Bart Stirling's Road to Success by Allen Chapman

A >> Allen Chapman >> Bart Stirling\'s Road to Success

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10

He let go his grip, ducked, made a pass to grasp the burglar's ankle,
but missed it.

An explosion, a sharp flare, a keen shock filled the air, and before
Bart could grip the man afresh he had sprung from the platform and
vanished.

At the same instant the flag rod clattered to the boards, and a second
later, rubbing his face free from sudden pricking grains of powder, Bart
saw what had happened.

The blow intended for him had landed upon one of the iron bars of the
window with a force that exploded the track torpedo.

It had flared out one broad spiteful breath, sending a shower of sparks
among the big mass of fireworks in the storage room, and amid a thousand
hissing, snapping explosions the express shed was in flames.

CHAPTER IV

BLIND FOR LIFE

Bart's first thought was of his father. He instantly leaped from the
platform.

As he did so there was a violent explosion in the storage room, the
sashes were blown from place outright, and Bart dodged to escape a
shower of glass.

He was fairly appalled at the suddenness with which the flames enveloped
the interior, for they shot up in every direction, and the partition
dividing the shed appeared blown from place.

Rockets were fizzing, giant crackers exploding by the pack, and colored
chemicals sending out a varied glow.

Bart dashed for the front--a muffled cry caused him to hurry his speed.
His father had uttered the cry.

Dazed by the light, his eyes filled with smarting particles of burned
powder, Bart suddenly came in violent contact with a human form just as
he turned the corner of the shed.

Both nearly upset in the collision. At first Bart fancied it might be
one of the burglars, but peering closer he recognized the friendly
roustabout.

"Told you so!" gasped the latter in a desperate fluster. "Fire--I'll
help you."

"Yes, quick! run," breathed Bart, rushing ahead, "My father's in that
burning building!"

Bart was thrilled. The main room of the express shed was one bright blur
of brilliancy and colored smoke.

It rolled and whirled, obliterating all outlines within the room.

"Father! father!" shouted Bart, dashing recklessly in at the open
doorway.

He could not make out a single object in that chaos, but he knew the
location of every familiar article in the place, and made for the chair
in which his father usually sat.

"Father!" he screamed, as his hands touched the arms of the chair and
found it empty.

The sulphurous flames nearly choked him, the heat from the crackling
wooden partition singed his hair, but he could only grope about blindly.

"Here he is," sounded a suffocating voice.

"Where, oh! where?" panted Bart.

He threw out his arms wildly, groping to locate the speaker, whom he
knew to be the roustabout. "Where is he--where is he?"

He had come in contact with the roustabout now, who with all his
timidity was proving himself a hero in the present instance.

"Lying on the floor--stumbled over him--I'm on fire, too!"

Bart's feet touched a prostrate form. It was moved along as Bart stooped
and got hold of the shoulders.

The roustabout was helping him. They dragged together, stumbling to the
doorway on the very verge of fatal danger, and reeled across the
platform.

The roustabout jumped to the ground. Once there he gently but in a
masterly way drew the inanimate form of Mr. Stirling from the platform,
and carried him over to a pile of ties outside of the glow and scorch of
the burning express shed.

Bart anxiously scanned his father's face. It was black and blistered but
he was breathing naturally.

"Overcome with the smoke--or tumbled and was stunned," declared the
roustabout.

Excited approaching shouts caused the speaker to glare down the tracks.
Half a dozen people were hurrying to the scene of the fire. The
roustabout with a nervous gasp vanished in the darkness.

Bart was hovering over his father in a solicitous way as a night
watchman and a freight crew appeared on the scene. There was a volley of
excited questions and quick responses.

No means of extinguishing the flames were at hand. The newcomers
suggested getting the insensible Mr. Stirling over to the street beyond
the tracks a few hundred yards distant, where there was a drug store.

Bart ran for the hand truck on the platform, saw two of the men start
off with his father on it, and hurried back to the burning express shed.

He had hoped to save something, but one effort drove him back, realizing
the foolhardiness of repeating the experiment. The building and its
contents were doomed.

The crowd began to gather and grew with the moments. A road official
appeared on the scene. Bart made a brief, hurried explanation and ran
over to the drug store.

To his surprise his father was not there. Bart approached the druggist
to ask an anxious question when the companion of the latter, a
professional-looking man, spoke up.

