A MIDNIGHT ALARM.
“I tell you what,” suggested Andy; “let’s cook our supper here. What’s
to hinder, when we’ve got a stove handy, and there’s no great amount of
gasolene around? I’m just hungry enough to want to see you throw things
about and wrestle with a regular camp dinner. What say, Frank?”
His cousin seemed to reflect.
“Oh! well, I don’t mind,” he presently replied. “Nobody ever knew me
to refuse a chance to do my own cooking. But only this once, Andy,
remember. We’ll be too busy tomorrow to spend time over a fire. All
that will come in time, when we’re off on some of the bully little
trips we expect to take, when we get used to piloting our flying
machine through the clouds.”
“All right. In the morning we can get breakfast at the house, one at a
time, while the other stands guard. After all I guess the only danger
is leaving things alone at night. There’s a good moon tonight, too. But
since you agree to my game, I’m off to get some grub, and that dandy
aluminum camp outfit the colonel gave me on my birthday. Just the
chance to break it in. What will I fetch along to eat, Frank?”
“Oh, anything you can grab,” laughed the other, knowing that Andy,
being a good feeder, the real difficulty would be in his gathering
enough for half a dozen fair meals. “A beefsteak wouldn’t go bad, with
some spuds and beans from the garden. And don’t forget the tea, on your
life!”
“Listen to him, would you?” jeered Andy, stopping in the doorway to
answer. “Why, to hear him talk you’d think he was an old maid. Shall I
fetch the cat for you to rub as we sit before the fire? If I had my way
it’d be coffee every meal. But I suppose I’ll have to give in like I
always do,” and he ran off laughing.
When he came back later he was fairly loaded down with numerous
packages, while over his back he seemed to have a little bag thrown.
“Take some of these traps, will you, Frank? That’s the little aluminum
cooking outfit in the sack. It nests in a mighty small space, you see,
but answers for two persons. But you’ve seen it before and admired it
without stint. Just the thing to carry up in an aeroplane, where every
ounce of extra weight counts. And I’m pleased to know that you’re going
to be the one to take the new shine off my birthday present from the
best of guardians, Colonel Josiah Whympers.”
Andy generally pronounced the full name of his guardian. Somehow, he
seemed to feel that the old gentleman rather liked to hear it. And
besides, it gave an added spice to what he was saying.
Whatever Andy did was right, according to that indulgent party. There
might be a limit to his belief in the boy’s capabilities; but if so, it
had never as yet been reached.
So, while Frank was once more looking with admiring eyes on the frying
pan that could shed its handle, the neat little shiny kettles nesting
within each other, the utensils for coffee making, and tea, too, if
wanted, not to mention cups and platters, all made of the strongest
aluminum, Andy jogged back to the house for another load.
“Here, hold on,” said Frank, looking up when the other had deposited
the second assortment of stuff, “d’ye want to swamp us outright? I
declare if you haven’t gone and brought out enough for half a dozen
already. Look at the steak! How in the dickens are we going to make way
with all that, not to speak of cooking it?”
“Oh, I forgot to tell you we’re going to have company,” said Andy,
wickedly, as he made ready to shoot off again.
“Colonel Josiah Whympers’ coming to join us in our frugal repast?”
asked Frank, a look of pleasure on his face.
“Just that. When he heard what we meant to do he got fidgetty at once,
and finally threw out such broad hints that I had to ask him to join
us. Besides,” added Andy, with a look of what his cousin called “soft
sawder,” and which was meant as oil is used to allay friction; “he’s
been complaining a good deal lately because he never had a chance to
taste your cooking, after me bragging about it so.”
“Ah, get along with you,” laughed Frank, pretending to throw something;
“but I say, Andy, while you’re about it just borrow the family frying
pan from the cook, because this little one would never do for such a
gigantic steak, especially since I see you brought a lot of onions
along and want them fried, too.”
“O.K., boss! All shall be done as you order, after being so kind as
to not kick over the traces because I’ve invited a guest. But _such_
a guest! They destroyed the pattern after Josiah Whympers was made, I
reckon. I’m going to get blankets this turn and that blessed frying pan
ditto,” after which he shot off on a run.
Andy did things with a rush, in which he was ever a marvel to his slow
friend, Elephant Small, whose failing seemed to be just the other
extreme, as he crawled along after the style of a snail.
Frank always carried out everything he attempted well. If he worked
at machinery he was conscientious about every trifling bolt and nut.
If he played baseball he did it with his whole soul and made as near
a success of his work as was possible. And now, when he was elected
“chief cook and bottle washer,” as Andy called it, of the supper that
was to be prepared, he set about the job just as an experienced cook
would have done.
Evening had come. Already the July sun was hovering close to the
horizon. The day had been singularly cool for a summer spell, though
doubtless it would grow hot again by the morrow.
At any rate it was not a serious task standing over a fire and looking
after the various vessels that simmered and bubbled. Then the fine
steak was slapped on a pan that had already been well heated, which
was Frank’s way of cooking such a delicious morsel. It immediately
began throwing off a most appetizing odor that kept Andy groaning and
wondering how long he could stand it.
The onions, too, had a scent all their own. And as if this were not
enough, Frank, in honor of the expected guest, had allowed Andy to have
coffee, so that there was another fragrant smell added to the lot.
