Adventure Magazine, March 1916 — page 106: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

about water. = _ “Tf there ain’t no explosion till you hit that pipe, I guess, by jabers, that we’ll live some time yet. And who is you, young fel- ler? You seem to know as much about oil as John D.” | “Don’t know a thing about oil,” replied Red, “but I know about gas and I know I’ve worked in both of them. You fellows forget that the*force below is what is crowding that burning oil up in the air. Remove it once and the oil that is up drops. Do as you suggest—sever the col- umn for a fraction of a second with a can- _ non-ball—the burning column has lost the _ force that holds it in the air, and drops. They it meets the new rush shooting up, and the burning oil is scattered all over the val- ley.” ‘And we are it!” cried some one. The foreman said nothing, only stood and looked thoughtfully at the pillar of flame. Then he ordered: “Cut the cannon play! I guess this man knows what he’s talking about. Not as it makes an awful lot of difference, ’cause I don’t believe Bill ’ud hit it in a thousand years. What in the blue blazes we'll do now, gets me. I’m up against it!’ And slowly he turned and walked away. A moment or two Red stood, then went home. He was still stiff and sore, but a good night’s sleep put him in a different case, and he was a new man when, after dropping a line to the girl, he strode over toward the oil-well. THERE had been a change of boss- es in the night. The man now in charge was a sleek, dapper young fellow of thirty-five or so, tall and muscular- _ looking, with an air of decision and finality about him. As Red came up, the newcomer was talking to the foreman, and his words snapped out with force and authority. “Start to tunnel right here,” he ordered, indicating a spot some six or seven hundred feet from the burning well, “and run the tunnel so we will hit the pipe about twenty or twenty-five feet below the ground. There _ is the cap now all ready to put on.”” And he pointed to a piece of machinery lying by. With the instinct of the mechanic Red strolled over to the cap. It was a heavily built affair, in several parts, a collar to bolt round the pipe, a middle piece that screwed on the collar, and a top piece composed of a . Solid, heavy pair of jaws, pushed together Adventure with wonderfully powerful springs. * The mechanism was plain. The springs forced the jaws over the pipe and shut off the flow of oil. The only thing he wondered about was how it was to be put on at twenty feet below the ground. He found that this was the problem the Irishman was discussing as he returned, but the young man cut him short. ‘“‘Never mind that now,” the latter was saying. ‘We'll find somebody when we get that far. Meantime, hire everybody you can to dig that tunnel. Give a dollar an hour if necessary. I'll get the timbers ready, for you’ll have to shore up as you go along. Now get busy, for that fire is eating up fifty thousand dollars a day.” Then without another word 2 turned on his heel and walked swiftly away. At the same moment Red caught the eye of the foreman. “Y’m your man at a dollar an hour,’ he said, and, when the latter nodded, got a pick and shovel and again began to dig into the ground. The big wages brought a crowd of men around, and soon the tunnel was traveling underground. About seven feet high and seven feet wide they made it, so that a dou- ble steady stream of men with wheel- barrows could work inside, one line going in empty, the other coming out with barrows full of dirt. At the end of the tunnel, a gang dug ahead, while another kept close behind with timbers, shoring up the roof to protect the workers. And so the work went forward, day and night, till at last the pipe was exposed. Slowly they worked around, leaving it standing alone in the midst of the chamber, a solitary column, black and sinister. The rush of the oil was so great, that if one laid his ear against it, it almost deaf- ened him. Then the cap was carried in, and then came a pause. Work stopped, and for a space the men hung around, seated on the ground or on the overturned wheelbarrows, talking among themselves. Slowly it began to be whispered about that no one would attempt to cut the pipe and set the cap. Most of the men drew their money and departed, Red among them, hugging his nearly forty dollars tightly. It meant much to him, and he had worked long hours to make it. And then all the light and hope went out Eomichbooks (E(0)