Larry Barlow's ambition

“Discharged! Oh, Larry, what will we do now? We have only a little money saved up!”

Such were Kate’s words when he brought his story home.

“Don’t worry, Kate, I’ll land on my feet all right enough,” Larry answered cheerfully. He was never one to look on the dark side, of a thing.

“Do you think you can get another job in Ferryville?”

“Perhaps I can. I’m going to try over to the rolling mill, and at the Hardware Works.”

But before going Larry went up to the garret room to look over his invention and to speak the words with which our story opened.

Larry worked on his model for the rest of that day, and far into the night.

“If I could only sell this we’d be in clover, and I could tell fellows like old Grinder to go to Halifax!” said Larry, when Kate came up to make him go to bed.

“That’s true, Larry,” she answered. “But come to bed now; you mustn’t worry all night over your inventions.”

“I can’t help it, Kate,” he laughed. “I love the work. They tell me Edison keeps at it sometimes for three and four days and nights at a stretch, and I don’t wonder at it.”

Yet, though he went to bed late, Larry was up bright and early on the day following, and after a hasty breakfast he started out to look for another situation.

His first visit was to the rolling mill, a long, low place lying close to the river. Here the noise was deafening, and our hero could hardly make, himself heard as he approached the superintendent in the yard for a job.

“Sorry Barlow,” said the superintendent, “but I haven’t any opening. If I had I would take you on willingly. I knew your father, and he was a fine man, and a splendid bench hand. Come around in a month or so and see me again—if you don’t strike anything in the meantime.”

“I’ll remember that sir, and I thank you.”

At that moment one of the general managers of the rolling mill came up to speak to the superintendent.

Larry walked away, but he had not gone over fifty paces when a boy came running after him.

“Mr. Willis wants you,” he said. Willis was the superintendent’s name and Larry at once went back.

“Mr. Hobart, our manager, wants a man to go to New York for him,” explained the superintendent. “There is a special order to fill, and it ought to be under the direction of a practical machinist. If you want the job you can have it. It will take two or three days’ time.”

“I’ll take it,” answered our hero, willingly. It might give him just the opening for which he was looking.

He walked into the office, and there received full directions as to what to do. The errand pleased him greatly, for the work would take him to one of the fire engine houses of the metropolis.

On the following morning he bade goodby to Kate, and set out for New York, along with a fellow workman. The goods to be delivered went by freight on one of the river boats.

Larry had not been to the metropolis for several years, and the sights pleased him greatly, but nothing was so interesting to him as the houses and apparatus of the fire department.

“You are interested, no doubt of that,” said one of the captains of a downtown company, as he showed the youth around.

“I would like to be a New York fireman,” answered Larry. “Some day I’m going to try to be, too,” he added.

“It’s a hard life, lad, and but little time to yourself.”

“I am a volunteer fireman up at Ferryville. I belong to the hook and ladder company.”

“Yes? Then you must know something about the work, although let me tell you that a fireman’s duties in this city are more perilous than anywhere else. We often have dangerous conflagrations to fight.”

“I’d be willing to go where anybody else went,” answered Larry, readily.

“You might not be so willing if you saw where our boys are called on to go—down in smoke-choked cellars, and into buildings stored with dangerous chemicals and sometimes explosives?”

“Of course I wouldn’t want to lose my life, sir, but I wouldn’t hang behind the rest, I am sure of it!” smiled Larry, confidently.

He was just preparing to leave the engine house, when an alarm rang out. He had hardly time to step out of the way, when in leaped the horses from the stable. The harness hung over them, and in a twinkle the sets came down and were secured automatically. The fire under the boiler was already lit, and down the stairs and the sliding pole came the firemen, some donning their rubber boots and coats as they ran.

“Can I go?” asked Larry, eagerly.

“On foot—yes,” answered the captain. “No outsiders allowed on the machine. It’s against the department rules.” And then, almost before Larry knew it, the engine had left the house and was whirling down the street as fast as three heavy and powerful horses could carry it.

“All right, I can run if I’m put to it!” muttered the young machinist, and the way he sprinted over the sidewalk, through the streets and among the trucks and cars caused many a person to gaze after him in wonder.

The fire was in a downtown office building, and if the truth must be told, Larry saw but little, for being only a private citizen, he was speedily hustled back by a policeman, and then he had to keep outside of the ropes which were stretched from point to point. But he watched as much as he could see with interest, and spent a good part of the time in inspecting the hook and ladder trucks and the extension ladder truck which reached the scene.

“If my invention don’t beat that, then I’ll split it up for fire-wood,” was what he told himself, as he looked the extension ladder over. “Mine will go higher than that, it can be worked in a smaller space, and I’ll bet it will bear twice, yes, three times as much weight and pressure.”

“What do you want here?” demanded one of the hook and ladder men, as he knocked against Larry. He had had but little sleep for forty-eight hours, and felt far from pleasant in consequence.

“I was only looking at the truck and the ladder, sir.”

“Well, clear out; we don’t want boys around.”

“Thank you—for nothing!” answered Larry.

“You needn’t get gay about it!” growled the fireman, savagely.

“And you needn’t get impudent,” returned Larry, and walked off.

Part of Larry’s errand called him uptown on the East side, and after remaining at the fire as long as he dared, he inquired his way to the entrance of the Brooklyn Bridge, and there took a Third Avenue Elevated train uptown.

The train was fairly well filled, and the youth had to take a seat directly behind one of the cross seats in the center of the car.

The cross seat was occupied by two men, who soon attracted his attention. One was nicely dressed, and at least fifty years of age; the other was younger, and much rougher in appearance.

“I think we can use that lift now,” one of the men was saying. “The inventor has been dead several years, you know.”

“That’s true,” was the answer of the man who was well dressed. “But we must go slow. He had a son, remember. The young man may be on the watch for us.”

“Bah! He was from a town away up the river. I don’t believe he’ll ever come to New York. I want some money, and if it’s in that elevator lift I want to get it out. Nothing ventured nothing gained.”

The two men arose and hurried to quit the train, which had just rolled into a station. Larry stared at them in amazement.

“They must be speaking of father’s invention,” he murmured to himself. “I must find out who they are.”