Jack North's Treasure Hunt

A Chance for a Position

"Where are you going, Jack?"

"To the shops of John Fowler & Company."

"To look for a job?"

"Yes."

"Then you are in luck, for I heard this morning that they want another striker in the lower shop at once."

"Then I'll strike for the opening at once, and my name is not Jack North if I don't land it."

"It will be John Slowshanks when you do get it, mind me!" cried out another voice, from an alley-way near at hand, and before Jack North or his companion could recover from their surprise the speaker, a tall, awkward youth of twenty, sped up the street at the top of his speed.

The scene was in Bauton, a large manufacturing city of New England. The first speaker was a workman at the shops that had been mentioned, but beyond the fact that he placed the youth before him in the way of getting work, he needs no special introduction.

The other person was a lad of eighteen, with brown, curly hair, blue eyes, and a round, robust figure. His name was John North, and he was the son of a couple in humble circumstances.

"Take care!" cried the man, "that sneak will get in ahead of you, and then a snap of your little finger for your chance of getting the job at Fowler's."

Jack North did not stop to hear his friend through. He was very much in need of a situation, and he knew the young man who had rushed in ahead of him as a bitter enemy. That fact, coupled with his desire to get work, caused him to dash up the street as fast as he could run.

Naturally the appearance of the two running at such a headlong pace aroused the attention of the passers-by, all of whom stopped to see what it meant. Others rushed out of their houses, offices or workshops to ascertain the meaning of the race, until the street was lined with excited, anxious men, women and children.

"Is it fire?" asked an old, gray-headed man, and another, catching only the sound of the last word, repeated it and thus a wild alarm was quickly spread.

Meanwhile Jack North had found that he could not overtake his rival. He was not a fleet runner, while the other had gotten a start of him, which he could not hope to make up.

But he was too fertile in his resources to despair. In fact he was never known to give up a contest which he had once fairly entered. This persistence in whatever he undertook was the secret of Jack North's wonderful success amid environments which must have discouraged less courageous hearts.

Still it looked to his enemy, as the latter glanced back to see him leisurely turn into a side street leading away from their destination, that he had nothing further to fear from him.

"Thought you would be glad to give in," cried out the delighted seeker of the situation at the engine shops, and believing that he had nothing further to fear, the awkward youth slackened his gait to a walk.

Though Jack turned into the alley at a moderate pace, as soon as he had gone a short distance, he started again into a smart run.

"I shall have farther to go," he thought, "but Fret Offut will think I have given up, and thus he will let me get in ahead of him."

This seemed the truth, when, at last, Jack came in sight of the low-walled and scattering buildings belonging to John Fowler & Co., engine builders.

Fret Offut was nowhere in sight, as Jack entered the dark, dingy office at the lower end of the buildings.

A small sized man, with mutton chop side whiskers, engaged in overhauling a pile of musty papers, looked up at the entrance of our hero.

"Want a job as striker, eh?" he asked, as Jack stated his errand. "I believe Henshaw does want another man. I will call him. What is your name?"

"Alfret Offut, sir. It's me that wants the job, and it's me it belongs to."

It was Jack North's enemy who spoke, as he paused on the threshold panting for breath, while glaring at our hero with a baleful look.

"How come you here?" he demanded of Jack, a second later.

"My feet brought me here, and with less slowness than yours, judging by your appearance," replied young North.

With the arrival of the second person on the scene, the clerk had turned away to find Henshaw, and while he was gone the rival youths stood glaring upon each other.

After a short time a big, red-faced, soot-be-grimed man appeared, saying as he reached them:

"If Offut will come this way I will talk with him."

"Henshaw," said the clerk simply, returning to his work, leaving the newcomer to attend to the visitors as he thought best.

"Ha--ha!" laughed young Offut, softly, as he followed the foreman, "where are you now, Jack North?"

Though Jack gave slight token of his feelings, he was more vexed at this usurpation of his rights than he cared to show. He lost no time in starting after the others in the direction of the shop. "I'm going on twenty-one," Offut said, as they stopped at the door, "and there ain't a chap as can outlift me."

"Beg your pardon, Mr. Henshaw," said Jack, brushing up, "but it's I who am after the job and to whom it belongs. Mr. Jacobs--"

"Is your name Alfret Offut?" interrupted the other youth sharply in the midst of Jack's speech. "I reckon Henshaw knows who he is talking to." "It was me Mr. Jacobs recommended the place to, and you are trying to steal it from me," cried Jack. "You are telling a likely story, Jack North, and if you say another word I'll hit you. Henshaw called for me, and it's me he's going to give work."

