STALLED
"What's going on?" asked Mr. Ringold, who had been awakened in his
berth, near the two boys, by hearing the talk. "Has any thing happened?"
"There certainly has," replied Blake, taking care not to speak too
loudly, for fear of awakening the other passengers. "Our undeveloped
films have been stolen--the ones showing the relief train, and the
bridge work."
"Stolen!" exclaimed the manager, thrusting his head out from between the
curtains.
"Well, they're gone, and that's the only way I can account for it," went
on Blake, as he told the story, the colored porter standing by, and
listening with open mouth.
"We haven't made any stops since you put the films under your berth;
have we?" asked Mr. Ringold.
"No, sah, dish yeah train ain't done made no stops since dark," answered
the porter.
"Then the thief must be aboard still!" cried the manager. "We must find
him. It's probably Munson, just as you suspect. Wait until I get some
clothes on, and we'll search."
It was not an easy matter to look for Munson aboard a train consisting
mostly of sleeping cars, the occupants of which had, in the main,
retired. But when the urgency of the matter was explained to the
conductor, he lent his aid, and by questioning the porters and brakemen,
and such passengers as were aroused, it was learned that no one
answering Munson's description had been seen.
"Of course it may not have been he," said Blake, when the fruitless
search was over, "and, if it was, he may have jumped from the train."
"He could have done that," the conductor admitted. "We struck a pretty
stiff grade not long ago and had to reduce speed. He could have jumped
off, if he hit the right place, with little chance of injury."
Nothing more could be done, and, regretting the loss of the valuable
films, Blake, Joe and the others returned to their berths.
"I'll wire all the agencies and warn them against buying those films,"
said Mr. Ringold. "That may help some. And I'll get a detective agency
after Munson. Those pictures are too valuable to lose."
Breakfast was eaten aboard the train just before coming into Hannibal,
and at the first stop Ringold sent off his telegrams. A more complete
search of the train, by daylight, failed to disclose Munson, or any
suspicious characters whom he might have engaged to trail our friends,
and steal from them.
"Well, we'll be there soon, now," Joe said, as he rose from the table in
the dining car. "We'd better get our things together, Blake."
"That's right. Say, it's raining again!"
"So it is!" agreed Joe, looking out of the car window. "This is fierce!
Isn't it ever going to let up?"
It had rained at intervals for the last two days, and that fact, coupled
with the knowledge that it had been pouring more or less steadily before
that, did not give much assurance that the flood would soon abate.
"The Mississippi will be higher than ever," murmured Blake. "It's going
to make it bad all around--bad for us and bad for those who are lost.
We'll have hard work finding them."
"We'll never find them," broke in the gloomy voice of C. C. Piper. "They
are gone forever."
The faces of Blake and Joe, no less than that of Mr. Ringold, were
grave. There were grown men and women in the party of players reported
as being lost, but the two boys thought most of Miss Birdie Lee. It was
almost as though their own sister were lost, so near and dear did they
feel toward the little actress.
Rain, rain, and still more rain! The big drops splashed on the car
windows, and on either side of the track were to be seen wet and sodden
fields, many of them almost out of sight under sheets of water. They
passed through miles of dripping forest, to come out perhaps near the
bank of some stream that was filled to overflowing. Once the tracks were
partly under water, at a point where a small river had overflowed the
banks, and the engineer had to slow down for fear of spreading rails.
It was a dreary outlook, and when they stopped at a station where they
could get newspapers, the printed reports of the flood were most
alarming.
"Isn't it ever going to let up raining?" asked Blake, as he wiped the
moisture from a window and looked out for a possible sign of a break in
the clouds.
"It'll rain for forty days--or longer," said Christopher Cutler Piper,
in still more gloomy tones.
A passenger in the seat ahead of the comedian turned around, gave one
look at the actor, and then, taking a bottle from his valise gravely
offered it to C. C.
"Here," he said, "take some of this. It will do you good."
"Hey! What is it?" asked the comedian, suspiciously.
"Liver medicine," went on the passenger, who looked as though he might
be a country doctor. "I know what's the matter with you. You've got
liver complaint. I've had it, and I know just how mean it makes you
feel."
"But there's nothing the matter with my liver!" protested the actor.
"Nothing at all!"
"Don't tell me! I know better!" declared the other, with emphasis. "I
put this medicine up myself, and it's the greatest liver regulator and
revivifier in the world. One dose will make you feel like a new man, and
two will almost cure you. I won't charge you anything for it, either. I
hate to see anyone suffer as you do."
"But I don't suffer," cried Mr. Piper, at a loss to understand the
other's queer action. The actor looked around as though for help, in
case the man should become violent.
"You don't suffer!" the country doctor cried. "Why, you have the worst
complaint in the world. You're a pessimist!"
"Huh!" grunted C. C.
