Roy J. Snell

“ There is no mystery in all the world greater than a deserted wreck. An old house, an abandoned mill, a cabin in the forest, all these have their charm of mystery, but the wreck of a ship, laden with who knows what treasure, and abandoned by her master, a wreck so remote from inhabited lands that it has not been visited since the night of its disaster, here was mystery indeed.
So eager were they to board the craft that they could scarcely wait until the plane had been made fast and the canvas boat lowered. ”

“ In the day, especially toward evening when the outer light was failing, when the forge fires burned brightly, and the white hot metal on the dies glowed at each stroke of the massive hammers, when the whang-whang-whang of steel on steel raised a mighty clamor, then it was a place to conjure about. ”

“ The rest of that night, waiting in the shadow of a gigantic sheet-steel press, in full view of the vault where rested the remaining bars of steel, Johnny saw no movement, heard no sound that told him there were other human beings in the building save himself and the regular night watchman, who made his monotonous hourly rounds, pausing only to punch a clock here and there. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Around this corner, then that one, down a long row of half-assembled automobiles where a single mislaid tool in their track might mean a disastrous spill, through a maze of trucks loaded down with finished parts, now out into the open air between buildings, now through a tunnel, they raced. Now gaining, now losing, now dashing through a short-cut and almost clipping the end of the stranger’s mule, now headed off by a slamming door, Johnny gained, only to lose again, until at last he came up short to find the stranger’s mule standing deserted in the heart of the packing-room. ”

“ Unbuckling his harness he rose stiffly, stretched his cramped limbs, then, turning hastily, unlashed a small skiff from the back of the fuselage and, having tossed it lightly into the water, seized the paddle, leaped into the skiff and paddled rapidly toward the shore.
He had been gone for perhaps five minutes when, without warning, from out of the white fog there appeared the prow of a small motorboat. The engine was not going. The two occupants of the boat were rowing, each with one oar. Their destination, beyond doubt, was the seaplane. ”

“ 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.” ”

“ The plane swung around, square with the wind, then began a glide which increased in speed with each fraction of a second. Pant was dragged from his seat by the mere force of the air. With nostrils flattened, eyes closed, body bent like a western rider’s, as he is thrown in the air by a bucking bronco, he still clung to the wheel and guided the craft as best he could. ”

“ Question is, what are we going to do with them?”
“More than likely it is, ‘What are they going to do with us?’” grumbled Pant. “There are twenty or more of them to our three. Their ship is a hopeless wreck. It will, half of it, be on the beach in pieces by morning. We have the only means of transportation. The only way to leave the island is by plane. Question is, what will they do about that?”
It was, indeed, a serious situation. Johnny’s brow wrinkled as he took in the full significance of it. ”

“ Johnny had sighed.
“It is a dream—a dream that has come true,” the old man had fairly shouted. “All that is needed is capital to perfect larger motors, to put them upon the market. If only your president can be made to see it, as you and I see it—”
“I’ll try,” Johnny had gripped the old inventor’s hand. “I’ll see what I can do.”
The next night Pant had accompanied Johnny to the aged inventor’s room, and there over some wonderful coffee and doughnuts prepared by the inventor’s wife, they talked over the future of the strange dust-burning engine. ”

“ The stranger had gathered up his tools and had backed away.
Johnny’s heart had skipped a beat when he saw how close a shave it had been; two of the connecting-rods were all but free from their fastenings, and the others might have been in a few moments more.
“I’d like to have him pinched,” he grumbled, “but what’s the use. They’d say we were crazy. You can’t tell them the whole truth, and you can’t have a man arrested for working on the wrong car by mistake.” ”

“ A seaplane was the only craft that could bring him to the island in time, and of all the air-craft then on the coast, none had the possibilities of such protracted flight save their own. He wished them to take him there. The reward would be ample and, should his mission be successfully accomplished, they would be real benefactors of mankind, since some tens of thousands of children would be benefited.
Johnny and Pant held a long consultation. The undertaking was a serious one. Could it be that the stranger knew the type of engine their plane carried? ”

