A RUNAWAY CAPTURED
Johnny had known a thrill or two, but none quite like drifting through
the night in a balloon that was not meant for drifting.
"Not an ounce of ballast!" Felix groaned. "And the night so dark we may
plunge without a moment's notice into those cold, black waters. And
then--oh well, what's the good of thinking about that?"
There truly was no use at all of thinking about it. If worse came to
worst and they were able to tell the moment of great danger, they might
throw his instruments and the searchlight over to lighten the balloon.
"All this equipment," Felix moaned, "cost plenty of money!"
In spite of their predicament, Johnny found himself wondering about that
equipment and what they had been about to do.
For a time Johnny was silent. Then of a sudden he exclaimed, "Felix, we
are drifting northeast! That means we'll be over the lake for hours. If
the wind rises, if a strong gust drags us down, or if the gas bag leaks
and we are plunged into the lake we are lost! A three hundred foot cable
hangs beneath this balloon. It is weighting us down. Suppose we could cut
it away?"
"It's an idea!" Felix was all alert. "But it hangs from below. How'll you
reach it?"
"Here's a rope. I'll go over the side. You hang on to the rope."
"That," said Felix slowly, "will be taking a long chance."
"Whole thing's a chance." Johnny was tying a loop in the rope. "Now I'll
put a foot in this loop, hold to the rope with one hand and work with the
other. Flashlight will tell me all I need to know. Can hold the light in
my teeth."
"You should be in a circus." Felix laughed. For all that, he made the
other end of the rope fast, then prepared to lower his companion.
As he climbed up and over, Johnny felt his heart miss a beat. It was
strange, this crawling out into space. All was dark below. Was the water
a hundred or a thousand feet down? He could not tell. The majestic
Lindbergh light swept the sky, but its rays did not touch them.
"If only it did," he murmured, "someone would see us."
Strangely enough, at this very moment the professor's golden-haired
daughter, Beth, was making strenuous efforts to bring that very thing to
pass, to get one of those eyes of the night, a powerful searchlight,
focussed upon the runaway balloon.
Her father, sensing that something had gone wrong with the balloon, had
hurried her away to the spot from which the balloon had risen. Arrived
there after a wild taxi ride, she had discovered on the instant what had
happened.
"Some--someone cut the cable with an electric torch!" In vain her eyes
searched the sky for the balloon. She was about to hurry away when a hand
gripped her arm.
"Where would you go?"
"Why! I--"
Taking one look at the man, she sent forth an involuntary scream. She had
seen that man before. He carried a knife in his sleeve. She was terribly
afraid.
Her scream had electrifying results. A huge bulk of a youth with tangled
red hair emerged from somewhere.
"Here you!" he growled, "Let her go!"
Releasing the girl, the small dark man sprang at her protector.
"Look out!" the girl screamed. "He--he has a knife!"
Her warning was not needed. The little man's knife went coursing through
the air. Next instant the little man followed it into the dark. The big
fellow's fists had done all this.
"Now, sister," the young giant turned to Beth, "where was it you wanted
to go?"
"The--the Skidmore Building."
"The Skidmore? O.K."
Fairly picking her up, he rushed her to the taxi that was waiting for
her, then climbed in beside her. "Skidmore Building. Make it snappy!"
Once in the taxi and speeding away, Beth was able to collect her
thoughts. There was, at the top of the tall Skidmore Building, a
searchlight. This was not always in operation, but was held in readiness
for any emergency either on the water or in the air. If only she could
get that light searching the air for the runaway balloon something, she
felt sure, could be done about it.
The taxi came to a sudden jarring halt.
"Here you are!"
"Here." She dropped a half dollar in the taxi driver's hand. At the same
instant something was pressed into the palm of her left hand. She looked
up. Her powerful young protector was gone. In her hand was a card.
A moment later as she shot toward the stars in an elevator she looked at
that card and smiled.
"Gunderson Shotts, 22 Diversey Way" it read. And in the lower right hand
corner, "Everybody's Business."
She smiled in spite of herself as she murmured, "Gunderson Shotts,
Everybody's Business. What a strange calling!"
