White Fire
CHAPTER V A STRANGE TEST
On a work bench before the window in the laboratory there rested aninstrument the like of which Johnny had never seen before entering thefactory for work. The main body of it was a black drum about a foot longand ten inches in diameter. Out from this drum there ran a tube which,bending first this way, then that, passed into a bottle, then out of itinto a second, then out again and so on until six or eight bottles hadbeen included in its route.
"Let's see," said Johnny. "This one catches the carbon, this one,tungsten, this, water vapor, this, iron, and so on. Guess the thing's allset for taking off the different known elements that are likely to befound in any steel. But how about those unknown elements? Here's a wildshot in the dark." Taking down three bottles from the wall, he poured alittle from each into a fourth bottle. He then replaced the three bottlesand, by the aid of two short tubes, inserted the bottle he had justfilled into the circuit running from the drum. Repeating the operationwith a new set of bottles he added a second bottle to the circuit.
"There," he smiled, "if there are any strange atoms floating around,those ought to give them a home. Now for it!"
Pushing open a slide in the side of the drum he adjusted his bit of steelin a position between two electrical poles and directly before a smallnozzle. He then shut the drum, turned on a switch which started a lowsnapping sound inside the drum, turned a valve which set a slight roarresounding within the drum, then sat back to watch.
Presently a greenish gas could be seen passing along inside the glasstube.
"Working!" he smiled. "Pretty slick arrangement! Electric spark sets fireto the metal, oxygen feeds the flame. Burn up anything that way. That gaswas the hardest, most flexible steel in the world a moment ago."
As he sat there watching the process go forward, hearing the hum and snapinside the drum, now and then catching the roll of thunder from the stormthat raged outside, he thought of the three Shakespearean witches andtheir steaming caldron. He liked to think of himself as a modern wizardwith his smoking electrical caldron.
But something caught his eye. The color of the liquid in one of thebottles of chemicals he had mixed at random was turning from white to adull brown as the gas from burning steel passed through.
"Catching something!" he ejaculated. "Wonder what it may be?"
For ten more minutes he sat watching. Then, when all the gas hadapparently passed off he turned the valve, threw out the switch, and satthere lost in thought.
It was interesting, this experiment. This instrument had alwaysfascinated him. He felt that it might be that he had made a discovery.But thus far he could go, no farther. Of chemical analysis he knewnothing. Already he had made a vow with himself that, as soon as his debtof honor was paid, he would begin somewhere, somehow, a study of thosesciences which were so closely related to industry--chemistry,metallurgy, engineering, mechanics, physics.
But now he was stuck. He had never really been given permission to workin the laboratory alone at night and he was loath now to admit he haddone so.
"Oh, well," he sighed, "probably nothing to it, anyway. I'll just labelyou and put you up here for the present." He scrawled a few words on alabel, pasted it to the bottle containing the dull brown liquid, then setit upon an upper shelf.
"Some day," he smiled, "perhaps I'll have the nerve to tell Mr. Brownabout it, but not now." Brown was the head of the laboratory.
He went out into the aisle and began walking slowly up and down beforethe vault. He was sleepy and tired. This night work was telling on him.
"Wish it was over with," he muttered. "Anyway," he smiled, "I've gotsomething to show them this time," and he patted the steel bar in theright-hand pocket of his blouse.
* * * * * * * *
"You say someone drove the traveling crane down the loading-room andhelped you chase that man!" the manager exclaimed next day after Johnnyhad told the story of his queer night's adventures. "That seemsincredible!"
"Maybe so, but it's true!"
"There are only three men in our employ who can run that crane and they,I am sure, were not there."
Johnny smiled. "Can't explain it; all I know is, it's true."
"I'll put a double guard on the place. Can't have things going on likethat."
Johnny smiled again. He had told of the double struggle with thesnake-like adversary, of the chase, of the ride on the traveling crane,and the recovery of one steel bar, but had not mentioned the "white fire"nor the steel test he had made. "What's the use?" he had asked himself."Who'd understand a thing like that 'white fire'?"
"Well," said his employer, "I'm glad you recovered one of the bars; Ionly wish you had secured the other. One may do us all the harmpossible."
"You never saw such a man," Johnny half-apologized. "Like an eel, he was,a regular contortionist. I've handled a lot of fellows, but never onelike him."
"It wasn't your fault," Mr. McFarland reassured him. "You did better workthan many persons twice your age might have done. Well," after a moment'sthought, "you keep that bar until this evening, then, when you go towork, give it to Marquis and have him put it in the vault. Your work willbe as before until further orders."
