MAKING A GETAWAY
Tell a Teuton that he can't, and very likely he will show you that he
can. It's in the blood. Between the prophecy of the snag-boat captain
and my vainglorious answer at the Cheyenne crossing, I learned to
respect the words of the man who invented the eccentric old river. In
the face of heavy head winds, I quoted the words, "You'll never get
down"--and they bit deep like whip lashes. On many a sand-bar and gravel
reef, with the channel far away, I heard the words, "Plenty of water,
yes, but you won't find it!" And always something stronger than my
muscles cried out within me: "The devil I won't, O, you inventor of
rain-water creeks!" Hour by hour, day by day, against almost continual
head winds and with the lowest water in years, that discouraging
prophecy invaded me and was repulsed. And that is why we have pessimists
in the world. A pessimist is merely a counter-irritant.
I stood on the bank for some time after the _Atom I_ slid into the
water, admiring her truly beautiful lines. Once I was captain of a trunk
lid that sailed a frog-pond down in Kansas City; and at that time I
thought I knew the meaning of pride. I did not. All three of us were a
bit puffed up over that boat. Something of that ride that goes before a
fall awoke in my captain's breast as I loved her with my eyes--that
trim, slim speed-thing, tugging at her forward line, graceful and
slender and strong and fleet as a Diana.
I said at last: "I will now get in her, drop down to the town landing,
and proceed to put to shame a few of these local motor-tubs that make so
much fuss and don't go anywhere!"
I loved her as a man should love all things that are swift and strong
and honest, keen for marks and goals--a big, clean-limbed, thoroughbred
horse that will break his heart to get under the wire first; a
high-power rifle, slim of muzzle, thick of breech, with its wicked
little throaty cry, doing its business over a flat trajectory a thousand
yards away: I love her as a man should love those. Little did I dream
that she would betray me.
I took in the line and went aboard. At that moment I almost understood
the snag-boat captain's bearing. To be master of the _Atom I_ seemed
quite enough; but to be the really truly captain of a big red and white
snag-boat--it must have been overwhelming!
I dropped out into the current that, fresh from its plunge of four
hundred feet in sixteen miles, ran briskly. Everything was in readiness.
I meant to put a crimp in the vanity of that free-information bureau.
I turned on the switch, opened the needle valve, swung the throttle over
to the notch numbered with a big "2." I placed the crank on the wheel
and gave it a vigorous turn.
"Poof!" said the engine sweetly, and the kind word encouraged me
immensely. Again I cranked.
"Poof! Poof!"
It seemed that I had somehow misunderstood the former communication, and
it was therefore repeated with emphasis. Like a model father who walks
the floor with the weeping child, tenderly seeking the offending pin, I
looked over the engine. "What have I neglected?" said I. I intended to
be quite logical and fair in the matter.
I once presided over a country newspaper that ran its presses with a
gasoline engine with a most decided artistic temperament. That engine
used to have a way of communing silently with its own soul right in the
middle of press day. I remembered this with forebodings. I remembered
how firm but kind I was obliged to be with that old engine. I remembered
how it always put its hands in its pockets and took an extended vacation
every time I swore at it. I decided to be nothing but a perfect
gentleman with this engine. I even endeavored to be a jovial good
fellow.
"What is it, Little One?" said I mentally; "does its little carburetor
hurt it? Or did the bad man strangle it with that horrid old gasoline?"
I tenderly jiggled its air valve, fiddled gently with its spark-control
lever. I cranked it again. It barked at me like a dog! I had been kind
to it, and it barked right in my face. I wanted to slap it. I lifted my
eyes and saw that the rapid current would soon carry me past the town
landing. I seized a paddle and shoved her in. Of course, a member of the
free-information bureau was at the landing. He had with him a bland
smile and a choice bit of information.
"Having trouble with your engine, aren't you?" he said as I leaped
ashore with the line. "There must be something wrong with it!" The
remark was indeed illuminating. It struck me with the force of an
inspiration. It seemed so true.
"Strange that I hadn't thought of that!" I remarked. "That really must
be the trouble--there's something wrong with it. Thanks!"
I tied the boat and went up-town, hoping to sidetrack the benevolent
member of that ubiquitous bureau. When I returned, I found half a dozen
other benevolent members at the landing. They were holding a
consultation, evidently; and the very air felt gummy with latent advice.
"What's the matter with your engine?" they chorused.
"Why, there's something wrong with it!" I explained cheerfully, as I
went aboard again. I began to crank, praying steadily for a miracle. Now
and then I managed to coax forth a gaseous chortle or two. The
convention on the landing understood every chortle in a truly marvellous
way.
