Johnny, not three feet to the right of him, swung past. The man instantly dodged back and dropped to the floor, but Johnny, leaping from his iron swing, was upon him before he could get to his feet again. There followed a second struggle similar to the first. This stranger was a contortionist, there could be no question about that now. Before three minutes had elapsed, he had again wriggled like an eel from Johnny’s grasp and had dashed through the door to freedom. In disgust, Johnny sat up and dabbed at some scratches on his face which were bleeding. “Never saw anything like that,” he grumbled. Above him the traveling crane hung in impressive silence. He gazed up at the driver’s cab. All was motionless there. But what was that? Did he see one of the landing doors on the fourth floor open a crack, then close again? He thought so, but in the pale moonlight that streamed in through the windows he could not be sure. “Fate seems to mock at a fellow sometimes,” he mumbled. “Look at the luck I had, that trip on the crane and everything, and then look at the luck I didn’t have; he got away!” He moved a foot to rise, and something jangled beside it. “What?” He put out his hand and took up a bar of steel. For a second he flashed a light upon it. His heart beat wildly; the steel was blue—the bluest steel he had ever seen. “It’s one of the stolen bars,” he muttered. “Lost it out of his pocket.” A careful search showed him that the second one was not there. Then suddenly he remembered that he was a long way from his main trust—the vault where reposed the remaining six bars. Rising hurriedly, he went racing back to the center of the factory where the vault was located. Arrived at the corner of the forge-room he paused and peered away through the darkness to a point where a small light shone above the vault door. He half-expected to see a figure crouching there. There was no one in sight. Once more the aisles of machines, conveyors and tunnels appeared deserted. Strain his eyes and ears as he might, he caught only the din of the storm beating on the cupolas above the forge-room and an occasional flash of lightning. Seating himself on a fireless forge, he leaned back against its smoke conveyor and rested. The double struggle, the race, the strange occurrences of the night, had unnerved him. He started at every new blast of the wind, fancying it the move of some new intruder. He was puzzled. Who could have been present to give him that fast ride on the chain of the traveling crane? Surely not a watchman; these men knew nothing about traveling cranes; indeed, few men did. The manipulating of these huge burden-bearers, capable of carrying a loaded box-car from one end of the unloading room to the other, was a delicate and difficult task. There were scores of levers and switches to operate, scores of motions to memorize, yet this man, whoever he was, had shown a competent control of the massive machine. Who could he have been? He thought again of the bar of secret-process steel which he had now in his possession. Only a few days before he had wished for a particle of that steel that he might test it. Now he had in his possession a whole bar of it, yet how was he to secure a sample for testing? Only a minute particle was needed, but how was that to be obtained? He was seized with a sudden desire to try his skill on this strange metal. He had learned a little of steel-testing while in the salvage department. Not sixteen feet from the point where he now sat there was a branch laboratory for testing steel. All the equipment for testing it was there. There was only lacking the tiny particle of steel. Taking the bar from his pocket, he turned it over and over. He struck it on an anvil and enjoyed the bell-like ring of it. He held it to the light and studied the intense blue of it. Never before in the history of the world had there been such steel, he was sure of that. Laying the bar down upon the cinders of the forge, he took a little circle around the forge-room to stand at last gazing at the door of the vault. Some faint sound caused him to turn about. At once his gaze was fixed on the forge where the steel bar was resting. The red glow of fire was on the forge. The coal was on fire. One end of the bar glowed with a peculiar white light! His first thought was that there had been matches lying on the forge, and that they had been accidentally lighted, setting off the coal. This theory was quickly abandoned. Coal didn’t start burning that easily. Then, remembering the old vault-keeper’s remark, “It doesn’t seem to take the heat right. Gets all sort of crumbly when it’s been heated,” he dashed for the forge, seized a pair of tongs, and drew the piece of metal from the fire. It slipped from the tongs and fell upon the cement floor with a dull thud. In an agony of fear lest the steel had been ruined he seized a hammer and cold chisel and, placing the edge of the chisel against the still white-hot surface, struck it sharply with the hammer. A thin circle of steel coiled up about the edge of the chisel, then dropped to the floor. “Nothing the matter with that steel,” he muttered, as he watched the white heat slowly fade to a bright red, then dull red, then black, “but one thing, I’ll wager: That was our old friend the ‘white fire’ once more.” He glanced about him apprehensively, as if fearing to see glowing eyes staring at him from the dark, but all he saw was a fresh flash of lightning followed by a burst of thunder. Looking down, his eyes were caught by the thin coil of steel cut from the bar. It was cool now and blue almost to transparency. He picked it up and dropped it again, to see it bounce ten inches from the floor. “Nothing the matter with that steel,” he repeated. Then a new thought struck him. “Why, that—that bit of coiled steel is my particle for testing.” Touching the bar of steel he found it still hot. Waiting impatiently for it to cool, he paced the floor, his eye first on the vault-door, then on the precious steel. What if he were to be successful in his analysis of the steel? That would be a great honor, indeed. Retracing his steps to the side of the forge, he once more tested the steel bar. Finding it cool enough, he thrust it into his pocket, picked up his bit for testing, and strode away to the laboratory, where through a window he could keep watch of the vault door. |
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