"You are young Stirling, are you not?" he interrogated.

"Yes, sir," nodded Bart.

"Don't get frightened or worried, but I am Doctor Davis. We thought it
best to send your father to the hospital."

"To the hospital!" echoed Bart turning pale. "Then he is badly
injured--"

"Not at all," dissented the physician reassuringly. "He was probably
overcome by the smoke or fell and was stunned, but that injury was
trifling. It is his eyes we are troubled about."

"Tell me the worst!" pleaded Bart in a choked tone, but trying to
prepare himself for the shock.

"Why, one eye is pretty bad," said the doctor, "and the other got the
full force of some powder explosion. They have good people up at the
hospital, though, and they will soon get him to rights."

"I must tell my mother at once," murmured Bart.

He left the place with a heart as heavy as lead. It seemed as if one
furious Fourth of July powder blast had disrupted the very foundations
of all the family hopes and happiness, leaving a blackened wreck where
there had been unity, comfort and peace.

If his father was disabled seriously, their prospects became a very
grave problem. Bart, too, was worried about the loss to the express
company. The books were probably out on the desk when the fire
commenced, the safe was open, and the loss in money and records meant
considerable.

Bart felt that he was undertaking the hardest task of his life when he
reached home and broke the news to his mother--it was like disturbing
the peace of some earthly Eden.

Mrs. Stirling went at once to the hospital with her eldest daughter,
Bertha. Bart, very anxious and miserable, got the younger boys to bed
and tried to cheer up his little sister Alice, who was in a transport of
grief and suspense.

The strain was relieved when Bertha Stirling came home about eleven
o'clock.

She was in tears, but subdued any active exhibition of emotion until
Alice, on the assurance that her father was resting comfortably at the
hospital, was induced to retire.

Then she broke down utterly, and Bart had a hard time keeping her from
being hysterical.

She said that her mother intended staying all night at the side of her
suffering husband and had tried to send some reassuring word to her son.

"You must tell me the worst, you know, Bertha," said Bart. "What do
they say at the hospital? Is father in serious danger? Will he die?"

"No," answered the sobbing girl, "he will not die, but oh! Bart--the
doctor says he may be blind for life!"

CHAPTER V

READY FOR BUSINESS

Bart Stirling stood ruefully regarding the ruins of the burned express
shed. It was the Fourth of July, and early as it was, the air was
resonant with the usual echoes of Independance Day.

Bart, however, was little in harmony with the jollity and excitement of
the occasion. He had spent a sleepless night, tossing and rolling in bed
until daybreak, when his mother returned from the hospital.

Mr. Stirling was resting easily, she reported, in very little pain or
discomfort, but his career of usefulness and work was over--the doctors
expressed an opinion that he would never regain his eyesight.

Mrs. Stirling was pale and sorrowed. She had grown older in a single
night, but the calm resignation in her gentle face assured Bart that
they would be of one mind in taking up their new burdens of life in a
practical, philosophical way.

"Poor father!" he murmured brokenly. Then he added: "Mother, I want you
to go in and get some rest, and try not to take this too hard. I will
attend to everything there is to do about the express office."

"I don't see what there can be to do," she responded in surprise.
"Everything is burned up, your father will never be able to resume his
position. We are through with all that, I fancy."

"There is considerable to do," asserted Bart in a definite tone that
instantly attracted his mother's attention because of its seriousness.
"Father is a bonded employee of the express service. Their business
doesn't stop because of an accidental fire, and they have a system to
look after here that must not be neglected. I know the ropes pretty
well, thanks to father, and I think it a matter of duty to act just as
he would were he able to be about, and further and protect the company's
interests. Outside of that, mother," continued the boy, earnestly, "you
don't suppose I am going to sit down idly and let things drift at
haphazard, with the family to take care of and everything to be done to
make it easy and comfortable for father."

A look of pride came into the mother's face. She completely recognized
the fidelity and sense of her loyal son, allowed Bart to lead her into
the house, and tried to be calm and cheerful when he bade her good-bye,
and, evading celebrating groups of his boy friends, made his way down to
the ruined express shed.

A heap of still smouldering cinders and ashes marked the site. Bart
stood silently ruminating for some minutes. He tried to think things out
clearly, to decide how far he was warranted in acting for his father.

