they received the electric thrill of an order, which broke their weary
vigil in the famous bay by sending the cruiser to patrol duty among the
southern islands. But when they were under way Franklin found that the
congressman was still aboard, and his hopes revived a little. For a week
of coasting from port to port he looked in vain for some event which
would set him right.
Then came an order transferring him. He was assigned to the _Marietta_, a
tiny gunboat no bigger than a harbor tugboat and with but half the draft.
He had only time to get his belongings together, which does not take a
sailor long. He found that his cousin had also been transferred, and was
to be commander of the cockle-shell.
The _Marietta’s_ first assignment was to take none other than the
congressman up a river to the capital of a province where he had a son,
an officer of the army, in command of the garrison. There Franklin would
definitely see the last of him. They had no thought of meeting with any
delay on their run of the five miles of winding stream, but it is when
they are least expected that guerrillas appear.
The congressman was sitting in the bow admiring the scenery, the little
engine was “chugging” earnestly, the screw was whirling vigorously
through the muddy water, when out of the soft green foliage of the right
bank cracked a volley. The congressman, a veteran himself, dropped on the
deck and looked about him for a rifle, his old eyes flashing.
The cadet had never been under fire before. He dodged and fell on the
deck with the others. Franklin was at the wheel and remained erect,
frightened but not forgetting his duty. There had not been a tremor of
the rudder.
“Steer for that bank, sharp, sharp!” Edward called, and Franklin obeyed.
“I don’t want to—to endanger your life,” he panted to the congressman,
his sentence broken by the ring of a bullet against the hull, and whistle
of other bullets over their heads.
“Seems to me I’d put a few shots back at ’em in the meanwhile,” said the
congressman. “What’s that for?” He nodded toward a rapid-fire gun in the
bow. “And that?” toward a one-pounder in the stern.
Edward could not fail to take the hint. He sprang up with trembling limbs
and ran to the rapid-fire gun, calling for the other to be manned. A
bullet struck its support before he could put it in action. That made him
forget all his training. He aimed wildly, and jammed the delicate machine
almost instantly. Then, in his desperation, he ran toward the wheel.
“Steer in closer, closer!”
“It’s too shallow, sir,” Franklin replied.
“No, it’s not.” The ensign could hear the triumphant shouts of the
insurgents, who increased their fire. He was wild with exasperation.
“It’s not!” he repeated, and seized the wheel in his own hands and turned
it hard alee. The bow veered sharply. For an instant the boat flew
forward, then grounded.
As if they had been waiting on this for a signal, a fire broke out from
some bushes which rose above the level of the grassy bank on the left
side.
“Both sides!” gasped the ensign. He sprang overboard, as much to avoid
the fire as anything. “Push her off!”
Everybody leaped into the water. When the insurgents on the left bank saw
the predicament of the Americans, they broke out of their cover with a
yell, and came running toward them. Meanwhile, the _Marietta_ was still
in range of the fire from the other side. It was a question only of
minutes, yes, of seconds, before they would be prisoners.
The current swung the _Marietta_ partially round and drove her fast into
the soft mud, and the misdirected efforts of her crew to free her were as
unavailing as if she were a battle-ship.
“Can’t somebody fire that gun? Can’t somebody fire?” the congressman
called, putting the strength of his sixty years against the hull, and
feeling his shoes sinking in the soft ooze beneath them.
At this juncture, in face of the fire, Franklin sprang on deck, and
ran aft to the jammed instrument of their hope. He felt as cool as his
father’s son ought to feel under such circumstances. The parts of the
mechanism were not a jumble to him as they were to the excited cadet, and
he saw the difficulty and how simple it was. His study, his questions,
had not been in vain.
“Man the one-pounder! Get the rifles, everybody!” he called, with the
instinct of command.
As they tumbled aboard the crew heard the rat-tat-tat of the gun under
Franklin’s hand, sweeping the field of white-shirted figures pressing
forward, and soon a little shell from the one-pounder threw up dirt at
their feet. The insurgents were too near their prize to be stopped yet.
“Keep cool, everybody, keep cool!” said the congressman, himself firing
with the nice calculation of a man at a range.
The Americans did not realize that shots were still coming from the rear.
They knew that the insurgents on the other side of the stream could not
cross it, and that was enough. If the gun should jam again, all would be
lost.
