Read Ebook: An aviator's luck by Cobb Frank

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Ebook has 1008 lines and 43327 words, and 21 pages

"Hurt him?" asked Fatty, feeling in the bag of peanuts.

"Not a bit!" declared Mr. Beezley, gazing mournfully at Fatty. "Not a bit! You see he only fell about six hundred feet or so."

He popped a peanut into his mouth, and firmly closed the bag. Ernest Beezley glanced at him, then solemnly studied the sky.

"Looks like rain," he said. "If it does, I won't have to fly for a couple days. I hate to go back to the Aviation Field; so many accidents happening all the while. Funny one the other day. One of the best pilots out there. He had been eating stuff; ice-cream, I suspect. Anyway something cold and wet, and he followed it up with a bag of peanuts. I never felt so sorry for anybody in my life!"

"What happened?" asked Fatty. He cast a suspicious look about but every face was grave.

"Oh, he died," said Ernest regretfully. "Nice chap. Gosh, I never hope to see anyone pass out in such agony! It took ten fellows to hold him, and then they didn't. Just from following ice-cream with peanuts! About ten cents' worth, I should say."

"No, I don't suppose so," agreed Ernest, nodding. "Of course there is always a first time."

He strolled off toward the court, and the boys continued to study the wireless and the cards. But Fatty stood thoughtfully contemplating the bag of peanuts.

"I don't believe that," he said, looking at Frank, who lingered.

"Believe what?" asked Frank.

"About the fellow who died from eating ice-cream and peanuts."

"Hey you, Ernest!" called Frank. Ernest turned and strolled back. "Fatty doesn't believe what you told about the fellow who died from eating peanuts."

"Well, he needn't," said Ernest. "Of course I can show him where the fellow tore up a lot of the sod when he was just commencing to feel bad. And two of the chaps who tried to hold him are in hospital yet. Why, they say you could hear him yell nearly to Louisville."

"Just how did it take him worst?" asked Frank, frowning sympathetically.

Fatty did not hear, and he stood thinking deeply. No one but Fatty knew how Fatty hated to be sick, or how he shunned pain. But he looked with fond longing at the peanuts. The boys were still busy over the wireless. Looking down, he saw the close green grass. How awful to tear it up by handfuls in his agony! He had had three ice-cream cones since breakfast!

He stepped nearer to the boys. He opened the bag of peanuts.

"Hey, fellows," he said in an offhand tone of voice, "help yourselves to some of these!"

The weeks passed during which the boys went their several ways. Day after day of clear weather, not too hot, made the tennis courts all too attractive for Eddie's peace of mind. Bill went his way to the three Aunts, who petted and pampered him in a fashion that would have utterly spoiled anyone but sweet-tempered Bill.

What Fatty Bascom and Skinny Tweeters did they kept to themselves, partly because no one else was interested and partly because they themselves were too interested to mix with the other boys. Also Fatty felt the hot weather and was kept about home, where he could partake of plenty of cooling drinks. The two were slowly learning the Morse code, and were able to send halting and disconnected messages to each other.

Then came the rain. It rained Monday and Tuesday; it continued on Wednesday, speeded up on Thursday, and seeming to strike its gait on Friday, settled down to a steady drizzle.

Eddie rejoiced at first, and went over to the courts in rubber boots and slicker to gloat over the deepening mud. But by Thursday he pined for Bill, for work, for anything, and his sister Virginia found him hard to live with. When, on Saturday morning, Eddie heard Bill's loud whistle he upset two chairs and his small brother in a mad attempt to reach the door.

Bill looked well and happy. There was a sort of sleek, prosperous look about him, although he wore the same clothes and necktie that Eddie remembered. It puzzled Eddie. Also Bill treated Virginia almost like an equal and forbore to ask her to run any errands, although she openly hung around.

The sleek look bothered Eddie. Bill was certainly holding something back. Finally Eddie remembered some wood he had to pile in the cellar, and conducted his guest down into a region too damp for the admiring Virginia to follow.

Then he sat down on the edge of a laundry tub.