"It's the spark-plug, that's sure!" announced one with an air of
finality. "When an engine has run for a while (!) the spark-plug gets
all smutted up. Have you cleaned your spark-plug?"
"No, Jim!" contradicted another, "it's all in the oil feed! Look how she
puffs! W'y it's in the oil feed--plain as day! Now if you'll take off
that carburetor and----"
I cranked on heroically.
"It's in the timer," voluntered another. "You see that little brass
lever back there? Well, you take and remove that and you'll find
that----"
I cranked on shamelessly.
"The batteries ain't no good!" growled a man with a big voice that
reminded me of a bass-drum booming up among the wind instruments in a
medley. Like the barber who owned the white owl, I stuck to my business.
I cranked on.
"It ain't _in_ them batteries--them batteries is all right!" piped a
weazened little man who had been grinning wisely at the lack of
mechanical ability so shamelessly exposed by his fellows.
"Now in a jump-spark engine," he explained leisurely, with a knowing
squint of his eyes and an uplifted explanatory forefinger: "in a
jump-spark engine, gentlemen, there is a number of things to consider.
Now if you'll take and remove that cylinder-head, pull out the piston,
and----"
The voice of the expounder was suddenly drowned out by the earsplitting
rapid-fire of the exhaust! The miracle had happened! Hooray!
I grasped the steering cords and jammed her rudder hard to port. Her
fourteen-inch screw, suddenly started at full speed ahead, made the
light, slim craft leap like a spike-spurred horse.
But the turn was too short. She thrust her sharp haughty nose into the
air like an offended lady, and started up the bank after that
information bureau. If a tree had been convenient, I think she would
have climbed it.
I shut her down.
"_She went that time!_" chorused the information bureau. Coming from an
information bureau, the statement was marvellously correct. But I had
suddenly become too glad-hearted for a sharp retort.
"If you will please throw me the line, and push me off," I said
confidently, "I'll drop out into the current."
I dropped out.
"Now for putting a crimp in some people's vanity!" I exulted.
I cranked. Nothing doing! I cranked some more. No news from the crimping
department. I continued to crank; also, I continued to drift. Somehow
the current seemed to have increased alarmingly in speed.
I thought I heard a sound of merriment. I looked up. The little weazened
man was gesticulating wildly with that forefinger of his. He was
explaining something. The information bureau, steadily dwindling into
the distance, was not listening. It seemed to be enjoying itself
immensely.
I swallowed a half-spoken word that tasted bitter as it went down. Then
I cranked again. There seemed to be nothing else to do. It was a hot
day; hot sweat blinded me, and trickled off the tip of my nose. My hands
began to develop blisters. Finally, a deep disgust seized me. I once saw
a tender-hearted lady on her knees in the dust before a balky auto. I
remembered her half-sobbed words: "_You mean thing, you! What is the
matter with you, anyway! Oh, you mean, mean thing!_"
I sat down in front of that engine and abandoned myself to a great
feeling of tenderness and chivalry for that unfortunate lady. In that
moment I believe I would have fought a bear for her! Oh that all the
gasoline engines in the world could be concentrated somehow into one
big woolly, scary black bear, how I could have set my teeth in its neck
and died chewing!
I heard a roaring of waters that broke my vision of bear fights and
gentle ladies in distress. A hundred yards ahead of me I saw rapids. The
words of the information bureau came back to me with terrible
distinctness: "Why, her light timbers will go to pieces on the first
rock!"
Although I am no hero, I didn't get frightened. I got sore. "Go ahead,
and smash yourself up, if you like!" I cried to the balky craft. And
then I waited to see her do it. She swung 'round sharply with the first
suck of the rapids, struck a rock, side-stepped, struck another, and
went on down, grinding and dragging on a stony reef.
It suddenly came to me that this was what they called the Grocondunez
Rapids. I remembered that they said the name meant "the big bridge of
the nose." The name had a powerful fascination for me--I wanted to hit
something good and hard somewhere in that region!
Finally she swung clear of the reef, caught the swirl of the main
current, and started for New Orleans with the bit in her teeth. I wasn't
ready to arrive in New Orleans at once; I had made other arrangements.
So I grasped a paddle and drove her into shallow water. I leaped out,
waist-deep in the cold stream, and threw my weight against her.
Pantingly, I wondered what was the exact distance to the nearest axe. I
resolved to crank her once more, and then for the axe hunt!
