curs
could have turned on any gas, here. You're crazy, ha! ha! ha! Insane,
eh? A good joke--capital joke, that! I must tell it at the Union League
Club! 'Tiger' Waldron, suddenly insane, and--ha! ha! ha!"

He burst into a long, shrill cacchination. Already his face was scarlet
and his mind a whirl. Though neither man understood the reason, yet the
fact remained that one of the last great explosions had ruptured a
subterranean check-valve closing the six-inch pipe that was to feed the
storage-tanks; and now a swift, huge stream of pure oxygen gas was
rushing at tremendous velocity into the vast chamber of steel.

Waldron, his heart leaping as though it would burst his ribs, raised a
fist to strike down his insulter; then, with drunken indecision, joined
in the maniacal laughter of the staggering old man.

In their ears a strange, wild humming now became audible. Lights danced
before their eyes; their senses reeled, and violent, extravagant ideas
surged through their drunken brains.

"_Ha! Ha! Ha!_" rang Waldron's crazy laughter, echoing the old man's.
All at once, his cigar broke into flame. Cursing, he hurled it away,
staggering back against the ladder and stood there swaying, clutching it
to hold himself from falling.

There he stood, and stared at Flint, with eyes that started from his
head, with panting breath and crimson face.

The old man, in a sudden revulsion of terror, was now grovelling along
the floor, by one of the massive walls, clawing at the steel with
impotent hands and screaming mingled prayers and oaths. His ravings,
horrible to hear, echoed through the great tank, now swiftly filling
with gas.

"Help! Help!" he screamed. "Save me--my God--save me--. Let me out, let
me out! A million, if you let me out! A billion--_the whole world_! The
world, ha! ha! ha! Damn it to Hell--the world, I say! I'll give the
world to be let out! It's mine--I own it--_all, all mine!_ Ha! Dogs! You
would rise up against your master and your God, would you? But it's no
use--we'll beat you yet--out! _out_!--the world--I own it! All this
plant--this gas, all mine! My oxygen--ah! it chokes me! _Help!
Help!_--Swine! I'll scourge you yet--_absolute power_--_the world_--!"

With one final spark of energy, panting, his heart flailing itself to
death under the pitiless urge of the oxygen, old Flint sprang up, ran
wildly, blindly straight across the steel floor, and, screaming
blasphemies like a soul in Hell, dashed into the o