But it did not jam; and soon the insurgents, no longer able to stand the
persistent accuracy of the machine, began to fall back, and finally ran
in pell-mell flight, leaving their wounded behind.
Promptly Franklin whirled his gun round and began firing upon the first
attacking party, which withdrew when it saw that it was unsupported by
the other side.
When excitement no longer made their efforts futile, and one was not
pushing against another, and with the screw properly directed to their
assistance, the crew was very soon able to force the stranded _Marietta_
back into the stream.
After the congressman had emptied the water out of his shoes and was once
more seated, with nothing to do but to enjoy the scenery, he said to
Franklin, in beaming gratitude:
“Well, young man, you’re quite a general!”
Franklin blushed. The remark did not make him think of his ambition. It
gave him speech for another cause.
“O sir, I want you not to believe that those charges were true. They
weren’t. I wouldn’t have overstayed leave if it hadn’t been—but—but you
ask Charley the rest.”
“I don’t believe them. To prove it, all you’ve got to do is to pass the
examination to Annapolis. I’ll see that you get the appointment.”
Franklin’s manner and his eyes spoke his gratitude better than his
tongue. Edward, who had overheard, looked proudly at his cousin, and then
said to the congressman:
“I thank you, too, sir! I sha’n’t be happy till he wears the uniform his
father wore. He saved us all to-day.”
His little speech saved Edward from a court of inquiry. He became
Franklin’s best friend, and if ever he goes into action again there is no
doubt that he will behave like a veteran.
ON A TIGHT ROPE
By Albert W. Tolman
“My highest ambition at seventeen,” said the linotype operator, “was
to become a professional acrobat. I then lived with my parents on a
farm near the manufacturing town of N. All my spare time was spent in
vaulting, jumping, turning handsprings, and practising other feats of
strength and agility.
“On the Fourth of July a travelling tight-rope performer, Signor Lupini
of Verona, as the posters called him, was to display his skill on a
rope above the river that flowed through the town. He arrived with two
assistants on the afternoon of July 3d, and a crowd of boys, myself among
them, met him at the railroad station. We saw a spare, wiry man, above
the ordinary height, light-complexioned, with steely-blue eyes. He looked
us over inquiringly.
“‘Boys,’ said he, ‘I need some young fellow to help me to-morrow. Who
wants to be wheeled across the rope in a barrow?’
“The others hung back; but I jumped at the chance. ‘I do!’ I exclaimed,
quickly. He seemed pleased as he ran his eyes over me. I was of medium
height, with good muscles.
“‘All right,’ he said. ‘Come to the hotel at seven, and I’ll tell you
what’s wanted.’
“At the stroke of the hour I was on hand, and he explained my duties.
Then he pulled a ten-dollar bill from his pocket.
“‘That’s yours at nine to-morrow night if you do your work well,’ he
said. ‘Now go home and sleep soundly.’
“My parents were spending the Fourth with cousins in a neighboring town,
so I was alone in the house. I went to bed early, but until long after
midnight excitement kept me from getting a single wink.
“The next day I was on hand bright and early. I helped stretch the rope
between two mill roofs, ran errands, and made myself generally useful.
When not busy I hung about, watching my employer. He certainly was an
artist in his line, a man without bravado, either all nerves or none at
all. I could not help thinking, too, that for an Italian he spoke English
remarkably well.
“At half past two a carriage took us from the hotel to the western mill.
We dressed in the loft. The signor donned his tinsel-spangled tights. I
figured as clown in an old stovepipe hat and white cotton suit, liberally
besprinkled with stars of red and green. The same colors streaked my
face. As we clambered through the scuttle, the crowds lining the bridges
and banks set up a shout, and the town band on the other mill began
playing ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’
“Sharp at three o’clock the music stopped. The assistant on our roof
advanced to the edge, fired six blank cartridges from a self-cocking
revolver, and shouted this magniloquent announcement through a megaphone:
“‘Ladies and gentlemen, the celebrated Signor Lupini will now illustrate
his art, assisted by Rinaldo Nobisco, the famous clown, recently secured
from the London hippodrome, ladies and gentlemen, at great trouble and
expense.’