"I don't exactly know what action the express people usually take in a
case of this kind," he reflected, "nor how soon they get about it. I can
only wait for some official information. In the meantime, though,
somebody has got to keep the ball rolling here. I seem to be the only
one about, and I am going to put the system in some temporary order at
least. If I'm called down later for being too officious, they can't say
I didn't try to do my duty."

Bart set briskly at work to put into motion a plan his quick, sensible
mind had suggested.

About one hundred feet away was a rough unpainted shed-like structure.
He remembered the time, several years back, when the express office had
been located there.

It was, however, forty feet from any tracks, and for convenience sake,
when the railroad gave up the burned building which they had occupied
for unclaimed freight storage, it had been turned over to the express
people.

Bart went down to the old quarters. The door had lost its padlock and
stood half open. Inside was a heap of old boards, and empty boxes and
barrels thrown there from time to time to keep them from littering the
yards.

A truck and the little delivery cart, being outside of the burned shed,
Bart found intact. He ran them down to the building he had determined to
utilize, temporarily at least, as express headquarters for
Pleasantville.

The yards were fairly deserted except for a sleepy night watchman here
and there. It was not yet seven o'clock, but when Bart reached the
in-freight house he found it open and one or two clerks hurrying through
their work so as to get off for the day at ten.

There was a good deal of questioning, for they knew of the fire, and
knew Bart as well, and liked him, and when he made his wants known
willing hands ministered to his needs.

Bart carried back with him a hammer and some nails, a broom, a marking
pot and brush, pens, ink and a couple of tabs of paper.

As he neared the switch shanty where Lem Wacker had been on duty the day
previous, he noticed that it had been opened up since he had passed it
last. Some one was grumbling noisily inside. Bart was curious for more
reasons than one.

He placed his load on the bench outside and stuck his head in through
the open doorway.

"Oh, it's you, Mr. Evans," he hailed, as he recognized the regular
flagman on duty for whom Wacker had been substituting for three days
past. "Glad to see you back. Are you all well?"

"Eh? oh, young Stirling. Say, you've had a fire. I hear your father was
burned."

"He is quite seriously hurt," answered Bart gravely.

"Too bad. I have troubles of my own, though."

"What is the matter, Mr. Evans?"

"Next time I give that lazy, good-for-nothing Lem Wacker work he'll
know it, I'm thinking! Look there--and there!"

The irate old railroader kicked over the wooden cuspidor in disgust. It
was loaded to the top with tobacco and cigarette ends. Then he cast out
half a dozen empty bottles through the open window, and went on with his
grumbling.

"What he's been up to is more than I can guess," he vociferated. "Look
at my table there, all burned with matches and covered with burnt cork.
What's he been doing with burnt cork? Running a minstrel show?"

Bart gave a start. He thought instantly of the black streaked face he
had tried to survey at the express shed window the night previous.

"My flag's gone, too," muttered old Evans, turning over things in a vain
search for it. "I'll have a word or two for Lem Wacker when it comes to
settling day, I'm thinking. He comes up to the house late last night and
tells me he don't care to work for me any longer."

"Did he?" murmured Bart thoughtfully. "Why not, I wonder?"

"Oh, he flared up big and lofty, and said he had a better job in view."

Bart went on his way surmising a good deal and suspecting more.

He made it a point to pass by the ruins of the old express shed, and he
found there what he expected to find--the missing flag from the switch
shanty; only the rod was bare, the little piece of red bunting having
been burned away.

Bart dismissed this matter from his mind and all other disturbing
extraneous affairs, massing all his faculties for the time being on
getting properly equipped for business.

He selected a clean, plain board, and with the marking outfit painted
across it in six-inch letters that could be plainly read at a distance
the words:

EXPRESS OFFICE.

This Bart nailed to the door jamb in such a way that it was visible from
three directions.

Next he started to carry outside and pile neatly at the blind end of the
building all the boards, boxes and other debris littering up the room,
swept it, and selected two packing cases and nailed them up into a
convenient impromptu desk, manufactured a bench seat out of some loose
boards, set his pen, ink and paper in order, and felt quite ready for
business.

He had gained a pretty clear idea the day previous from his father as to
the Fourth of July express service routine.

The fireworks deliveries had been the main thing, but as these had been
destroyed that part of the programme was off the sheet.