Mr. Henshaw, who for the first time seemed to realize the situation, looked surprised, as he gazed from one to the other.

Disliking to raise a fuss Jack remained silent at first, but he felt bound to say:

"I was first at the office, and I claim--" "You'd claim the earth, as far as that is concerned, you miserable chick of nobody!" broke in Offut.

The last was more than Jack could stand, and stepping quickly forward, he cried: "Stop, Fret Offut! you have said enough. I don't want any quarrel with you, but I am as good as you."

"Are yer?" demanded the fiery Offut, whose greatest delight seemed to be in provoking a quarrel. "I can lick you out of your boots, and I will do it before I will let you get in here." By this time Mr. Henshaw, a rather rough man, as slow as he was of comprehension, was interested in the dispute, and not averse to encouraging sport of the kind, he said:

"That's it, boys; fight it out. I'll hire the lad that downs the other."

"Then the job is as good as mine!" cried Fret Offut, rushing at Jack with great bluster and no regard to fairness.

The Test of Strength

If taken unawares, Jack North did not allow his enemy to get very much the advantage of him. As the other rushed forward, expecting to overpower him by sheer force, he met him squarely in a hand-to-hand struggle for the mastery.

Mr. Henshaw seemed delighted, and he cried out:

"Limber up, lads, limber up! A job to him that comes out on top! Hi, there!"

Sundry other exclamations came from the excited foreman at every change of the situation, while several spectators, attracted to the place by the out-cries, gathered about the young contestants, lending their voices to the confusing sounds of the scene.

While Fret Offut was taller and larger than Jack North, he lacked the latter's firm-set muscles, and what was of even greater account, his unflinching determination to win. Our hero never knew what it was to possess a faint heart, and that is more than half the battle every time.

Thus when young Offut crowded him back against the wall of the building, and every one present felt sure he must be overpowered, Jack set his lips more firmly together and renewed his resistance with redoubled effort.

Then, as he struck his foot against a piece of scrap iron and reeled backward in spite of all he could, his friends groaned, while Fret Offut cried, exultantly:

"Ho, my fine cub, down you go this time! Henshaw--"

But Mr. Henshaw never knew what was to be said to him, neither did the young bully ever realize fully just what followed.

Jack, concentrating all the strength he possessed, rallied. He threw out his right foot in such a way as to catch his antagonist behind his left knee, when the latter suddenly found himself sinking. At the same time the grasp on his collar tightened, while with almost superhuman power he was flung backward. With such force did Jack handle his adversary that he sent him flying several yards away, where he fell in a pool of dark, slimy water.

The spectators cheered heartily, while Mr. Henshaw clapped his grimy hands and shouted at the top of his voice:

"Well done, my hearty! That's a handsome trick and well worth a job."

Fret Offut arose from his unwelcome bath, dripping from head to foot with the nasty mess, presenting a most unprepossessing appearance.

The foreman was turning back into the shop, followed by Jack, and the crowd was rapidly dispersing.

"Hold on!" he bawled, "that wasn't fair. I tripped--stop, Henshaw! don't let my job go to that miserable thief."

Getting no reply to his foolish speech, Offut followed the others into the shop. His appearance being so ridiculous he was greeted with cries of derision from the workmen, which only made him the more angry and belligerent.

"I'll get even with you for this, Jack North!" he cried, "if I follow you to the end! My father always said your family was the meanest on earth, and now I know it is so. But you shall hear from me again."

With these bitter words the defeated youth, who really had no one to blame but himself for his ill-feeling, disappeared, though it was not to be long before he was to reappear in the stirring life of Jack North, and bring him such troubles as he could not have foreseen.

It proved that Mr. Henshaw was anxious for another workman, and after asking Jack a few questions, told the lad he might begin his task at once.

The pay was small, less than five dollars a week, but Jack did not let that cause him to refuse the opportunity. He needed the money, for his folks were in poor circumstances, and he went about his work with a stout heart.

He quickly proved an adept workman, observing, rapid to learn and always diligent, so much so that the foreman took a strong liking to him.

Several days passed and it became evident to Jack that if he had left one enemy outside the shop, he had another within, who was ready to improve every opportunity to trouble him. This was a small, thinfaced man who worked with him, and whose name was Mires. Besides being physically unable to carry an even end with him, this workman was prone to shirk every part of his work that he could, this portion falling largely on Jack to do in addition to his own.