"You're always looking on the dark side of things," went on the doctor,
"and that shows your liver is affected. One bottle of my celebrated
revivifier will make you look at things through rose-colored spectacles.
Don't take my word for it, though. Take the medicine."
"All right," agreed Mr. Piper, while the boys and Mr. Ringold smiled in
appreciation of the joke. "I'll take some later," and he laid the bottle
aside. The doctor turned away, apparently satisfied, and a little later
Mr. Piper began telling to Joe and Blake one of the many humorous
stories for which he had been famous while on the vaudeville stage,
before taking up moving picture work.
He brought the tale to an end, amid laughter from the boys, and the
doctor, hearing, turned around.
"That's more like it," he said, casting a glance of approval at C. C.
Piper. "I knew you'd feel happier after one dose of my liver
revivifier."
"But I didn't take it!" said the actor.
"Though I'm going to!" he added quickly, as he noted the look on the
other's face. "I'm sure it's good," he said, and then, when Blake told
the medical man that it was only C. C. Piper's invariable habit to look
on the gloomy side, even while cracking a joke, the patentee of the
revivifier shook his head in a puzzled fashion.
"Queerest case I ever heard of," he said. He went several seats up in
the car after that, as though he were afraid C. C. might, in a fit of
sudden despair, do him some injury.
This little incident served to somewhat enliven a day that had begun
gloomily enough, and which seemed as though it would continue so, for
the rain showed no signs of stopping.
"It's lucky we brought along rubber boots and our rain-coats," remarked
Blake, as he and Joe were gathering their baggage and cameras together,
preparatory to leaving the train, which would soon arrive in Hannibal.
"Yes, we'll need 'em all right," agreed his chum. "And say, we're going
to have trouble getting pictures if this downpour keeps up. We'll get
nothing but blurs on the films."
"Oh, it's bound to let up some time," spoke Blake, hopefully.
The train had been proceeding slowly for some time now. The tracks ran
along the river, occasional glimpses of which could be had.
"Look at that!" suddenly cried Joe, as the train rounded a curve, giving
the best view yet had, of the flooded Mississippi. "Say, that's some
water, all right!"
"I should say yes!" exclaimed Blake.
The boys looked out on a big stretch of muddy water, in which numerous
trees, and other debris, could be seen floating. The current seemed
sluggish enough, though doubtless it moved with considerable power. Now
and then small buildings could be noted in the yellow water, having been
carried down from some farms further up stream.
"There goes a house!" exclaimed Mr. Ringold, who was at the adjoining
window. "Say boys, this surely is serious!"
The house, a small one, was turning slowly about in the current.
"Say, I wish we could get some pictures," murmured Blake.
"You'll have enough chance to get them later," spoke a brakeman, going
through the car. "You haven't begun to see things yet!"
"Are they very bad?" asked Joe.
"I should say so! I doubt if we can get in. The river has gone up two
feet since yesterday, and it's still rising."
"You mean we won't get into Hannibal?" asked Blake.
"That's about it. I don't see how we're going on much farther. The track
just ahead of us was on the edge of the water last night, so I heard,
and it's bound to be covered now. There are a couple of bridges, too,
that were in danger of being washed away."
"I knew it! I knew something would happen!" cried Mr. Piper.
"Say, hadn't you better take some of that liver regulator?" asked Mr.
Ringold, with a smile at the comedian.
The train, which had been proceeding more and more slowly, now came to a
stop. The passengers glanced uneasily about, and Joe and Blake hurried
out.
"Any accident?" Joe asked, of the brakeman who had spoken of the flood.
"No; at least not to the train. We're stuck, that's all."
"Stuck?"
"Yes, stalled! We can't go any farther." He pointed ahead, to where the
line swept around a curve, and at the bend stood a man with a red flag.
"Come on, let's see what it is," proposed Blake. He and his chum ran to
where the flagman stood, and, as they rounded the curve, they saw ahead
of them a break in the line, where a bridge had been swept away. The
train could go no farther.
"Look at that river!" cried Joe, pointing to the big stream. It was not
the Mississippi, but a side stream, swollen by the heavy rain, and it
was adding its waters to those of the big river.
There was scarcely any sound to be heard, save the splatter of the rain,
the river not rushing along with a roar, as flooded streams sometimes
do. But that there was terrible power in this silent current could not
be doubted. And much debris was being carried along in the muddy waters.
"What is it?" asked Mr. Ringold, as he came up to join the boys. They
pointed to where the bridge had been swept away.
"Well, we'll have to get a boat, to take us off to Hannibal, I guess,"
said the manager, always practical in an emergency. "Can we get one
around here?" he asked of the flagman.
"The railroad has sent for a tug to take the passengers on to the city,"
the man answered. "I expect she'll be here soon."
"Come on, we'll get our stuff together," said Mr. Ringold. "I'm anxious
to get to the city and make some inquiries for the lost ones."