“Whistles and catcalls from the boys below greeted this absurd reference
to me, and I felt rather foolish. Signor Lupini stepped briskly forward,
bowed to his audience and was soon promenading along the spidery line
between the two cornices. Aided by a long balancing-pole, he stood on one
foot, knelt, lay down, walked across blindfold, and performed many other
marvelous feats. His perfect control of nerve and muscle fascinated me. I
did not realize that his facility came from years of toilsome practice.
“Here was the calling for me. I resolved to stretch a rope the very next
day between the beams over the haymow.
“During the signor’s exhibition the crowd was very quiet, and the band
did not play. It was only when he was once more safe upon the roof that
their long-restrained applause broke forth, and the band struck up ‘Hail
to the Chief.’ He rested a few minutes, and then motioned to me to make
ready.
“Among our paraphernalia was a strong, light wheelbarrow with a tire
grooved to fit the rope. I began to feel a little shaky; but there was no
time to indulge this emotion, for my employer exclaimed: ‘All aboard, my
boy, and remember, a stiff upper lip!’
“I seated myself, facing forward, my feet dangling on each side of the
wheel. Signor Lupini, stooping, gripped the handles.
“‘Sit steady,’ he said. ‘Don’t wink one eye unless you wink the other at
the same time.’
“He ran me a few turns round the graveled surface, then flicked the wheel
dexterously up on the rope and headed straight for the edge.
“‘Keep perfectly still,’ he adjured me, ‘and you’re as safe as you’d be
on the street.’
“For all my assumption of coolness, I was frightened half out of my wits.
I shut my eyes for a moment, and when I opened them we were fairly out on
the tremulous hemp.
“‘Don’t look down,’ cautioned the signor. ‘Face straight forward. Sit
tight.’
“Hardly daring to breathe, I stiffened myself as if I were in a plaster
cast. I could see the narrow line just ahead buckle slightly at the
approach of the wheel. How long that two hundred feet seemed!
“Slowly, surely, we drew near the roof. The tire jolted against the
cornice. In two or three seconds we were safely on the gravel. Then the
band blared out and the crowds set off explosives. My fright was over,
and I felt proud as a peacock.
“On the trip back my employer made me sit facing him, and I had a good
chance to admire the easy, effortless play of his wiry muscles. He was a
thorough gymnast, a man of steel and india-rubber. After several other
trips, during which I occupied different positions on the barrow, we went
back to the hotel.
“Promptly at eight we emerged again through the scuttle. A crowd bigger
than that of the afternoon had gathered, and a roar of applause greeted
us. I say ‘us,’ for by this time I felt myself to be almost as important
as Signor Lupini. My head was completely turned.
“The evening performance possessed certain novel features. Tin pans of
red fire stood on each cornice, and along the bridge-rails had been
stationed a half-dozen boys liberally supplied with rockets and Roman
candles.
“The master of ceremonies fired an introductory volley with his revolver.
“‘Light up, Jimmy!’ he shouted to his associate across the river, at
the same time touching a match to the pan beside him. Jimmy obeyed. A
deep red glow illuminated the scene, flashing from the mill windows, and
revealing the human clusters on bridges and banks.
“As in the afternoon, Signor Lupini began with a few feats performed
alone, the blaze of fireworks making his spangled tights glitter. I
waited impatiently for our dual performance, thirsting for some of the
applause. Finally my turn came, and the signor wheeled me back and forth
several times. So great was my confidence in him that I had forgotten my
nervousness.
“At last nine o’clock was near.
“‘Now, my boy,’ said my employer, ‘we’ll wind up with something I don’t
try very often. I see you have good grit.’
“He screwed to the barrow sides a light, strong chair of steel, its seat
a yard in air. After helping me into this, he passed me a long-handled
pan of red fire. We were to close in a blaze of glory. ‘Keep cool,’ said
he, ‘and we’ll give ’em something to look at.’
“He trundled me up to the cornice, his assistant dropped a lighted
lucifer into the pan, and we moved out on the rope amid the crimson
glare and the whizzing of rockets. The crowd yelled, and one of the boys
setting off fireworks from the lower bridge lost his head.
“_Whi-s-s-sh!_ A badly aimed rocket shot not five feet over our heads,
showering us with sparks. A little lower, and it would have dashed us
from the rope. Signor Lupini drew a quick breath. I cringed in my steel
chair, but still kept tight hold of the pan handle. The sudden fright set
my teeth chattering. My employer noticed my trepidation.
