OUR SATURDAY STORY.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 58, 8 March 1913, Page 16

OUR SATURDAY STORY.

EXTINGUISHING A SCORCHER. (By GEORGE FITCH.) To begin with, I will confess that 1 am a coward about automobiles. I am not like some people. For mc there is a limit. I don't mind turning corners sideways, or going over thank-ye-marms at seventy miles an hour, or landing in a hedge fence once in a while because a machine doesn't happen to be quite as nimble about turning corners as a country road. Every man who rides with the demented class has to get used to these things, and I can endure them. But when it comes to racing two miles for the privilege of slipping slantwise across a track in front of a locomotive as big as the senior pyramid, or whooping past a blind street corner, top speed, trusting to luck that some other idiot isn't whooping down the side street at the same time; or yanking on the high on a long down grade on the theory that if yon meet anything it Is best to be going faster than the other fellow—-well, all these are past my dead line. I know I'm a coward, but I can-t help it It makes mc feel creepy to scrunch over live things, too, and when little children come running out on to the street in front of a machine—l shut my eyes. Oh. I'm no real anto Send! No racing car for mc. Give mc a nice, comfortable touring car, 1913 model, built to make thirty on the boulevards and sound like fifteen, and I don't ask another thing. Steepleehastng In a gasoline go-devil Isn't my line. I avoid the record manglers; and if I can't avoid them, I make them mad so they will avoid mc. That's what Jones and I did to Banbury. It's been six months since he has asked as to ride—six months !of peace and safety. What's more, he will never ask us again. He Is afraid If he does we will ask him to ride in our motor boat— there! Blamed if I didn't hoist the curtain while the scene setters were still on the stage. To begin again, I don't own a car. You've guessed as much. People who own cars have some defence. They ride in their own l worry-wagons Instead of getting abducted by goggled galoots who find a holy joy In trying to punch holes in the horizon. Bnt people who don't have cars have friends who own them, and they are for ever getting taken home via some point seventeen miles in the opposite direction. That was Banbury's style. He was a friend of mine who lived next door. It's three miles from down-town to onr place, and three times a week Banbury used to drive up In his twoton terrifler and say, "Jump in.'' That used to make mc mad in itself. There was something about Banbury's "Jump In" that made mc boil. It was so hypnotic. I didn't want to Jump. I had a great desire to tell the man to take his car and drive it off the first high spot he could And. Bnt while I was figuring out just how to insult him without losing his friendship. I was also crawling into the car. Banbury owned the ornerlest. most abandoned, most drunk-and-dlsorderly automobile In onr town. It had sixty horse-power aud a hind axle like the underpinning of an elephant. He always used to drive it with the muffler cut out so as to make it sound Rs fatal as possible, and It was against his principles to go Into low speed on any pretext whatever. Forty miles an hour everywhere, with a laugh for the poor and the policeman, was his platform. lie was the boss tonsorial artist among antomobilists. He shaved kerbstones, telegraph poles, buggies, hearses, and perambu' lators. He was also some hair tonic. He raised twenty heads of hair a day by honking past them so close that their owners' coat buttons scratched the paint on the tonnean. But at that. I always envied the pedestrians and the horses when I rode with Banbury. They only had him for a second. I had him for ten and twenty miles at a dose. Ton know how you try to steer an auto with yonr leg, from the back seat, when the Idiot at the wheel Is trying to make it loop the street car? I have sat in Banbury's car and steered so hard that my leg ached for an hour afterwards. I have wondered vaguely as we dodged locomotives whether I would be presentable at the funeral; it's snch a disappointment at a funeral when the corpse can't appear for Inspection. And I have figured horribly, half an hour at a stretch, just what would happen to the city directory If a steering knuckle should break, a wheel should dish, or the machine shonld throw a shoe on a crowded corner. Three times a week, as I said, Banbury kidnapped mc with that undertaker teaser of his and took mc home. He drove himself—fools of his calibre being scarce and hard to hire—and every time he hit sixty miles and just missed hitting something else, he would turn his large, round face around with a smile of perfect bliss and ask, "I guess this Isn't fun, hey?" And I from the corner of the tonnean, or the front rail, or the middle of the air, or wherever I happened to be, would reply in words jerked out like sausage links, "Isn't—it though!" And all the while 1 was fighting mad to think that my bright and promising life, for the mere rental of which my firm was paying a thousand pounds a year, was being flipped around in and ont of the jaws and about the canines and incisors of death, jnst for the amusement of a red-necked lawbreaker. It may be almost worth while to march up a hill with 100,000 other defenders of your country and get shot Into a thinly distributed paste by a thirteen inch shell, but what possible credit is there in being wrapped around a telegraph pole with one foot in yonr vest pocket and the other in the transmission of an ex-automobile, and of being arrested ir you are alive and called a joy rider by the papers if yon are dead? Every week I hated Banbury more, and every week he managed to get just about one more mile an hour from his car. And finally one night I rebelled. "No," I said, when he stopped and said, "Jump In," "I'd rather ride i n a common, old, flat-wheeled chariot with a conductor who washed last week than try to bnrt into Paradise In sections in that car of yours.. Ton drive too fast for mc. Ton come too near hitting things! I am jnst as comfort- ; able in yonr car as I would be tied up in front of a mad bull with some friend trying to save mc by shooting the ropes off."