Pretty soon a thumping announced that Colonel Josiah had arrived, and
Andy jumped up to welcome the old man. He came in, sniffing the air
vigorously and manifesting the most intense delight.
“Reminds me of many a scene in my checkered past, lads,” said the old
gentleman, who was a smooth-shaven party, with long white hair, and
eyes that had not lost the fire of their younger days. “And I’m glad
I held off until the feast was nearly ready, because I just couldn’t
stand that long. This looks homelike. Glad to be with you, my lads. It
was nice of you to ask an old codger like me. Perhaps I can repay you
by relating a number of events this reminds me of.”
That was his one weak point. His past had really been so filled with
adventures without number that everything served to bring some striking
scene to his mind. But boys with red blood in their veins never tire
of hearing about such things. And these two lads were built along such
lines, for they deemed it a treat whenever they had a chance to listen
to his thrilling recitals.
And the colonel never forgot to impress a moral to his tales. Old age
was beginning to give him a different view of life from what he may
have entertained at the time these scenes he mentioned were being
enacted.
They sat there for nearly two hours talking. From his own past
experiences the old man deftly turned the conversation in line with
their aspirations, and asked many questions concerning what they
expected to do when they found they could manage their aeroplane, which
he had examined with considerable curiosity, and not a few words of
praise.
Finally he announced that he had better be returning to the house. Andy
would not let him go alone, though the moon was shining brilliantly.
When he came back later he found his comrade deep in the job of
cleaning up.
“Oh, what’s the use doing that tonight?” asked Andy, prone to want to
put off things to another day that ought to be done now.
Frank knew his little weakness only too well.
“Not much,” he said, decisively. “We’ll find enough to do in the
morning. Here, you get a towel and start in to wiping these things.
And with such a dandy outfit I do hope you take a little pride in
keeping things clean and bright.”
“Huh!” grunted Andy, “thought that was the best thing about
aluminum--that a fellow never needed to clean it up.”
“Listen to him, will you?” laughed his cousin; “perhaps you had a
sneaking notion, too, that it might get the spuds peeled and do all
sorts of stunts. Make up your mind, my boy, nothing is ever gained
without some work. Give that dish another rub while you’re about it,
Andy, and then set it back on the stove to warm up. Soon be through
here and then, if we feel like it, we can get at those bike wheels that
are to go under our framework, according to the design we’re following
after.”
Although possibly Andy may have confessed to being somewhat tired,
still, the fever was rioting through his veins, and he could not say
no, when Frank proposed anything connected with the completion of that
wonderful monoplane that haunted his very dreams, so much was it in his
mind during his waking hours.
Accordingly they set to work. Frank had arranged his plans and knew
just how this thing and that must be managed in order to secure the
greatest amount of success.
“Now she looks like the real thing!” declared Andy, enthusiastically,
when the little wonder had been duly elevated and fitted with the
wheels that were to prove so useful in starting off and in landing.
“Watch how the engine works again in this new position,” said Frank, as
with a few deft turns of his hand he set things in motion.
The quick pulsations of the motor thrilled them. Small wonder then that
these enthusiastic novices of the air navigation idea could hardly tear
themselves away from a contemplation of their prized aeroplane and
think of such an ordinary thing as securing some sleep.
“Come, look here, it’s going on midnight,” declared Frank, finally;
“and we must get our bunks ready to turn in. I’m going to tumble over
on this pile of planks here. Nothing like the soft side of a board for
a bed, they say.”
“And since I went and fetched this cot out, thinking you’d accept it,
why, sooner than see it lie idle, I’ll dump my blanket in there and
curl up. Got the bar across the door, Frank?” asked Andy, as he started
to yawn again.
“Sure,” replied the other, “and the little window partly open, to give
us air, for it’s close in here. Now turn in and don’t let me hear a
yawp from you till morning.”
“Oh, I’ll sleep as sound as a nut; always do. That is, if I don’t get
to dreaming something about that darling little----” but as Frank threw
a block of wood across the shed and made the speaker duck his head, he
did not finish his sentence.
Presently all was quiet within the long shed, save the regular
breathing of the two boys. The moonlight sifted in through the open
window and lighted up the queer workshop after a fashion, so that the
great batlike object occupying so much space could be dimly made out.
Perhaps an hour had gone by. From without there came only such sounds
as one might expect to hear on a July night in the country, for
the place of Colonel Whympers was outside of Bloomsbury and really
surrounded by fields and woods.
Something suddenly aroused Frank. He hardly knew himself what it could
have been, but as he sat upright in his blanket he believed he heard
loud voices somewhere outside. Then something that seemed to be very
heavy came down with a loud impact that awoke even that hard sleeper,
Andy.
“What was that?” he exclaimed, sitting bolt upright.
Frank, quick to act, was already out of his warm nest and making a bee
line for the window, which happened to be in a quarter that could be
reached without his stumbling over the monoplane occupying the middle
of the place.
Of course, not to be outdone, Andy tumbled off his cot, climbed to his
feet and as the doors happened to be more convenient to him, he was
quickly throwing the heavy bar aside. This done, the impulsive Andy
rushed straight outside, clad only in his pajamas as he was.