“ But motionless and silent as they might be, Johnny knew there were at least two persons in that building who were there without leave or license.
To attempt to run down a single individual in the vast plant, with its labyrinth of aisles, with thousands of machines, drill presses, millers, forges, moulders, cranes, conveyors, with its seemingly tangled mass of overhead equipment and its endless underground tunnels, would be equal to the task of capturing a fish with a hand-net on the bottom of the Atlantic. ”

“ Such a fine spoken and polished old gentleman had he proved to be that Johnny had been prevailed upon to accompany him to his home to see the engine.
He had found the home of the aged inventor to be a fourth-floor back flat, being merely two dark rooms upon an alley. Here, with his wife, a pleasant-faced old lady, he lived and labored.
[109]
“You see,” he had said, as he uncovered the engine with the dramatic movement of one who unveils a great work of art, “this engine of mine is different from all other internal-combustion engines. It doesn’t burn gasoline; it burns dust.” ”

“ Instinctively, as if preparing to run away from the ocean, which, having been lashed by the storm, must still be rolling in great, sweeping waves that would wreck their frail craft the instant she touched its surface, he tilted the plane’s nose to a sharp angle and set her climbing. ”

“ Slowly the “Dust Eater” settled down upon the waters of the bay. A few minutes later they were sitting about the fire, making plans for the night’s watch and the morning’s renewal of the search.
“Clouding up. Looks like storm,” said Pant suddenly.
“Hope it doesn’t bring those black boys back to us,” said Johnny, wrinkling his brow.
Before Johnny went to sleep he thought in some wonder of one experience of that day, of the burning of the native canoe. He could not help but connect that up with other incidents: the white fire in the factory and the burning of the automobile in the desert. ”

“ Johnny sat down and this time told the story of the white fire through from the beginning. Only one thing he did not tell: He did not tell of testing the steel in the laboratory and of the bottle of brownish liquid on the top shelf.
The manager listened with rapt attention, now and then ejaculating: “Never heard of such a thing! Can’t believe it unless I see it myself! Impossible, young man! Impossible! Can’t believe it!”
“But here’s the forging to prove it,” insisted Johnny stoutly. ”

“ Every afternoon the two boys, togged out in aviator’s garb, were learning to fly this new plane. It was planned that, when the boys found themselves to be perfect masters of this new vehicle of the air, the six connecting-rods should be placed in the motor of the seaplane, and that it be shipped to the Pacific coast. There, under ideal conditions, they were to test out, not only the connecting-rods, but the seaplane, flying, as a last trial, a thousand miles or more.
The pay Johnny had received for the cross-continent trip had enabled him to make a large payment on his debt of honor. ”

“ The ship, but recently a staunch sea-craft, had become a roost for sea-gulls. Literally thousands of them rose screaming into the air as the “Dust Eater” gracefully glided into the waters of the sheltered bay. ”

“ A race in an airplane might not end happily, especially with him at the wheel.
His mind became at ease presently, and he again took up the thread of thought that had been broken off. Should this day’s work be completed in safety, their days of thrills and dangers would, for a time at least, be over.
“Seem to be following us,” broke in Pant again. “Man, but they’ve got some speed! Let her out a notch or two.”
[227]
The plane seemed fairly to leap from beneath them as Johnny, obeying instructions, “let her out.” ”

“ A mule in a factory, as you will remember, is one of those hard-working, snub-nosed little motors that drag trucks about from department to department. The boys were working over the motor of this mule. There came now and then the metallic clink of a wrench, or the tap tap of a hammer, followed by a grunt of satisfaction or disgust. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The Professor seemed inclined to take these remarks as being in the form of a joke, but seeing that Johnny was serious, he said, as his brow wrinkled:
“It is really very important that we be on our way. We cannot be more than a hundred miles from our destination.”
“Perhaps not even that,” said Pant, “but they may be very hard miles to travel.”
“If we only were there,” sighed Johnny. “There is sure to be coal on the wreck.”
“But, since we’re not, let’s explore our island,” suggested Pant.
“And sleep,” said Johnny. “I’m about to fall asleep as I walk.” ”