Banbnry just opened his plentiful mouth and laughed until I couldn't hear the exhaust of his engine. After that he kept right on stopping for mc, and on-each occasion he &ad a new-insult

"Get in, Sam," he would say- Tve- Inst' had the engine taken out. She works with! a spring now. You'll like her better." i

Or, "Come on, Sam. I'm going to take Blame's Utile boy np, too, and he'll hold your hand if you're afraid."

Or, "Jump in, Sam; ril run the hill on' fhe-«k>w speed and get you a sack of fudge on the way if you'll come."

I told Jason Jones, my next-door neighbour, abont these insults one Sunday -while! we. worked on our motor-boat, -yVe owned a twenty-four-foot, semi-speed model boat with a six-horse engine, that could kick It' along nine miles an hoar at nine hundred! revolutions, and A*fugi Sunday we worked!

together on our craft. Motor boating is the best of all sports. There is no arrogant, disagreeable bumptiousness about it Ton do not run over people, get arrested for speeding, or mangle yourself in any one of a dozen different ways. Serenely and happily the motor-boatist wallows over the waves. Inhales wind and weather Instead of dust and small insects, and the worst that can happen to him is to get into the trough of a sea with his ignition drowned ont and nothing more sustaining than rubber boots In case he can't bale as fast as the river comes aboard. Motor boating Is a glorious and gentle sport. It is enjoyed by Nature lovers, but automobllists scorn it. There Is nothing to scare bnt the turtles. Jones and I go down early to the dock each Sunday to work on our boat. Sometimes we get it ready to run before night, and sometimes we don't; but we always enjoy ourselves to the core. It was while sitting on the gunwale, after having cranked the engine eighty-nine times at a stretch — a record for him —that Jones heard my wall and conceived his brilliant idea. "I'll tell you what we'll do," he said; "I've suffered from Banbury, same as you have. He got mc in one night and took mc eighteen miles out to some country club, in twenty-four minutes and ninety-six jolts. I'm laying for him, too. Suppose we inveigle him Into the Peggy next Sunday. He doesn't know any more about navigating than he does about the golden rule. We can break down and let enough water In through the pump intake to keep him working for his life for an hour or two while we tinker with the engine. Or maybe It will be rough and save us the trouble. Ten to one we will have him praying for help before two hours. Then we can take him home and tell him what a nervous little pussy cat he Is when he isn't scaring people In his own particular way. How does that sound?" "Jonesey," said I, rising up solemnly and swapping a handful of grease with him, "you're the genius of the age. It sounds like Revenge with Valenciennes trimmings." . Then we gave up cranking the Peggy, and went home to get ont the working plans for the plot. It was as easy as electing the worst man in a city election. Banbury jnst sniffed and said no clam-chasing for him. Six horsepower in an ex-mud scow presented about as much attraction for him as a nice bowl of bread and milk after tennis. Then I spoke my little piece. I had been rehearsing it all morning. "Very well, Banbury," I said, "sorry yon won't come. Some people are nervons abont the water, I know; but there's no real danger. You're as safe as you are In yonr own car. If it would make you less afraid we could tow a skiff after us " That was enough. After Banbury had decided not to slap my nose aronnd where it could sneeze Into my ear, as he promised earnestly to do at first, he declared that he was going to navigate with us the next Sunday. "Do what you like and go as far as yon like!" he roared, "bnt don't let mc hear any more of this nervous talk. When I get nervous about navigating a catfish slough in a horse trough, with a bnllt-over cream separator for an engine, I'll let you know, but don't feel Insulted if I bring along the "Xorth-western Christian Advocate" to read. I've got to have some excitement during the day." ' I went to Jones, and we fell on each other's shoulders. Then we put in a fierce week on the Peggy. We took her apart from fly-wheel to propeller, cleaned her np and tnned her until she would start with a single twist of the wheel every time. Then we filled the stern of the boat, suggestively, with life-preservers, and waited for our prey. We had an idea that Banbnry didn't know mnch about the glorious art of navigation. We over-estimated it by that word "much." He didn't know anything at all about It. "When lie got down to the dock on Sunday morning the river was full of white caps in answer to our prayers, and the Peggy, lying a hundred yards out at her anchorage, was bobbing "howdydo" enthusiastically. Banbury looked at her, and J. could see relief breaking out on his face. "So you're not going after all," he said cheerfully. "That's too bad. , I was hoping It would be better weather. I had sort of set my heart on this trip." "■What makes you think we're not going?" demanded Jones. "Well, yon haven't got the boat in, and It looks pretty squally," began Banbnry. "Say, what do you think we run—a ferry boat?" said I. It Was my turn at bat. "We row out to our boat when we want her, and while there Isn't sea enough on toumke the trip interesting, We're going to do the best we can for you." I threw some oars Into a flat-bottomed punt, climbed in, and motioned to him to take a seat. "What!" yelled Banbury, "go out in that butter boat! I'm no fish." "Sam," said Jones wearily, "Mr. Banbnry wants an ocean liner to take him out to our boat. I'm afraid he isn't enough of a seaman to go out on a day like this. Will you run up to the boathoase and telephone to my little boy? He wanted to go to-day, but I told him a big, stout man who wasn't afraid of anything was going to go." If Jones had hit Banbnry on the neck with brass knuckles he couldn't have looked more unhappy. "I'm going; what's the matter with yon?" he moaned. Then he got down on his stomach and crawled into the punt from the float, and we paddled out to the Peggy. I won't say that I didn't help Nature a little bit, but the fact Is, we shipped about all the water that was good for us on the way out, and had a real nice trip. I'll bet the Peggy looked as big as an island to Banbury when he crawled into her. I cranked the engine and the Peggy started downstream, nicely as you please. But not nicely enough for Banbury. I could see that in a minute. We were going into the waves quartering, and about every fourth one come aboard. Ordinarily, we would have run across to the lee shore, but that morning we stayed out and took whatever came. We gave Banbury the pump and told him to bail- We also told him how to put on a life-preserver, and which way to jump in case the boat went over. Then Jones and I left him to himself in the stern. Theoretically, we sat together on the front seat to run the engine. But in reality, whenever we leaned down to investigate it, we were shaking hands and patting each other on the back. Ton never saw such noble work with a bilge pump as Banbnry performed that day. It kept us busy picking up enough seas to keep ahead of him. He pretty nearly pumped the oakum out of her. And whenever he stopped for breath, I would turn around, fog np my voice a little, and say: "Bully work, old man; we're still on top. But it's all we can do to keep her running. Keep right at it. Watch ont; here comes a big one. Wboopr" Then Jones would I slant .her off just abont in time to catch six gallons of river, and Banbnry would bail as if he were a prisoner in a cistern In . the Middle Ages, pumping for life. [ It was the happiest trip I ever made. ' As a matter of fact, we were more than . even with Banbnry before we had gone j five miles. But we were hoggish. We wan- , ted to scare him until he would jump from ■ his car imd hide for ever after when he saw us coming. I have since learned that J enough la a great plenty, and that more j than enough is what causes dyspepsia, In- | solvency, obituaries, and other troubles. 1 But I didn't know it tkea.