I leaned over the gunwale and began to grind. For the life of me, I
don't know just what I did to her; but it seemed that she had taken some
offence. Without the least warning, she leaped forward at three-quarter
speed, and started up stream with that haughty head of her thrust
skyward!
I clung desperately to her gunwale, and she dragged me insultingly in
the drink! She made a soppy rag of me! I managed to scramble
aboard--something after the fashion of a bronco-buster who mounts at a
gallop.
But the way she _traveled_! I forgot the ducking and forgave her with
all my heart. I held her nose well out into the channel where the
current ran with swells, though no wind blew.
[Illustration: THE "ATOM I" UNDER CONSTRUCTION.]
[Illustration: THE CABLE FERRY TOWED US OUT.]
[Illustration: LAID UP WITH A BROKEN RUDDER.]
Bucking the rapids, she split the fast water over her nose and sent it
aft in two clean-cut masses, that hissed about her like angry skirts. A
light, V-shaped wake spread after, scarcely agitating the surface. She
dragged no water. There was no churning at her stern. Only the dull,
sub-aqueous drone, felt rather than heard beneath the rapid banging of
her exhaust, told me how the honest little screw thrust hard.
I pushed the spark-lever close to the reversing point, and opened her
throttle wide. This acted like a bottle-fly on the flank of a spirited
mare. She shook herself, quivering through all her light, pliable
construction, lifted her prow another inch or two, and flung the rapids
behind her.
Slim, fleet, clean-heeled, and hungry for distance, she raced toward the
Benton landing two miles up.
In my anxiety to show her to the benevolent ones, I left the current and
took a crosscut over a rocky ford. Pebbles flung from her pounding heels
showered down upon me. I climbed forward and let her hammer away. She
cleared the gravel bar, and as she plunged past the now silent
information bureau on the landing, condescendingly I waved a hand at
them and went on splitting water.
We shot under the bridge, forged into the crossing current, passed the
big brick hotel, where a considerable number came out to salute us.
They dubbed her the fastest boat that had ever climbed that current, I
learned afterward. Alas! I was getting my triumph early and in one big
chunk! I figure that that one huge breakfast of triumph, if properly
distributed, would have fed me through the whole two thousand miles of
back-strain and muscle-cramp. And yet, through all the days of
snail-paced toil that followed, I remained truly thankful for that early
breakfast.
The Kid and the Cornishman, busy in camp with the packing for the
voyage, had shared in the gloom of my temporary defeat. But now, as I
plunged past them, I could see them leaping into the air and cracking
their heels together with delight. They had wet every plank of her with
their sweat, and they were as proud as I. In the light of the following
days, their delight dwindled into a pathetic thing.
I held her on her course up-stream, reached the bend a mile above, swung
round and--discovered that she had only then begun to lift her heels!
With the rapid current to aid, her speed was truly wonderful. She could
have kept pace with any respectable freight train at least.
I indulged in a little feverish mental calculation. She could make, with
the minimum current, eighteen miles per hour. Every day meant fifteen
hours of light. Sioux City was two thousand miles away. We could reach
Sioux City easily in ten days of actual running!
While I was covering that fast mile back to camp I saw the _Atom I_
passing Sioux City with an air of high-nosed contempt. I developed a
sort of unreasoning hunger for New Orleans--a kind of violent thirst for
the Gulf of Mexico! Nothing short of these, it seemed to me, could be
worthy of so fleet a craft. When I shoved her nose into the landing, I
found that my companions thoroughly agreed with me.
All that night in my restless sleep I drove speed boats at a terrific
pace through impossible channels and rock-toothed Scyllas; and the
little Cornishman fought angry seas and heard a dream-wind shrieking in
the cordage, and felt the salt spume on his face. "I wonder why I am
always dreaming that," he said. "Atavism," I ventured; and he regarded
me narrowly, as though I might be maligning his character in some way.
At dawn we had already eaten and were loading the _Atom_ for the voyage.
With her cargo she drew eighteen inches of water. At full speed, she
would squat four inches. It was the first of August and the water,
which had reached in the spring its highest point for twenty years, had
been falling rapidly, and now promised to go far below the average
low-water mark. We had ahead of us a long voyage, every mile of which
was strange water.
Once again I went over that feverish calculation. This time I was more
generous. I decided upon fifteen days. The cable ferry towed us out
beyond the gravel bars that, during the last week, had been slowly
lifting their bleached masses higher. In mid-stream we cut loose.
At the first turn the engine started. We were going at a good half-speed
clip, when suddenly the engine changed its mind. "Squash!" it said
wearily. Then it let off a gasoline sigh and went into a peaceful sleep.