"Now get it out of your system!" he commanded.

"Get what?" asked Bill innocently.

"Aw, you know what! Whatever it is you are holding back. Come on; I know you have something to tell."

Bill was unable to resist. "Well," he said, "reckon you will be mighty well pleased your own self when I tell you. It was like this. Come time for me to come home, my Aunts wanted to make me a present. Something that I could keep to remember my visit with. Usually they get me something but every other time they have selected it to suit themselves and not me at all. But this time they told me I was growing to be a big boy, and they wanted me to have a choice in the matter. Gee, but I was glad, because usually they get me something about five years too young.

"Well, Rowland, I had an awful time trying to decide what to pick out, and by and by I happened to think of that softy, Fat Bascom and his wireless, and I thought what larks you and I could have with an outfit. We could have it so we could talk at any time, and take messages out of the air for miles and miles. The more I thought of it the more I wanted it."

"So they liked it?" inquired Eddie.

"Liked it? Well, I will say they did! And what do you think? They wrote to Frank, and he is to go down town and buy the best outfit they have down there."

"When is he going?" asked Eddie breathlessly.

"This afternoon," answered Bill. "He was busy this morning; had to shine his shoes or something. But we are going down right after luncheon."

"Well, I'm going too. Can't I go too?" Eddie demanded, standing up and rolling down his sleeves. "Come on upstairs while I dress!"

"I thought you would like to come," said Bill. "Get fixed and come along to the house for lunch. Gee, it is a pity we live so close to each other. If you lived in the Highlands, now, or out on the River road, or out at West Point, we could have some fun. I tell you what we can do, we can pick up Ernest Beezley at the Aviation Field at Camp Knox. Won't he be surprised?"

"Aw, Frank will give it away first time they meet," said Eddie in a disgusted tone. "Frank, doesn't have any sense of the importance of things. But we will get a lot of fun out of it. Wouldn't it be great if we could overhear some plots against the government or something of the sort, and break them up, and get in all the papers? 'Wonderful detective work done by two of our Louisville boys.' That sort of thing, you know."

"It will more likely be 'Arrest of two of our Louisville boys who have been balling things up with their wireless plant,'" said Bill. "All I want out of this thing is some fun."

"Of course!" said Eddie hastily. "That's all. Well, let's get out of this." He went up the stairs two steps at a time, brushed his hair, hastily gave his countenance what he called a wash, threw his slicker over his shoulders, and was ready.

Luncheon at the Wolfes' was a technical affair. Frank, who knew a lot about a great many things, was asked countless questions about wireless and patiently explained all he knew.

The trip down town was all too long. Frank's little flivver coughed and sputtered and had as many symptoms as it knew, just to be contrary, Bill declared.

But at last they were there, and a little later they were on their way home with everything needed to install a first-class medium-radius wireless. They had everything.

In the rear of Bill's house was a shed, so-called. It was a two-story affair that had evidently been built for servants' quarters. There was a second floor, and there, Frank decided, was the place for their receivers.

The two boys went to cleaning with a will. Eddie, with a weather-eye on the clouds, hoped fervently for more rain as he scrubbed and sloshed water over the floor, while Bill cleaned windows. Frank, promising to help them whenever they were ready, went into the house.

As they worked, an idea suddenly occurred to Bill.

"Say, Eddie," he said, "wouldn't this be a dandy room for a club room?"

"Why couldn't we?" asked Bill. "I could be the president."

"Presidents are elected," said Eddie with scorn. "They don't just elect themselves."

"That's all right too," said Bill, laughing. "But it is my shed and my wireless, and if I wasn't president some other fellow would have the say-so, and play the dickens with everything perhaps."

"Well," said Eddie, "all right; you be president and I will be vice-president."

"That's fair enough," agreed Bill, rubbing away on the window. "But I say we keep it small."

"Oh, yes; let's only have five or six fellows in it. That's the sort of a club to have especially when it is something as unusual as this. Whom will we ask? Shall we have Fat and Skinny? They have a sort of wireless of their own."

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