Johnny was disappointed. He had hoped to be relieved from this task,which would grow doubly monotonous since it was definitely known that theremaining bar of steel had been carried from the factory. He managed toconceal his disappointment, however, and went his way, to sleep the daythrough with the bar of steel beneath his pillow.
He did not return the bar to Marquis, the day keeper of the vault, as hehad been instructed to do. When Johnny arrived he found the vault locked,its keeper gone.
"Well, old precious one," he smiled, patting the bar of metal, "it's onemore night in my company for you, whether you like it or not."
It was that same night, in the long, silent hours just followingmidnight, that something happened that was destined to change the entirecourse of Johnny Thompson's life. He was sleepy--sleepier than usual, forhis sleep had been broken into that day.
"If only I had another shaving off that steel bar," he thought tohimself, "I'd do that experiment again, and try for a different result."
As if expecting the miracle to repeat itself, he walked to the forge-roomand placed the bar of steel on the little heap of coals at the center ofthe same forge that had burned so mysteriously the previous night.
Then with a laugh, which told plainer than words that he thought he waskidding himself, he turned and strolled away down the aisle among theforges.
No room held such an endless fascination for him as this forge-room. Inthe day, especially toward evening when the outer light was failing, whenthe forge fires burned brightly, and the white hot metal on the diesglowed at each stroke of the massive hammers, when the whang-whang-whangof steel on steel raised a mighty clamor, then it was a place to conjureabout. But even now, in the dead still of the night, the powerful hammersresting from their labor, the long line of forges with fires burned outspoke to him of solemn grandeur and dormant power.
He had just made the length of the room and had turned about when fromhis lips there escaped a muffled cry.
Instantly he broke into a run. Once more, as on the previous night, theforge on which the steel bar lay was a mass of white and red fire.
By the time he had reached the spot, the bar of metal was a glowing whitemass from end to end.
His first thought was to seize the tongs and drag the bar from the forgeto the floor; his second was a bolder one. It caused his heart to thumploudly, his breath to come quickly.
Dared he do it?
He put his hand to an electric switch by the side of the trip-hammernearest the forge. The answer was a snap and a spark.
"Current's on," he murmured. "I could do it. Old McPherson taught me howwhen I was in the salvage department--but dare I?"
To the lower surface of the hammer was attached a nickel-steel die. Tothe surface on whic
h it fell was bolted another. The two matched. Awhite-hot bit of steel placed upon the lower die at just the right spot,then struck; then moved and struck again; moved and struck two timesmore, would be no longer a clumsy bar of steel, but a rough-finishedconnecting-rod for an automobile. The white-hot bar of steel before himwas just the right length and thickness. Dared he do it?
As in a dream, he seized the metal with the tongs, lifted it, swung itabout to the proper position on the nickel-steel plate, touched a pedalwith his foot, heard the whang of steel on steel, saw the hammer riseagain, moved the white-hot metal, touched the pedal, heard the whangagain; twice more repeated the operation, then tossed the bit of metal,still glowing white-hot, upon the sanded floor; a perfect connecting-rodas to shape--but as to composition? His breath came hard. Had the bit ofmetal been spoiled in the heating and the forging? And, if it had, howcould he ever square himself?
To quiet his wildly beating heart he took a turn about the factory, thenreturned to the forge-room. He was just re-entering the forge-room whensomething caught his eye. What was it? Had his eye deceived him, or hadhe caught sight of a furtive figure dodging behind the sheet-metal pressover at the right? In a moment he would investigate, but first he mustmake sure that the newly forged connecting-rod of priceless steel wassafe.
Quickly his heart beat as he lifted the now thoroughly cooled steel, andallowed it to fall upon the cement floor.
"Sounds like real steel," he exulted.
He picked it up and examined it closely. "Not a flaw. And real steel--thebest steel on earth--and I forged it! But how?" He paused, a puzzled lookoverspreading his face. "How shall I tell them I heated it? What goodwill one forging do with no means of forging more?"
"Oh, well!" he murmured, at last, "I'll tell them, anyway. And now,"dropping the connecting-rod in his pocket, "the next thing is somethingelse. I wonder what it will be!"
He left the forge-room and walked cautiously toward the sheet-metalpress.
As he neared it, a dark object, like some wild animal leaping from itshiding-place among the crags, leaped out, and away.
Who was this? Was it his contortionist-enemy returned in hopes ofretrieving the lost bar, or was it some other intruder?
Johnny did not waste time on idle questions, but sprang away in hotpursuit.