Ten miles below town, v th» rlveri over a six-foot dam wlti-"» treat i?** It wasn't really so bad.-sh e " Q_l_? Übj gentle above, and clamnwg, '____. *" one-lungers up and dowii by th* to~l "'i along the shore. But it soßMed tiii__\ ' terrific, and there were rock* enough b_l the middle of the dam to parahts* craft. We decided to mi_ engine !2 drift down. That would fjfitis &_*£* ! of an hour in which to bleach Banbnrifl " hair and pry Into his past «ie. Then could crank up and take him home, *' : - It was too lovely to resist. I WM down quietly and shut off lit gMo Z~: Presently the Peggy began' to Mccooat Then her engine stopped. ~"»*! "My God!" yelled Jones. '.ni e __cA only a mile away, and she's balkrt Crank for your life. Banbury!" Banbury had been np in" front twin. In a shaky sort of way to enjoy if scenery. We had worked hliu forward I. order that he might have the pleasure of cranking the Peggy. H 0 weai - - "■ flour and Jumped for the crank. "Quick:" yelled Jones, BDUI over just enough to make the engine back fire, which she did. throwing Banbury ■over' the side of the boat with the'last char™ : of gasolene in her. "Try it -agaia<" hi yelled, throwing off the spark altogether That was the beginningof t*et|', nteD^t ' of the keenest bliss I ever enjoyed w. floated lazily down, bobbing about', in th* short, choppy sea, while Banbnry cranked like a crazy man. We tried pruning her. We tried changing batteries: We "tried, cutting ont the pump, screwing -j OWn . _" j needle valve, and spitting oh the fly-wheel. We tried everything that was ofJhb use to try, and Banbnry cranked twenty-tlmes for each trial. Between cranks, Jones' and -i : 'casse4 each other for leaving the oars at; home, We moaned about the necessity of swim, mlng out below the dam,. and. hoped the boat wouldn't be damaged when she .went over. And all the time Banbury wiuVgnmt. ing and moaning and fighting' tot; life.Going over a six-foot waterfall in aTantorboat on to the rocks below, with no saowledge of the useful art df swimming? wa» just as pleasant to him as falling' off tl» top of St. Paul's. It was one of '■'' pitiful and most thoroughly - SaUStjtog. sights I have ever seen. Every tike toy conscience jabbed mc, I thought of women he was so fond of frightening oh th* streets back at home, and my heart thw np like a water-pipe in winter. ' The plan was a beautiful - success, i; quarter of a mile from the dam, Bantraiy was on his knees alternately prsiyJ ing and yelling for help. He had a server on, wrong side up. His bands woe ' a mass of blisters, for we had : allowed him to crank most of the time with-th* compression on. He was all to, down inj ont under foot, off the map.- We would never be bothered with him again. All we had to do was to turn oh the' juice, Witl the fly-wheel, and give him a ten-mile laugh on the way home. I let on' the'£asoleh»' slyly, and Jones went np front. "Let a good man take the crank," hi said soothingly as he turned her orety . The Peggy didn't start. :-.■; Jones cranked rapidly abont nteli&M, Then he primed the engine,', threw 'air the compression, and cranked hntU:h* black In the face. '■'''.'. We could hear the roar of tile fills'ojite plainly now. We had abont •nve'MhiteJ to spend cranking the Peggy; and her average balk when she lay down on us was an hour! . _ ;■.-*.