* * * * * * * *
At that same moment Johnny was going over the side into the dark. It was
strange, this adventure. "Must be careful," he told himself. And indeed
he must. Dark waters awaited him. A drop from that height would probably
kill or at least maim him.
"No chance," he murmured.
The bright lights of the city called to him from afar. He had seen much
of that bright and terrible city; had meant to see much more. "Must see
it all," he told himself.
"But now I must forget it," he resolved.
And surely he must, for now he was beneath the basket. The tiny finger of
light from his electric torch shot about here and there.
Steadying its motion, directing it toward the end of the cable, he began
studying the problem at hand.
And then--something happened. Did his hand slip? Did the noose about his
foot give away? He will never know. Nor will he forget that instant when
his flashlight, slipping from his chattering teeth, shot downward and he,
by the merest chance, escaped following it.
How it happened he will never be able to tell. This much he knew: he hung
there in all that blackness supporting his weight by one desperately
gripping hand.
Somewhere below was the noose that should offer him footing. Somewhere
far, far below were black waters waiting. And through his mind there
flashed a thousand pictures of the bright and beautiful world he might,
in ten seconds' time, leave behind.
All this in the space of a split second, then groping madly, he found the
rope with his other hand. After that began the heart-breaking task of
groping in the dark with his foot for the dangling rope loop, while the
muscles in his arms became burning bands of fire.
"I must win!" he whispered. "I must!"
"Johnny! Johnny Thompson!" came from above. "What has happened?"
"Don't know. I--I'm dangling. Dra--draw me up if you can."
Came a sudden tug on the rope that all but tore the rope from his grip.
"No! No! Wait!"
Once again he sought that noose with his toe.
* * * * * * * *
As for Beth, she had gone shooting up in that express elevator in the
Skidmore Building.
Like a rubber ball she bounded from the car, then raced for a cubby-hole
in a corner where two men were standing.
"The balloon!" she exclaimed. "The captive balloon! It's loose, drifting!
You must find it with your light!"
"What's that?" one man demanded sharply. "Impossible! There's no gale.
That cable couldn't break!"
"It's loose! Drifting!" the girl insisted. "They cut the cable, someone
cut it. My brother and another boy are in the balloon. You must save
them."
One man glanced at the other. "All right, we better try it, Ben!"
At that a long finger of white light began feeling its way through the
blackness that is sky above Lake Michigan on a cloudy night.
Johnny, unable to find the loop in the rope, feeling his strength unequal
to a climb hand over hand, felt the muscles of his arms weaken until all
seemed lost.
And then, as if some miracle had been done, night turned into day. The
powerful light had reached him only for a second, but that was enough.
His keen eye had caught the loop in the rope. It was by his knee. A
sudden fling and his knee was resting in that loop.
"All--all right now!" he called. "Try to pull me up."
And at that the gleam of that powerful searchlight returned to rest on
the spot of air in which the runaway balloon hung.
"I'll step over and call the sausage balloon, Ben," one of the men in the
great steel tower said to the other as Beth, at sight of the balloon
still drifting high, began breathing more easily. "They'll have to go to
the rescue."
One more fierce struggle and Johnny tumbled over the side into the
balloon's basket.
"It--it's put on with steel rings," he panted.
"It--what is?" Felix stared.
"The cable. What did you think?" Johnny laughed in spite of himself.
"That's what I went over to see about."
"Yes," Felix grinned. "But now they've found us. All the honest people in
that great city will want to save us. Isn't it wonderful when you think
of it?" he marveled. "So many good people in the world! So many willing
to give a fellow a lift when he's in trouble. If only we could all pull
together all the time, what a world this would be!"
After that, each occupied with his own thoughts, they drifted on into the
night.
A half hour later a dark bulk came stealing toward them. This was a small
dirigible balloon owned by an advertising firm. Soon they were alongside.
Instruments were taken aboard, the runaway balloon deflated, then they
went gliding back toward the city of a million lights.
"Should have had this old sausage in the beginning," Felix grumbled.
"Will next time perhaps."
Johnny wondered if he would be invited to participate in that next
endeavor and, if so, what he would learn.
In due time they were back on good solid earth. But the day, for Johnny,
was not yet over.