At eight o'clock the morning express would bring in its usual quota, but
this would be held over until the following day except what was marked
special or perishable. There would be no out express matter owing to the
fact that it was a holiday.

"I can manage nicely, I think," Bart told himself, as, an hour later, he
ran the truck down to the site of the burned express shed and stood by
the tracks waiting.

A freight engine soon came to the spot, backing down the express car.
Its engineer halted with a jerk and a vivid:

"Hello!"

He had not heard of the fire, and he stared with interest at the ruins
as Bart explained that, until some new arrangement was made, express
shipments would be accepted and loaded by truck.

There were four big freezers of ice cream, one for delivery at the town
confectioner's, one at the drug store soda fountain, and two for the
picnic grounds, where an afternoon celebration was on the programme.
Besides these, there were three packages containing flags and fireworks,
marked "Delayed--Rush."

He closed the office door, tacked to it a card announcing he would
return inside of half an hour, and loaded into the wagon the entire
morning's freight except the two freezers intended for the picnic
grounds.

These could not be delivered until two o'clock that afternoon, and he
stowed them in the new express shed, covering them carefully with their
canvas wrappings.

Bart made a record run in his deliveries. He had formed a rough receipt
book out of some loose sheets, and when he came back to the office
filled out his entries in regular form.

Several persons visited the place up to nine o'clock--storekeepers and
others who had lost their goods in the fire. Bart explained the
situation, saying that they would probably hear from the express company
in a day or two regarding their claims.

He found in work something to change his thoughts from a gloomy channel,
and, while very anxious about his father, was thankful his parent had
escaped with his life, while he indulged some hopeful and daring plans
for his own ambitions in the near future.

"I'll stick to my post," he decided. "Some of the express people may
happen down here any time."

He was making up a list from memory of those in the village whose
packages had been destroyed by the fire, when two boys crossed the
threshold of the open doorway, one carrying a thin flat package.

Bart greeted them pleasantly. The elder was Darry Haven, his companion a
younger brother, Bob, both warm friends of the young express agent.

Darry inquired for Mr. Stirling solicitously, and said his mother was
then on her way to see Mrs. Stirling, anxious to do anything she could
to share the lady's troubles. Mr. Haven had been an editor, but his
health had failed, and Mrs. Haven, having some artistic ability and
experience, was the main present support of the family, doing
considerable work for a publishing house in the city in the way of
illustrations for fashion pages.

Darry had a "rush" package of illustrations under his arm now.

"I suppose we can't get anything through to-day, or until you get things
in running order again?" he intimated.

"We were sending nothing through on account of the Fourth," explained
Bart, "but you leave the package here and I will see that it goes on
the eleven o'clock train."

Bart had just completed the fire-loss list when a heavy step caused him
to turn around.

A portly, well-dressed man, important-appearing and evidently on
business, stood in the doorway looking sharply about the place.

"Well!" he uttered, "What's this?"

"The express office," said Bart, arising.

"Oh, it is?" slowly commented the man, "You in charge?"

"Yes, sir," politely answered Bart.

"Set up shop; doing business, eh?"

"Fast as I can," announced Bart.

"Who told you to?" demanded the visitor bending a pair of stern eyes on
Bart.

"Why do you ask that, may I inquire?" interrogated Bart, pleasantly, but
standing his ground.

"Ha-hum!" retorted the stranger, "why do ask. Because I am the
superintendent of the express company, young man, and somewhat
interested in knowing, I fancy!"

CHAPTER VI

GETTING "SATISFACTION"

Bart did not lose his presence of mind, but he fully realized that he
faced a critical moment in his career.

Very courteously he drew forward the rude impromptu bench he had knocked
together two hours before.

"Will you have a seat, sir?" he asked.

The express superintendent did not lose his dignity, but there was a
slightly humorous twitching at the corners of his mouth.

"Thanks," he said, wearily seating himself on the rude structure.
"Rather primitive furniture for a big express company, it seems to me."

"It was the best I could provide under the circumstances," explained
Bart modestly.

"You made this bench, did you?"

Bart acknowledged the imputation with a nod.

"And that--desk, is it?"

"Yes, sir."

"And the sign outside, and opened for business?"

"There was no one else on hand. I felt that I must represent my father,
Mr. Stirling, who is the authorized agent here, until the seriousness of
his condition was known. You see, there was business likely to come in,
and I have been here to attend to it."

