JOHNNY’S DARK DREAMS
Forest City was a place of many marvels; at least so it had seemed to
Mazie in the days when, dressed in rompers, she had come there to play.
The moment you entered the gate you came in sight of two very merry
giants, reposing upon a carpet of green and dressed in suits of red and
white checkers, six inches to each checker, each with his head propped
upon an elbow and putting out a red tongue at you.
The giants of course were made of stucco, and the field they reposed upon
was the side of the building, also made of stucco. That mattered little.
The place was one of enchantment and the merry giants guarded the
pleasant mysteries of it all.
Immediately behind the giants was a great room where, for a single thin
dime, you might purchase any number of thrills. You might try walking
through a revolving tank; walking up a stairway that went down as fast as
you went up; sliding down a wooden chute that had ten times as many bumps
in it as a dromedary has humps. You might try any number of things that
would set you screaming with delight or thrilling with sudden and quite
groundless fear.
Nor was this all. There was the skating rink and the City of Venice where
you glided in slow moving boats amid stately plaster-of-Paris castles and
ancient ruins of the same general composition. There was the palace of
mirrors; the chute the chutes; the ferris wheel, and, best and most
terrible of all, the roller coaster, a contrivance that, providing you
had never ridden upon it before, was capable of crowding a great many
thrills into a short minute of time.
To Mazie and Johnny, who, after all, were yet quite young, this place had
never lost its charm. They entered into the gayety as wildly as the rest;
at least Johnny had on every other occasion. This time Mazie found him
every now and again pausing to stand and stare at the teeming thousands
of men, women and children. He would stare for a full minute, then with a
sudden start would say:
“C’mon, let’s go in here,” or “Let’s go over there.”
At last, after leading him to a refreshment stand where they ordered a
cooling drink, Mazie turned to him with a sudden question:
“What’s the matter with you to-night?”
“I don’t know,” said Johnny slowly. “Mazie, do you believe in
premonitions?”
“What’s that? Some new religion?”
“No. It’s seeing things before they come to pass.”
“I don’t know. Why?”
“Well, it’s strange. C’mon, let’s go over there and sit down.”
“There!” he exclaimed a moment later as they sat on a bench, with the
throngs marching, parade-like, past them, “There! I saw it again!”
“It’s like this,” he said, mopping his brow. “I’ll be walking along here
looking at those faces—mostly happy faces, aren’t they?”
“Yes.”
“They ought to be happy. This is their play time and their play place.”
“Yes, Johnny, but what then?”
“Why, then of a sudden I see the look on those faces change. A look of
terror comes upon them. I seem to see them crowding and crushing,
trampling upon one another as they try in mad despair to escape from
something.” Again he mopped his brow.
“Escape from what, Johnny?” Mazie whispered.
“Fire,” Johnny whispered tensely.
Then, gripping the girl’s arm until it hurt, he fairly hissed: “Mazie, I
tell you this place is doomed! I can see it all too plain. It’s a
premonition, a warning of the firebug. If only I knew when and how!”
“You only dream it,” said Mazie. “The old fires and firebugs have got on
your nerves.”
“No, Mazie,” said Johnny more soberly, “it’s more than that. Perhaps you
might call it a hunch. It’s all of that. It’s the thing to expect. That
firebug has burned school houses, a recreation center, the zoo. He seems
to be bent on destroying everything that brings happiness to people. Why
not this place next? And think what it would mean, Mazie! Think of ten
thousand, maybe twenty or thirty thousand people, half of them children,
gliding in boats through the City of Venice; children on the roller
coaster and the chute the chutes; children a hundred feet in air on the
Ferris wheel; board walks thronged with people; and then, of a sudden,
the cry of ‘FIRE! FIRE!’ My God, Mazie, think! Think! Mazie, somehow I
must get that man!”
“Johnny,” said Mazie, “are there any people in the world who hate
happiness?”
“Plenty of them, I suppose; enemies of happiness.”
“Don’t you think your firebug is one of them?”
“He might be.”
“If he isn’t, what could be his motive? He has nothing to gain.”
“No; that’s right. Most fires that are set are set for gain. A man
secretly moves his insured stock away, then sets fire to his building, or
hires some firebug to do it, that he may collect insurance on goods that
were not burned. There is nothing of that in this. Sometimes revenge is
the cause. But what could one man have against a whole city?”
“What could he?”
“Nothing. Our firebug must be an enemy of happiness.”
“Why don’t you have the Chief round up all such persons? Your firebug
might be among them.”
“That might work. I’ll suggest it. Those people, though, are hard to
find.”
“Come on,” said Johnny after a moment’s thought, “let’s get out of here,
it makes me uncomfortable staying here. I’m afraid I’ll see it again.”
They left the grounds and took a car for Mazie’s house. There, amid the
cushions in Mazie’s cozy corner and with a cup of steaming cocoa before
him, Johnny managed to snatch from this night of unhappy dreams one
little moment of happiness.
After that, having thought of his resolve to visit Ben Zook yet that
night, he rose and bade Mazie good-night.
“Good-night, Johnny,” she smiled as they parted, “and good luck.”
“Let us hope for it,” Johnny’s smile was a dubious one.