--•. Right there Jones rose to the emergency. Of coarse we had no Beret have an anchor in a motor-boat : Some chump has always borrowed'it- Bnt io less than a minute' '" Jonei ' hid disconnected the engine •aU'SSrointd:- in ~ another minute he had -tied -toe: h«d-uK» around the fly-wheel end-of the'craoi.. shaft. I grabbed one end and he" the Other, We hoisted it up, and with a heart we dumped that engine overboard. Tier* was a soul-stirring splash, an* the' Peggy. swung aronnd stern foremost and stopped. We were anchored safe and aoond,-a':'han-dred yards above the dam.' "' '•'' Banbnry had been trying' to pray;' and had gotten as far as "Now I lay mc," nine or ten times, when he realised tost the obsequies bad been temporarily ■ postponed. For a minute the light on his'ftce was seraphic. He looked oat upon the beautiful green world only a few hnndr?d' very wet feet away as If he liad ; a proprietary interest in it once more. He wasso'happy at being jerked out of the 'jaws death, with tooth marks all over him,"'that 19 clean forgot us. Bnt presently he began to remember. The fact that'he was still bung by a hair over an exceedingly Informal place In the river, and'thit he had no prospects of getting away until 'somebody turned the water oftY began"to worm its way into his bliss and curdle'it. v And presently he b.-gan to converse with at. , "So this is what you call, navigating, '» it. yon imitation skippers?" he sneered. "Of all the dough-brained jobs I «« «»> this is the limit. If you am't"keep;.J<rar ; tinkered-up dry-goods box running, why do you put it in the water?" It .woald mrt* a good hot-house with' glass ."- You would make good gardeners, lon i would be company for the turnip^;vt<|h might even succeed at sprouting; ;pomoet. With a little more education yon' Mold clean streets." ' * ; •'¥■>*' And so on, Indefinitely. He «atthers.«ad skinned ns alive, and we sat there and took it without gas. There was nothing «hK to do. Sometimes he'd n«tt ; by, standing vi and yelling for help; then" he'd alt down, look us over calmly and coldly—le w as *» big as both of use—and begin agtla? "What you descendants of. a tbcinsand years of cabbages need Is judgment il f J 0 " are going to run a motor boat, yon iwint to go at It right. You want to hire: a:nurse- ;- girl. Any IltUe girl who has ueen'throDjn the first reader will do. Take her aW n B tD do your thinking for you. And yon heed a better boat, too. Why don't, yoa. get a piano box and use an electrician for* P ro " peller? If you don't want to maae-SUdi a big improvement all at once,.J o ?- co 'j™ do it by degrees. You might start tub. And you ought to begin studying » coffee-mill when you get home. A coople or chaps of your calibre ought to learn Jioww run a coffee-mill pretty well in Mf» °T years. The trouble with all fools Is; «**» want to do too mnch at once. Now, 'qL, would get an egg-beater and practise ■" Ing and stopping It " '. 4 It was very soothing, this < of Banbury's. After abont ■ nll0 ? r -?.Vjj ped blowing and began to raln-nttt/>. rain. We were as well ipW* 6 ?'*^- 09 au church steeple. Banbnry seemed to.««; more peevish after it had rained 4 ** -j He would empty his shoes and W*. 1 „ wring out his coat, and 6r thai g"» *, would have thought np something -."J 0 . ' say. He was a wonder at thlalk«■*■> things. We sat there and took ft. Oh occasions we might have talked be< * l what conld we say? We threw a" «" partce overboard with that engine, It rained and rained, _ &»**_ paascd, with nothing on boarf n»* "°»™* Ing than sasolene. Two o'clock «<*" >• ,and. after a atretch of time tag M ™fJ! season a pyramid, three o'clock when It had arrived it went away;-asi-»* an Arkansas freight train-and; then heard a motor boat whistle upstream, W