“‘Keep quiet, my boy, and we’ll get over all right,’ said he,
reassuringly, cool as a cucumber.
“On we rolled, smoothly and steadily. We were about half-way across when
the unlucky rocketeer on the lower bridge outdid his previous blunder. A
warning shriek blended with the swish of a projectile. I dared not turn
my head, but a sidelong glance revealed a fiery comet heading straight
toward us. Signor Lupini saw it, too, and could not repress a cry of
alarm. The next second it was upon us. I shut my eyes, convinced that we
were lost. A whir, a rushing of flame, a slight shock! The apparition had
passed, and we were still on the rope.
“I was hardly daring to congratulate myself when my heart was chilled
by a low groan behind me. The barrow wabbled. The signor was trembling
violently, swaying, reeling like a drunken man; every throb of his body
came to me through the tight-clutched handles. Something fearful must
have happened. I clung to the chair arms in sheer paralysis of horror.
An accident would hurl us down seventy-five feet into the river, where
drowning or maiming worse than death awaited us.
“We moved a few feet farther, then stopped. The barrow swayed, as if
about to overturn. Another groan from the signor. I would have questioned
him, but the words died in my throat. Perhaps he had been pierced by the
rocket, and might at any instant fall unconscious.
“Cries of horror rose from the spectators. The rockets and Roman candles
ceased. The entertainment threatened to become a tragedy.
“Again we started, moving intermittently. Now a few quick steps would
fill me with the dread of being flung off; now we almost stopped, and I
feared we should never go on. Before and behind us fizzed the red fire.
Signor Lupini’s feet shuffled on the rope, his breath came hard. Not a
word in explanation, but always those terrible groans. My hair bristled.
“With straining eyes I stared ahead into the red glare on the approaching
mill. How slowly the distance lessened! On the roof stood Jimmy, gazing
at us, pale and open-mouthed. The speechless horror on his face reflected
our peril.
“The cornice was only ten feet off. Signor Lupini thrust the barrow
suddenly forward. A second later the wheel grated on the gravel; it was
none too soon. As a long sigh of relief rose from the spellbound crowds,
the gymnast collapsed into a writhing heap. It took three men to get him
down through the scuttle and into the carriage that conveyed him to his
hotel.
“The rocket had struck his right calf a glancing blow. His skill had
enabled him to withstand a shock that would have overthrown a clumsier
man; but his muscles, steeled to resist, had cramped violently, and we
had been in deadly peril all the way across. Two lives had hung on his
ability to resist the agonizing pains and preserve his poise.
“That last hundred feet decided me that I didn’t care to be a
professional acrobat. The tight rope was never stretched between the
beams of the haymow.”
DOWN THE INCLINE
By Charles Newton Hood
“All that I had to do to earn my one hundred and twenty-five dollars a
week salary was, four times each week-day, to climb to the top of a high
tower, mount a bicycle, ride it down a long, narrow incline, pitched at
an angle of about forty-five degrees, then up a few feet and out through
the air, across a gap of thirty feet to another platform, and so to the
ground.”
It was John Manser who was speaking, formerly one of the most daring
performers in what is called the carnival business.
“No, I am not doing that sort of an act now.
“My mother had been writing to me, begging me to stop, but I was looking
forward to getting married, and that one hundred and twenty-five dollars
a week was making the nest-egg grow.
“I was one of the ‘feature’ acts furnished by the Ferari Brothers to
street fairs, carnivals and the like, and had stepped from construction
boss to performer one day by taking the place of an indisposed athlete at
an hour’s notice, and leaping the gap successfully on his bicycle without
any previous rehearsal. I was at once put on as a regular performer with
the company.
“My work did not seem so very terrible to me. With the bands playing and
with the thousands of happy spectators looking on, it was rather pleasant
than otherwise to climb to the top of the high platform, dressed in my
gay costume, and at the word, come hurtling down the steep run, and then
up and out through the air like a bird.
“All that seemed to be required was to be absolutely sure that the
apparatus was put up strong and perfectly true, and that the gap was of
exactly the correct width. Mine was precisely twenty-eight feet and four
inches. I always superintended the erection of everything myself, and
trued every part up with the utmost care.
“In the act itself, it required only strong hands and arms to keep the
bicycle steady and straight down the run, and to lean back a little and
give a strong up pull on the handle-bar when we ‘took off’ for the jump,
so that the machine would surely strike on the rear wheel on the other
side, to prevent the shock which would throw me headlong if the front
wheel should strike first, or even at the same instant.