Jack paid no heed to this, however, but kept about his work as if everything was all right, until a little incident occurred which completely changed the aspect of affairs.

Unknown to our hero, there had been a practice of long standing among the workmen of "testing" every new hand that came in, by playing what was believed to be a smart trick upon him. The joke consisted in sending the new hand in company with a fellow workman to bring from a distant part of the shop a pair of wheels, one of which was of iron and weighed over four hundred pounds, while its mate was made of wood and finished off to look exactly like its companion. The workman in the secret always looked out and got hold of the wooden wheel, which he could carry off with ease, while his duped associate would struggle over the other to the unbounded amusement of the lookers-on.

It heightened the effect by selecting a small, weak man to help in the deception, and Henshaw, liking this joke no less than his men, on the third day of Jack's apprenticeship, said:

"North, you and Mires bring along them wheels at the lower end. Don't be all day about it either," speaking with unusual sharpness.

"Yes, sir."

In a moment every one present was watching the scene, beginning to smile as they saw Mires start with suspicious alacrity toward the wheels. Some of the men, in order to get as good a view as possible of the expected exhibition, stationed themselves near at hand, having hard work to suppress their merriment in advance.

"Purty stout, air ye?" asked Mires, as he and Jack stood by the wheels.

"I never boasted of my strength," replied Jack, beginning to wonder why so much interest was being manifested over so slight a matter. His surprise was increased at that moment by discovering Fret Offut among the spectators, his big mouth reaching almost from ear to ear with an idiotic grin.

"Come to see the fun!" declared the latter, finding that he had been seen by Jack.

"I'll take this one," said Mires, stooping over the nearest wheel which was half buried in dust and dirt.

Then, without any apparent effort, the small sized workman raised the wheel to his shoulder and walked back from the direction whence they had come.

"Now see the big gawk lift his!" exclaimed Fret Offut, who had somehow been let into the secret. Still ignorant of the deception being played upon him, Jack North bent over to lift the remaining wheel.

A Long Trip Proposed

Having seen Mires carry off the other wheel with comparative ease, Jack naturally expected to lift the remaining one without trouble.

His amazement may be therefore understood when, at his first effort, he failed to move it an inch from the floor.

It lay there as solid as if bound down!

His failure was the signal for Fret Offut to break out into a loud laugh, which was instantly caught up by the workmen, until the whole building rang with the merriment.

"Baby!" some one cried. "See Mires carry his. North ain't got the strength of a mouse!"

By that time Mires had reached the opposite end of the shop, and was putting down his burden to turn and join in the outbursts over the discomfiture of his young companion.

Jack had now awakened to the realization that he had been the easy victim of a scheme to cast ridicule upon him.

Mires could never have carried away this wheel. The thought of the trick which had been played upon him aroused all the latent energy he possessed. He did not believe the wheel could weigh five hundred pounds, and if it did not he would lift it, as he believed he could.

Thus, with the shouts and laughter of the spectators ringing in his ears, Jack stooped for a second attempt to accomplish what no one else had ever been able to do.

"I'll grunt for you!" called Offut in derision. "Spit on your hands!" said a workman. Jack compressed his lips for a mighty effort, and his hands closed on the rim of the wheel, while he concentrated every atom of strength he had for the herculean task.

The cries of the onlookers suddenly stopped as they saw, to their amazement, the ponderous object rise from the floor, slowly but surely, until the young workman held it abreast of him. Not a sound broke the deathlike stillness, save for the crunching of his own footsteps, as Jack North walked across the shop and dropped his burden upon the wheel Mires had placed there.

A loud crash succeeded, the heavy iron wheel having broken the imitation into kindling wood and smashed into the floor.

The cries of derision were supplemented by loud calls of admiration, which rang through and through the old building until a perfect din prevailed.

Fret Offut waited to see no more, but stole away unobserved by the stalwart iron workers, who crowded around their victorious companion with hearty congratulations. Jack had won the friendship of nearly all by his feat, while Henshaw at once boasted of the act.

Mires, fancying that the laugh had been turned upon him, and he was about right, allowed all of the bitterness of his sullen nature to be turned against the young apprentice. In his wicked heart he vowed he would humiliate Jack in the eyes of his admirers in some way and at some time. But no opportunity came for him, as month after month passed.

Jack showed a wonderfully industrious nature, and he never seemed idle. When not at work he was studying some part of the ponderous machinery about him, as if anxious to learn all there was to be known about it. The knowledge he thus obtained was to be of inestimable value to him in the scenes to come.

