The Argosy, April 1912 — page 153: what you’re looking at

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

WRESTING A PITTSBURGH SECRET. He was familiar with the appearance of dynamite. Indeed, he knew that it was used in the quarry to loosen the rock be- neath which in some places the clay was imprisoned, and should have known what it was before he touched it.- If Carl Steiner had been in his normal senses, he would no more have picked up a stick of dynamite and handled it in this careless fashion than would Sim Galt him- self. As it was, perhaps he did not rec- ognize it. He was blind to all else except his desperate eagerness for vengeance, so why not to this? Certainly he did not care what it was at that moment. It did not take Sim Galt long to see that jhe wild-eyed, snarling man, waving this bolt of death in his face, was not mentally responsible. There was only one thing to be done. That was to make the attack him- self, instead of waiting for Steiner to let fly with his deadly stick. With a shout, in the hope of diverting the attention of his foe for an instant, Sim leaped forward and seized the dynamite. With one wrench he had it away. Then, exerting all his enormous strength, he lift- ed the maniac into the air with his other hand, and, for the second time, flung him to the ground like a bundle of old rags. Steiner was still struggling to get up as Sim Galt, holding the dynamite carefully in one hand, rushed through the dark pas- sage from the pit to safety, along with Pro- fessor Shaw and Fred Barrington. They had just reached the outer opening of the dark corridor, when, amid a crashing roar, as if a thunder storm were forcing its way up from the bowels of the earth, all three were hurled flat upon their faces. Noise, confusion and flying stones were all about them. The very mountain seemed to rock. Great fissures that had not been there before, appeared in the massive walls of the ravine. Then—silence! “He must have found some more dyna- mite!” observed Sim Galt. coolly. “ Neither of you fellows hurt?” “T’m not,” announced the professor. “Never touched me,” added Fred. “Well, I’m glad this here stick didn’t go off in my hand,” grunted Sim, as he care- fully laid his length of dynamite on the ground, close against the wall. “That would have cooked our goose all right. Let’s go an’ see what’s happened, anyhow. I guess the passage is clear. The explosion didn’t p’int this way.” 139 With the hunter in the lead, the three made their way back to the gray pit. The first change they noted was an enormous hole in the wall on the opposite side. The dynamite had aimed that way. ‘““Where’s Carl Steiner?” breathed Fred Barrington, in awe-stricken accents. sim Galt shrugged his shoulders. Professor Shaw who replied: “You might perhaps find traces of him somewhere on the mountain. But they must be so widely scattered, and in such small fragments, that it is extremely doubt- ful. When a high explosive lets go in a confined space its force is almost incalcu- lable.”’ “Steiner should have known better than to throw down a stick of dynamite at any time, it seems to me,” said Fred. “But particularly in a place like this, where he couldn’t possibly get away. I wonder why he did it?” But that was never known. The general theory was that he hastily picked up an- other stick of the explosive from the little pile and hurled it in the direction taken by Sim Galt without realizing what he was doing, but merely to satisfy his insane fury. There was no other reasonable explanation that could be made, so this one was accepted by everybody. “Well, you git the No. 1, Mr. Barring- ton,” remarked Sim, as he picked up a little of the powder from the ground and looked at it. ‘This here quarry does belong to you. I have a working interest in it that your father gave me. That’s how I came to let Carl Steiner have some of the powder. He offered me fifteen dollars for each bag of it I took down to Pittsburgh. Your father used to pay me ten. Not that I would have done it for Steiner if he hadn’t made me believe I didn’t owe nothin’ to the Barrington Company after the old man died. He’d make a man believe anything.” “T can well understand that,” remarked the professor. ‘There’s one thing I want to say, Barrington. I have always known that a certain rare mineral would be found wherever there was a deposit of what you call No. 1 powder. When we came into this pit a while ago I saw traces of it. It was the hope of finding this mineral that It was - made me more anxious to help you find the quarry than I might otherwise have been. We are all selfish. We shouldn’t be human otherwise.” “You’re not selfish, professor. I’m only GOMIIGIOO S CO