“All summer long I had enjoyed the work, and I often wondered that they
should pay me so much for such a simple thing. Even when the performer
who ‘looped-the-loop’ on a bicycle in another part of the grounds fell
and was crippled for life, I ascribed it to the fact that his health was
not very good, and that he sometimes resorted to stimulants to help him
through his act; and his misfortune did not render me at all nervous
regarding my own work.
“It was the last day of the carnival at Grand Creek. We had had a most
successful week, and on the closing night it was estimated that not less
than fifteen thousand people crowded the grounds. The last of my four
rides for the day was scheduled for eleven o’clock at night, and was to
be the closing feature.
“Promptly at five minutes of eleven I climbed to the platform, and my
bicycle was sent up to me by rope and pulley. It was a heavy, dark night,
but the thousands of electric lights made the grounds almost as light as
day. Little lamps were strung thickly all down the run, and the skeleton
framework of my tower and trestles was outlined with them.
“A fitful, eddying wind had come up, which roared dismally through the
timbers. It swayed the big framework somewhat, but not enough to trouble
me.
“The people had come crowding to my portion of the grounds, and as I
gazed down at their upturned faces, massed so thickly together below me,
the sight was a weird one under the electric lights.
“Straight ahead of me lay the narrow run, with its broad stripe of white
down the center, to aid me in steering, then the ‘saucer,’ as it was
called, at the bottom, where the run turned up toward the ‘take-off,’
then the wide gap and the farther platform, with its even wider guiding
stripe of white.
“I gave the bicycle a quick examination, stood up straight and made
the little posing flourish which is expected of all athletes, fixed my
bicycle on the run, and seated myself firmly. The official announcer
below raised his hand. The band stopped playing, and there was that
breathless hush of apprehension and expectation which is so carefully
worked up for sensational acts.
“‘All ready?’ shouted the announcer.
“‘Right!’ I responded.
“‘Go!’
“The snare-drummer of the band struck into the long roll with which he
always accompanied my flights. Instantly I removed the restraining foot
which I had kept upon the platform, placed it upon the locked pedal, and
shot rapidly down the incline.
“At that instant every electric light in the city of Grand Creek went out!
“It was a darkness doubly dense and awful after the brilliancy of the
moment before. Perfectly helpless, I was plunging down a steep, narrow
incline toward probable death. If the wheel swerved but a little to the
right or left, I should sweep over the edge and be dashed to pieces on
the ground below.
“My bicycle, rushing down the incline, travelled at the rate of fifty
miles an hour. Sometimes now I awake at night with a gasp of horror from
having lived over those awful moments, but at the time my thoughts were
cool and collected.
“‘It all depends on you, Jack, my boy,’ I told myself. ‘You can’t be
smashed any harder for keeping your head.’
“I knew that the wheel was absolutely straight for the jump when I
started, and grasping the handles, I bent every effort toward keeping the
wheel perfectly rigid. Down I rushed through the darkness, and so strange
was the sensation that it almost seemed as if the wheel had left the run,
and was sailing through the air. The speed seemed doubly terrific. Even
if I kept the run, could I hold the wheel for the jump and what then?
“The saucer came almost before I expected it. In spite of myself I must
have given a spasmodic twist to the handles, for the wheel twisted in
my hands and swerved. I threw myself frantically to one side and lost
consciousness!
“Yes, I’m alive yet. Entirely uninjured except for the thump which put me
to sleep when I struck the platform.
“The great momentum swept both the wheel and myself from the edge of the
take-off and hurled us against the yielding bodies of those in the front
row of the crowd, backed by the thousands of other spectators, as against
a carefully prepared and cushioned buffer. It was learned that not less
than eighteen persons received the impact of the wheel and myself at the
same instant, and so scattered was the blow that nobody was injured in
the slightest.
“One very fat man, who had been standing with his handsome top-hat
held behind him, told me that he sat down with fearful suddenness after
receiving my head in his stomach, and he showed me his hat; but he wasn’t
hurt.
“The next day the Ferari Brothers Carnival Company went to Battle Rapids,
but my ticket read East Putney, Vermont.”
THE COST OF LOVING
By Frederick Orin Bartlett