“ The door to the loading-room was locked. The stranger was running himself into a narrow passage from which escape would be impossible. Johnny leaped from his tram, to find the stranger facing him. That person was clearly on the defense. With fists doubled up he advanced to attack.
Just as the stranger struck out with his right hand, Johnny ducked low—so low that the other’s blow glanced harmlessly over his head. The next instant Johnny would have come up with a “haymaker,” had not the stranger thrown himself, stomach down, on Johnny’s back, and turned a quick somersault forward. ”

“ Johnny blushed uncomfortably.
“Your plan, though,” the manager hastened to assure him, “is a good one. Keep it up, and you may catch something yet.
“I have said,” he went on, “that we are not interested in petty thefts. We are not. This perhaps makes you wonder that you are employed as you are at the present time. But this is quite another matter. The taking of those two bars of steel, insignificant as they may seem—a few pounds in all—is of great importance to us, since, as I have explained to you, it may mean the revealing of a valuable secret. ”

“ Pant’s hand was at the lever. The engine went still, but just at that instant a tremendous flash leaped up from the large tank at the rear of the fuselage.
Pant leaped high, then sank back with a shudder.
“Man! Man!” he gasped. “If that had been gasoline in that tank! If it had!”
His brow wrinkled. “I only hope it didn’t rip her wide open. Anyway, we climbed some. Can afford to glide.”
They were surrounded by a succession of vivid flashes of lightning. The plane was tipped to a rakish angle. Through a storm-washed window Johnny saw what lay below. ”

“ If we don’t there’ll not be a man of them alive by morning. Their ship is out where the breakers are rolling strongest, not sheltered by the point, as the Chinese ship was.”
“It’s true,” said the Professor, “we must render them some assistance, but how?”
“The ‘Dust Eater,’” said Johnny.
“Couldn’t ride that sea, even if she could the storm,” said Pant. “What’s your idea?”
“Might not work,” said Johnny, “but in times like these, anything’s worth trying. C’m’on.”
They hastened down to the beach where the “Dust Eater” was straining at her moorings. ”

“ Johnny’s thoughts were cut short by a hand lightly laid on his shoulder.
“Thought I’d find you here.” It was his employer. “Some things in the factory I want to show you when the men are gone. They’re about out now. I’ll just wait here. Don’t let me disturb you.”
[25]
But Johnny had been disturbed; his eyes for the moment had been drawn from that passing string of men and the electro-magnet. As he again focused his eyes on the crack, he gave an involuntary start. Clinging to the face of the electro-magnet as if glued there, was an oblong paper box—a lunch-box. And the man who owned it? ”

“ McFarland, “we keep our most valuable tools and the diamonds used in giving to shaftings their finishing touches. Here also rest the six bars of steel of the mysterious, unknown formula. We hope soon to rediscover that formula, or that its inventor, through the agencies of the doctor of the sanitarium, will be restored to his normal mind and memory. An old and trusted employe presides over the vault during the day. It will be your task to guard it nights. At any time you feel yourself in danger, there are the secret doors, walls and passages I have shown you. ”

“ But as they reached the end of that plateau, grim despair gripped the boy’s heart. Far and away lay only the uneven volcanic ash and the sagebrush. Not a house, not an automobile, not a cattleman’s pony dotted the landscape, and from this promontory one might see miles.
[98]
“Might as well wreck her.” Johnny ground his teeth. “We’re stuck here. If they catch us they’ll strip her, and you can’t run a car without connecting-rods. Old boat,” he groaned, “we’ll stick to the trail till we crash or they run us down.” ”