of those now and then met with, in the working of a blast
furnace, when the supply of ore slackens, and many of the
laborers enjoy a few hours respite from active duty.
To the Chemist also had come the same breathing spell
and he was enjoying it to the full.
Presently, as he sat at his window lazily gazing out,
he heard someone call to him from outside—
“Ho Charlie!” ,
“Here” shouted Johnson and hurried to the door.
Number one furnace’s running mighty bad!” cried the
fellow, an intimate friend of the Chemist.
“It is!" exclaimed Johnson, with evident anxiety in
his tones.
“Yes, they’ve just finished the cast and the iron’s the
worst buckshot stuff I ever saw. Garret thinks they’ll have
to blow out. I’m going to the office to bring Jeff."
He was gone in a moment, leaving the Chemist standing
in the doorway staring 1 after him. Presently Johnson turn
ed into his laboratory and resumed his seat by the office
window. 1-Ie was thinking, and thinking hard.
■“Certainly I've done nothing to make this trouble,”
thought he, “but it is just possible—. ” Suddenly he re
membered the sample of ore he had guessed at several days
before. Could he have been so far wrong as to have caused
this disorder in the furnace? The thought made him grip
his chair with both hands. He felt his heart quicken its
beats.
“I wonder if I got those ores mixed,” exclaimed he, “and
guessed at the wrong - one?”
At that moment, happenig - to glance out of the window
he noticed a figure approaching the laboratory from the di
rection of the company’s office. It was Jefferson Gray, the
superintendent of the furnace!
“ByjJove!” exclaimed Johnson “I hope he donl stop
here now!” (The road from the office to the furnaces passed
7he Chemist’s Guess.