"Just so," vouchsafed his visitor. "No out shipments to-day, I believe?"

"No, it's a holiday, but there was some rush in stuff on the morning
express."

"Where is it?"

"I have delivered most of it--the balance, two freezers of ice cream, I
will attend to this afternoon. I am keeping a record and taking
receipts, but giving none--I didn't feel warranted in that until I heard
from the company."

"You have done very well, young man," said the stranger. "I am Robert
Leslie, the superintendent, as I told you. Do you mean to say you rigged
things up in this shape and got your deliveries out alone?"

"There was no one to help me," remarked Bart.

He felt pleased and encouraged, for the superintendent's cast-iron
visage had softened considerably, and he manifested unmistakable
interest as he reached out and took up and inspected the neatly
formulated memoranda on the packing-box desk.

"What's this?" he inquired, running over the pages Bart had last been
working on.

"That is a list of losers by the fire," explained Bart.

"This is from memory?"

"Yes, Mr. Leslie--but I have a good one, and I think the list is
tolerably correct."

"I am very much pleased," admitted the superintendent--"those claims are
our main anxiety in a case like this. I understand the contents of the
safe were destroyed."

"I fear so," assented Bart gravely. "The explosion was so sudden, and my
father was blinded, so there was no opportunity to close it. I tried to
reach it after rescuing him, but the flames drove me back."

Mr. Leslie was silent for a few moments. He seemed to be thinking. His
glance roamed speculatively about the place, taking in the layout
critically, then finally Bart was conscious that his shrewd, burrowing
eyes were scanning him closely.

"How old are you, Stirling?" asked the superintendent abruptly.

"Nearly nineteen."

"I suppose you know something about the routine here?"

"I have helped my father a little for the past month or two--yes, sir."

"And have improved your opportunities, judging from the common-sense way
you have got things into temporary running order," commented Leslie.

The speaker took out his watch. Then, glancing through the doorway, he
arose suddenly, with the words:

"Ah! there he is, now. I suppose you couldn't be here about four o'clock
this afternoon?"

"Why, certainly," answered Bart promptly. "People are likely to be
around making inquiries, and I have a delivery to make this afternoon,
as I told you, sir."

"I intend to see your father," said Mr. Leslie, "and I want to get back
to the city to-night. I may have some orders for you, so we'll call it
four, sharp."

"I will be here, sir."

The superintendent stepped outside. Evidently he had made an
appointment, for he was met by the freight agent of the B. & M., who
knew Bart and nodded to him.

As the two men strolled slowly over to the ruins of the express shed,
Bart heard Mr. Leslie remark:

"That's a smart boy in there."

"And a good one," supplemented the freight agent.

Bart experienced a thrill of pleasure at the homely compliment. He tried
to get back to business, but he found himself considerably flustered.

All the morning his hopes and plans had drifted in one definite
direction--to get some assurance of permanent employment for the future.

The only work he had ever done was here at the express office for his
father. It was a daring prospect to imagine that he, a mere boy, would
be allowed to succeed to a grown man's position and salary--and yet Bart
had placed himself in line for it with every prompting of diligence and
duty.

Mr. Leslie and the freight agent spent half an hour at the ruins. Bart
could see by their gestures that they were animatedly discussing the
situation, and they seemed to be closely looking over the ground with a
view to locating a site for a new express shed.

Finally they shook hands in parting. The express superintendent
consulted his watch, and turned his face in the direction of Bart.

As he neared the "new" express shed, however, he passed around to its
rear, and glancing out of a window there Bart saw that he had come to a
halt, and was drawing a diagram of the tracks on a blank page in his
memorandum book.

Just as Mr. Leslie had returned this to his pocket and was about to
start from the spot, a man hailed him. It was Lem Wacker. He was dressed
in his best, but the effort was spoiled by an uncertainty of gait, and
his face was suspiciously flushed.

"Did you address me?" inquired the superintendent in a chilling tone.

Lem was not daunted by the imposing presence or the dignified demeanor
of the speaker.

"Sure," he answered, unabashed. "You're Leslie, ain't you?"

"I am Mr. Leslie, yes," corrected the superintendent, his stern brow
contracted in a frown.

"They told me I'd find you here. My name's Wacker. Knew your cousin down
at Rochelle; we worked on the same desk in the freight house. Had many
a drink with Ted Leslie."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10