Bart Stirlings Road to Success

Bart Stirling's Road to Success

Project Gutenberg's Bart Stirling's Road to Success, by Allen Chapman This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: Bart Stirling's Road to Success Or; The Young Express Agent
Author: Allen Chapman
Release Date: May 25, 2005 [EBook #15903]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration: A PIECE OF ROPE WAS LOOPED DEFTLY ABOUT BART'S ARMS. _Bart Stirling's Road to Success Page_ 217]

BART STIRLING'S ROAD TO SUCCESS
Or
The Young Express Agent
BY ALLEN CHAPMAN
AUTHOR OF "THE HEROES OF THE SCHOOL," "NED WILDING'S DISAPPEARANCE," "FRANK ROSCOE'S SECRET," "FENN MASTERSON'S DISCOVERY," "BART KEENE'S HUNTING DAYS," ETC., ETC.
NEW YORK CUPPLES & LEON COMPANY 1908
* * * * *
THE BOYS' POCKET LIBRARY
BY ALLEN CHAPMAN
Cloth. Illustrated. Price per volume, 35 cents, postpaid.
THE HEROES OF THE SCHOOL NED WILDING'S DISAPPEARANCE FRANK ROSCOE'S SECRET FENN MASTERSON'S DISCOVERY BART KEENE'S HUNTING DAYS BART STIRLING'S ROAD TO SUCCESS WORKING HARD TO WIN BOUND TO SUCCEED THE YOUNG STOREKEEPER NED BORDEN'S FIND
CUPPLES & LEON CO, Publishers, New York
* * * * *

CONTENTS

CHAPTER
I. THE THIRD OF JULY II. "WAKING THE NATIVES" III. COUNTING THE COST IV. BLIND FOR LIFE V. READY FOR BUSINESS VI. GETTING "SATISFACTION" VII. WAITING FOR TROUBLE VIII. THE YOUNG EXPRESS AGENT IX. COLONEL JEPTHA HARRINGTON X. QUEER COMRADES XI. "FORGET IT!" XII. THE MYSTERIOUS MR. BAKER XIII. "HIGHER STILL!" XIV. MRS. HARRINGTON'S TRUNK XV. AN EARLY "CALL" XVI. AT FAULT XVII. A FAINT CLEW XVIII. A DUMB FRIEND XIX. FOOLING THE ENEMY XX. BART ON THE ROAD XXI. A LIMB OF THE LAW XXII. BART STIRLING, AUCTIONEER XXIII. "GOING, GOING, GONE!" XXIV. MR. BAKER'S BID XXV. A NIGHT MESSAGE XXVI. ON THE MIDNIGHT EXPRESS XXVII. LATE VISITORS XXVIII. THIRTY SECONDS OF TWELVE XXIX. BROUGHT TO TIME XXX. "STILL HIGHER!"
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BART STIRLING'S ROAD TO SUCCESS

CHAPTER I
THE THIRD OF JULY
"You can't go in that room."
"Why can't I?"
"Because that's the orders; and you can't smoke in this room."
Bart Stirling spoke in a definite, manly fashion.
Lemuel Wacker dropped his hand from the door knob on which it rested, and put his pipe in his pocket, but his shoulders hunched up and his unpleasant face began to scowl.
"Ho!" he snorted derisively, "official of the company, eh? Running things, eh?"
"I am--for the time being," retorted Bart, cheerfully.
"Well," said Wacker, with an ugly sidelong look, "I don't take insolence from anyone with the big head. I reckon ten year's service with the B. & M. entitles a man to know his rights."
"Very active service just now, Mr. Wacker?" insinuated Bart pleasantly.
Lem Wacker flushed and winced, for the pointed question struck home.
"I don't want no mistering!" he growled. "Lem's good enough for me. And I don't take no call-down from any stuck-up kid, I want you to understand that."
"You'd better get to the crossing if you're making any pretense of real work," suggested Bart just then.
As he spoke Bart pointed through the open window across the tracks to the switch shanty at the side of the street crossing.
A train was coming. Mr. Lemuel Wacker was "subbing" as extra for the superannuated old cripple whose sole duty was to wave a flag as trains went by. To this duty Wacker sprang with alacrity.
Bart dismissed the man from his mind, and, whistling a cheery tune, bent over the book in which he had been writing for the past twenty minutes.
This was the register of the local express office of the B. & M., and at present, as Bart had said, he was "running it."
The express shed was a one-story, substantial frame building having two rooms. It stood in the center of a network of tracks close to the freight depot and switch tower, and a platform ran its length front and rear.
Framed by the window an active railroad panorama spread out, and beyond that view the quaint town of Pleasantville.
Bart had spent all his young life here. He knew every nook and corner of the place, and nearly every man, woman and child in the village.
Pleasantville did not belie its name to Bart's way of thinking. He voted its people, its surroundings, and life in general there, as pleasant as could well be.
Here he was born, and he had found nothing to complain of, although he was what might be called a poor boy.
There were his mother, his two sisters and two small brothers at home, and sometimes it took a good deal to go around, but Bart's father had a steady job, and Bart himself was an agreeable, willing boy, just at the threshold of doing something to