THE BOY WHO MADE THE WHEELS GO ROUND.
“A motor-scooter!” echoed Rob.
“That’s right, Rob, and she’s a Jim Dandy, too!” exclaimed Merritt
enthusiastically.
“She’ll eat up space,” volunteered Tubby.
“Always on the eating tack,” laughed Paul.
“Better than being full of them,” remarked the fat boy, dreamily gazing
up into the black shadows of the wagon shed roof.
“Say, Paul,” asked Rob interestedly, “would you mind telling me what is
a motor-scooter. It looks fine,” he added encouragingly.
“A motor-scooter,” exclaimed Paul, “is a sled driven by an auto engine
and propelled by an aeroplane propeller over the frozen surface.”
“That sounds fine,” chuckled Merritt; “bet you cribbed it out of a
book.”
Paul Perkins, paying no attention, went on to explain to Rob the points
of the strange craft. He had constructed it ingeniously from parts of an
old, broken-down auto left behind by a summer resident. The engine part
of the affair rested on a framework of two-by-four timbers, and to the
flywheel of the motor had been fitted a pulley connected with a shaft
mounted above it, on one end of which was affixed a six-foot aeroplane
propeller.
Behind the engine came a seat for the driver, and another beside it for
a passenger. Gasoline was carried in a ten-gallon tank placed forward
of, and above the motor, while the cooling was effected by means of a
fan geared to the forward part of the machinery. Below the framework
came the runners on which the odd craft was expected to glide over the
ice. These were formed of old wagon timbers, along which strips of iron,
constructed from barrel binders, had been nailed.
Such was Paul Perkins’ wonderful motor-scooter. Rob, after an inspection
of the clever way in which it was put together, could not help admiring
the ingenuity of the young constructor. He knew that Paul was not a rich
boy, and that it must have cost him a lot of time and labor to carry out
his idea without funds to buy expensive tools or appliances.
“Merritt’s father let me use the forge at night,” explained Paul, “and
in that way Merritt came to be the first to know about it. I told him
during last summer.”
“And he kept your secret, too,” laughed Rob. “But why didn’t you tell
any one else?”
“I was afraid that it mightn’t work.”
“Well, will it?”
“Watch.”
Paul clambered into the driver’s seat and threw in a small switch. Then
he turned on the gasoline and adjusted the carburetor.
“Look out!” he shouted.
As he spoke, he turned a crank which he had geared to a toothed wheel on
the shaft. The engine turned over once or twice, and only a sort of low
sigh resulted. Suddenly there came a sharp sound, like twin explosions.
_Chug-chug!_
“Hooray, she’s off!” shouted Tubby.
Faster and faster the engine began to revolve, the smoke from its
exhausts filling the place with smothering vapor. Through the blue haze,
they could see the aeroplane propeller threshing round at terrific
speed. The frame of the novel craft quivered, as if anxious to move off.
But, of course, it could not. The motor-scooter was built for traveling
only upon the ice.
“How did you ever come to think of it?” asked Rob, as Paul shut off the
engine and climbed out of his seat.
“Why, it was last winter,” explained Paul, “you remember the inlet was
frozen, and we had iceboat races on it? Well, I was watching them, and
thinking why it wouldn’t be possible to make an ice motor-boat. First
off, I couldn’t see how to do it. I figured around, however, and at last
I thought out a way. But I didn’t have money enough to buy a motor, so I
gave up the idea. Then Higgins’ auto blew up and took fire. He was
disgusted, and when I offered him a small price for the engine he was
delighted. He wouldn’t take anything for it, in fact. He figured that
the fire had spoiled it. So it had, pretty well, but I fixed it
up—and—well, there she is, and what do you think of her?”
“Think?” exclaimed Rob. “I think she is a Jim Dandy, just as Merritt
said. But, Paul, will she run on the ice?”
“Don’t see why not. The propeller has tremendous driving power. I wish
it would hurry up and freeze, I’m dying to try her out.”
“I’ll bet you are. It will be a long time yet to frost, though. In the
meantime, what do you say to taking a little trip out to-morrow
afternoon to the old De Regny place? It will make a good walk.”
“What on earth do you want to go out there for?” asked Tubby in a
surprised tone.
“I have a reason,” rejoined Rob. “I’ll tell you about it to-morrow. Do
you fellows want to go?”
“Of course, but you’re mighty mysterious about it,” grumbled Merritt.
“Hush! Maybe he’s found a corned beef mine!” exclaimed Tubby in a low,
cautious voice.
“A corned beef mine? Why, I never heard of such a thing,” exclaimed Paul
seriously.