We had reached the brick hotel. We pulled in with the paddles and tied
up. The information bureau was there, and at once went into
consultation.
"I'm looking for an engine doctor," I said. "How about Mr. Blank? They
tell me he knows the unknowable."
"Best man with an engine in town," sad one.
"For gracious' sake, keep that man away from your engine if you don't
want it ruined!" said others. A man who can arouse a diversity of
opinions is at least a man of originality. I went after that man.
He came--with an air of mystery and a monkey wrench. He sat down in
front of the patient (how that word _does_ fit!) and after some time he
said: "_Hm!_"
He unscrewed this--and whistled awhile; he unscrewed that--and whistled
some more. Then he screwed up both this and that and cranked her.
"Phew-oo-oo-oo!" said the engine. Whereat the doctor smiled knowingly.
It was plain that she was an open book to him.
"What is the trouble?" said I, with that tone of voice you use in a
sick-room.
It appeared to be appendicitis.
"Spark-plug," muttered the doctor.
"Shall I get another?" I asked, half apologetically.
"Better," grunted the doctor.
I chased down an automobile owner, and a launch owner and a man who had
a small pumping-engine. I was eloquent in my appeal for spark-plugs. I
made a very fine collection of them[1] and hastened back to the doctor.
He didn't seem to appreciate my efforts. He had the patient on the
operating table. Everything was either unscrewed or pulled out. He was
carefully scrutinizing the wreck--for more things to screw out!
"Locate the trouble?" I ventured.
"Buzzer's out of whack," replied the Man of Awe. "Have to get another
spark-coil!" In times of sickness even the sternest man submits to
medical tyranny. I ran down a man who once owned a power boat, and he
had a spark coil. He finally agreed to forgo the pleasure of possessing
it for a suitable reward. Considering the size of that reward, he had
undoubtedly become greatly attached to his spark-coil!
I returned in triumph to the doctor. He was now screwing up all that he
had previously unscrewed.
"Think she'll go now?" I pleaded.
He screwed up several dozen things, and whistled a while. Then the
oracle gave voice: "'Fraid the batteries won't do; they're awful weak!"
With a bitter heart, I turned on my heel and went forth once more.
Electrical supplies were not on sale at any of the stores. But I found a
number of gentlemen who were evidently connoisseurs in the battery
business. They had batteries of which they were extremely fond. They
parted with some of superior quality upon the consideration of a
friendly regard for me--and a slight emolument on my part. I was
evidently very popular.
At a breathless speed I returned to--_not_ to the doctor. He had
vanished. Rumor had it that he had gone home to lunch, for the sun was
now high. So far as I know, he is still at lunch.
Several things were yet unscrewed. I fell to work. Wherever anything
seemed to make a snug fit, I screwed it in. Other remaining things I
drove into convenient holes. All the while I begged blind fate to guide
me. Then I connected the batteries, supplied the new spark-coil,
selected a new spark-plug at random, and screwed it in.
Having done various things, I carefully surveyed my environs for a lady.
There were no ladies present, so I spoke out freely. "And now," said I,
having exhausted my vocabulary, "I shall crank!"
Bill and the Kid sat on a pile of rocks looking very sullen. For some
reason or other they seemed to doubt that engine. I don't know how long
I cranked. I know only that the impossible happened. The boat started
for the hotel piazza!
I didn't shut her down this time. I leaped out and took her by the nose.
Putting our shoulders against the power of the screw, we walked her out
into the current, headed her down stream, and scrambled in, wet to the
ears.
My logbook speaks for that day as follows: "Left Benton at 2:30
P.M. Gypsied along under half gasoline for several hours,
safely crossing the Shonkin and Grocondunez bars. Struck a rock in
Fontenelle Rapids at 4:30, taking off rudder. Landed with difficulty on
a gravel-bar and repaired damages. At 5:30 engine bucked. A heavy wind
from the west beat us against a ragged shore for an hour and a half.
Impossible to proceed without power, except by cordelling--which we did,
walking waist-deep in the water much of the time. Paddles useless in
such a head wind. The wind falling at sunset, we drifted, again losing
our rudder while shooting Brule Rapids. Tied up at the head of Black
Bluff Rapids at dusk, having made twenty miles out of two thousand for
the first day's run. Have to extend that fifteen days! Just the same,
that information bureau saw us leave under power!"
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: Dear Reader: Should you undertake the Missouri River trip,
don't lay anything out on spark-plugs. I sowed them all along up there.
Take a drag-net. You will scoop up several hundred dry batteries, but
don't mind them; they are probably spoiled.]