UP IN THE AIR
It was nice in there.
"This is a good place to hide after killing a bandit," Warde Hollister
said.
"Look out, you'll strain your neck," I said to Dorry, because he was
craning his neck looking up.
He said, "I'm trying to decide which car is the one that was at the
bottom when we came along. I think it's that one up top."
"They're all the same, only different," I said.
He said, "If I'm right it means that the wheel went just half way
around--one half a revolution."
"Some highbrow," I said. "Don't talk about revolutions, they remind me
of history. A half a revolution is better than the French Revolution.
Take your feet off me. Do you want a whole car to yourself?"
"It's pretty crowded in here," Westy said.
"Well, go up on the top floor if you're not satisfied," I told him.
"You'll get a good view up there."
"How do you know there's a good view in that car?" Pee-wee said.
"I put it in there when the car was down here," I told him. "Ask me
something hard. Stop rocking, you make me dizzy."
Of course as soon as I said that they all started rocking the car. That
shows how they obey their patrol leader. The car went swinging more and
more and the rusty old wheel creaked.
"Git--app, git--app
Till papa comes home,"
they started singing. Warde Hollister was as bad as any of them, if not
worse.
"Have a heart," I said. "Stop! What is this? A life on the ocean wave or
a bee-line hike?"
"Rock-a-bye baby
On the tree top,"
they all went on. Honest, that patrol is the limit. I'd like to sell it
second-hand and get a new one.
"Listen to the ghosts up there," Westy said. "This old wheel sounds like
a nineteen-sixteen Ford."
I said, "You'll _look_ like a nineteen-sixteen Ford in a minute if you
don't let up. Take that phonograph horn off my head," I said to Pee-wee;
"or I'll throw it out of the car."
Pee-wee started yelling through it, "Only ten cents a ride on the
haunted ferris-wheel. A--ll aboard! Only a dime, ten cents!"
We were all shaking, and our heads were wobbling and we were wiping our
feet all over each other and the kid was shouting through his crazy
megaphone, and I was just going to pull it away from him and throw it
out of the car, when all of a sudden he dropped it and whispered,
"_Look--look!_ _Up there!_ _Look, quick!_"
"You're seeing stars," I said; "no wonder."
"_Look!_" he said. "It's a--it's th--th----"
"Now you see what you get from swinging too much," I said.
"Look--athe--athe--uppp----" he stuttered. "I--sa--thbandidt----"
"No, you don't," I said. "No more bandits. _Stop rocking, you fellows,
will you_; or this kid will be seeing some wild Indians."
They didn't pay any attention, only went on rocking the car more
and more. They had been rocking so hard they couldn't stop. Pee-wee's
jack-knife was bobbing against his belt, his compass was flopping
around, his megaphone was all over our laps, and his cooking
set was banging around on the floor. He was pointing up in the
air the best he could and saying, "Stpthe car, stpthecar--ts--the
bandit--tsthba--a--a--a--a--nt----"
The more I laughed the dizzier I got and the dizzier I got the more I
laughed. They were all laughing so hard and they were all so dizzy they
couldn't speak.
"Atta--b--b--oy, kid!" one of them said.
Pee-wee was tumbling all around from one fellow's lap to another's and
trying to talk. "Lkthba--a--a--a--a--nt----" That was about all _I_
could make of it.