“Didst not, little one?” chirped Tubby. “My uncle found one in northern
Montana.”
“In northern Montana!”
“Yes, sir,” went on Tubby, winking at the others, “it’s an interesting
thing to a fellow like you, Paul, who is fond of scientific research
and—and all that sort of thing. Shall I tell you how it occurred?”
“Please do,” begged Paul, sitting down on the edge of his invention and
composing himself comfortably.
“Well,” began Tubby, with the air of one who has deliberated long and
seriously over a matter, “it was this way. One fall my uncle, who had
been mining all summer, figured it was about time to get out of those
northern Montana mountains. He decided, though, before he left, to put
in the biggest blast ever heard of, so that when he came back in the
spring he could have plenty of rock to work. In due course, he set the
blast off, and discovered, to his astonishment, that the explosion had
uncovered a regular cliff of reddish-brown substance, interveined with
what looked like the finest jelly.”
“You don’t tell me.”
“But I do tell you. Well, uncle was considerably puzzled. He had never
struck anything like that before. All at once, glancing down, he saw his
dog was advancing to the cliff. Presently, the creature seized a
fragment that had been blasted to some distance, and began devouring it.
Imagine my uncle’s astonishment to find that the cliff seemingly was
edible. He investigated, and found that his blast had miraculously
uncovered a deposit of unknown extent of the very finest kind of corned
beef.”
“Didn’t he find a ketchup well or a mustard spring close by?” asked
Merritt seriously.
Tubby shook his head.
“No; uncle was a very truthful man. If he had found anything like that,
he’d have mentioned it. But he didn’t.”
“But the explanation,” urged the scientific-minded Paul, “how did he
ever account for it?”
“Why, an inquiry showed that years before there had been an earthquake
there, and a band of cattle had been swallowed up, and it so happened
that they were immersed in a salt mine. Thus, a very fine stratum of
corned beef was formed, which only awaited my uncle’s coming to be given
to a grateful public.”
“You say that this all happened to your uncle?” asked Paul somewhat
suspiciously.
“Yes, sure, to my uncle in Montana.”
“Really happened to him?” insisted Paul, who had detected a suspicious
quiver on Tubby’s lips.
“Yes, indeed. It happened to him just before he fell out of bed.”
A shout of laughter went up then, echoing and ringing among the rafters.
Paul good-naturedly joined in it, though the merriment was at his own
expense, but his laughter was suddenly checked. There was a small window
in one side of the place, and, peering through this aperture, Paul had
just detected a face. It was a countenance that was familiar to him, and
seemed to be taking the utmost interest in the details of his invention.
“What’s the matter, Paul?” asked Rob, checking his mirth, as he saw the
younger lad’s eyes fixed upon the window-pane.
“I—I saw a face there, an instant ago,” stuttered Paul. “It was looking
in on us, but it instantly vanished.”
“A face! Gee, whiz! who could it have been?” exclaimed Tubby.
“I don’t know,” rejoined Paul, “but I kind of thought I recognized it
for the minute that I saw it.”
“Who do you think it was?”
“Freeman Hunt, that fellow who used to——”
But the others had shot out of the barn at top speed.
“I’ll give that fellow a lesson if I catch him prowling around here,”
growled Merritt.
But, although they searched about the place thoroughly, they could find
no trace of the intruder. When they got back to the shed, they found
Paul putting up an old sack over the window through which the face had
peered.
“I’m not going to take any chances with this machine,” the lad said
earnestly, “and I want you fellows to promise not to tell any one about
it.”
“All right,” they readily agreed.
“Isn’t it patented yet?” inquired Rob.
“No,” rejoined Paul. “I’ve put the matter in the hands of a lawyer in
Washington, a friend of my dead father. I guess he’ll put it through. I
want to sell it and pay off the mortgage on the house; but, in the
meantime, I don’t want any one to know its details whom I can’t trust.”
“Well, the secret’s safe with us, Paul,” Rob assured him, as they parted
for the night, “but don’t tell too many people about it. That’s a
valuable invention, to my mind, and you want to guard it closely.”
“I will,” Paul promised, but he did not tell Rob that earlier in the
week he had confided his great secret to Freeman Hunt. That worthy had
heard something of a mysterious machine the lad was constructing, and
took occasion to find out what it was. By flattering the unsuspecting
boy, and telling him what marvelous things he had heard of him, Freeman
soon put himself in possession of the details of the machine’s
construction, and of the things Paul expected to accomplish.
“Sounds good,” Hunt had commented to himself that evening; “maybe we can
make some thing out of that kid’s information. I’ll tell my dad about
it. He’s slick as paint, dad is.”