This trait of his pleased Henshaw, who, if a rough man, was honest in his intentions, and he caused Jack's wages to be raised to seven dollars a week. This was done in opposition to his assistant, who had taken a strange dislike to him. His reasons for this will become apparent as we proceed. About that time Jack was surprised to find that Fret Offut had found employment in the building, though it was more as a helper than as a regular workman, his chief task being to wheel the scraps of iron and waste material away and to wait upon the boss of the big steam hammer.

He did not offer to speak to Jack, but the latter soon saw him holding whispered conversations with Mires and the second boss, Furniss, when he felt certain by their looks and motions that he was the subject of their remarks. Once he overheard Offut tell a companion:

"I sha'n't wheel scrap iron always and Jack North won't be boss, either."

Jack had been at the engine works about six months, when he accidentally learned that the company were planning to ship one of their machines to South America, and that they were looking about for a suitable person to send with it, to help unload it properly and set it up. A few days later, as he was leaving the shop to go home, Henshaw came to him, saying:

"Let me put a flea in your ear, Jack. John Fowler has got his eye on you for the one to go to South America."

Scarcely any other announcement could have brought greater joy to Jack, for he had a great desire to travel, and this long journey would take him away from home for many months, he felt it would be a grand opportunity. But he knew that Furniss had been working for the place, and he could not realize that such good fortune was to fall to him, so he said to Henshaw:

"I thought that Furniss was sure of the chance. I heard him say as much only yesterday." "A fig for Furniss! Old John had a long talk with me this morning, and I told him you were just the chap for the place, young and capable. He nodded his head and I could see that you were as good as taken. Of course we shall miss you, but it's a trip a youngster like you can't afford to miss."

"I should like to go, Mr. Henshaw, and I thank you for your kind words."

"Don't cost nothing," returned the bluff foreman, as he started homeward.

Jack was too happy over his prospects to mind the baleful looks of Furniss the next day, or to hear the jibes of Fret Offut. Could he have foreseen the startling result he must have been bound with dismay.

The following Monday, when the day's work was done and he was leaving the shop, Mr. Henshaw came along, and slapping him on the shoulder, said: "Let me congratulate you, my lad. It is just as I said; you are going to South America,--if you will."

"It seems too good to be true, Mr. Henshaw." "It's the blessed truth and I know it I don't blame you for feeling well over such an appointment, for it is something any of us might be glad of. But you deserve it."

The appearance of Furniss checked Jack's reply. He could see the other understood that he had lost. He had another proof of the fact before he got home from Fret Offut, who said:

"Feel mighty stuck up, don't yer? But let me tell yer,'twon't do any good."

This was the first time he had spoken to Jack since he had begun work in the shops, and our hero made no reply.

The following day, as he was about to leave the shop at the close of his work, Jack was accosted by Furniss, who asked him to assist him a moment at the big hammer.

Jack started at once to his help, noticing that the building was completely deserted at the time, except for the second boss and himself; even Henshaw, who generally stayed until after the workmen had left, was gone.

His surprise may be imagined then when he saw Fret Offut step from behind a huge boiler as he approached. Still he did not dream of any sinister purpose in the minds of the two, and he was about to stoop to lift a piece of iron at the request of Furniss, when he discovered a bar of iron so suspended over his head from the cross timber that a slight movement on his part was sure to bring it down upon his head.

No sooner had he seen his precarious situation than he started back, when Fret Offut flung a heavy slug at his feet. The effect was startling, for the concussion on the floor sent the menacing bar overhead downward with fearful force.

Jack succeeded in dodging the blow so far that he escaped the full weight of the falling iron, which struck the floor endwise with a heavy thud. But before he could get beyond its reach the massive bar tipped over, falling in such way as to strike him in the side of the head, and felling him senseless to the floor.

In a moment Furniss and Offut were bending over him with anxious looks on their grimy countenances.

"Is he killed?" asked the younger of the twain.

Jack answered the question himself by opening his eyes, though he was still too bewildered to attempt to rise.

"What did you do that for?" he demanded.

"Do what?" questioned Fret Offut. "You know well enough. You fixed that bar so it would hit me."

"Hear the boy talk!" came from Furniss. "It is true. If I get the chance--"

"Stop, you shan't get us into trouble," yelled the man, in a rage.

"Not much," put in Offut. "Let's teach him a lesson he won't forget!"

"So we will," answered Furniss; and both started forward to attack Jack.