When Banbury heard that whistle he jumped np and began yelling like mad. He' danced and swung his hat and shrieked until I felt distressed over the waste of, sound. The whistle came from a little] clamming boat on Its way down river, but It looked like a transatlantic liner when It chugged up and tied on to us. We were going to explain what had happened and humbly petlilon to be taken ashore, when Banbury headed us off. The chance of rescue had driven him clean daft All his fright had come back, and he was! possessed of just one idea. He wanted to get on solid land—to feel It with his feet,| put both arms around It, and to camp there for evermore. "All I want," he shouted, hauling out] his pockethook, "is to be taken over to that} shore there. Understand? There's flvej dollars In It for you. You take mc over! there, and, so help mc, If I ever set foot in a devil-built death-trap again, I hope I go down head-foremost."-"What's the- hurry, old man?" remarked Jones, smoothly; "we'll get fixed up pretty soon and take you back." "Take mc back!" roared Banbury; "take mc back! I'm going to walk back. I've been out with fools long enough. No more boats for mc; I'm done with 'em forever. Just let mc get on that shore over there and I'll show yon how to get back. I'll walk —I've had my lesson." "But it's ten miles and no roads, old man; you'd better come back with ns," said Jones, blandly. "We'll get home In time for supper. This Is jnst a common occurrence." "I'd rather crawl all the way," shouted Banbury. "Don't talk to mc, you fools. You'll never get that boat back, anyway. Just set mc on shore, my friend." "Oh, very well!" said Jones. "Come back for us, old man," he shouted to the clammer, as the latter cast off; "we've got some work for you, there's another five In it." We watched the little boat chug upstream to the bank, Banbury holding on with both hands. Then Jones grabbed the oil cans and got out the waste. "What are you going to do?" I asked. "We're going to go home in the Peggy, and we're going to beat Banbury," he said grimly. We watched Banbury scramble np the bank and disappear in the wet underbrush. The clammer stuck her nose Into the Btream again and chugged back. "Some scared, he was," her skipper said as he tied on. "And we're some busy," said Jones. "Just anchor, will you?" The clammer dropped a fifty-pound stone overboard, and we tied on. Then we hoisted our motor from the damp and lugubrious deep. Ever hoist a 130-pound motor in a tippy boat? It's no snap. I had a lame back for a week. But we managed it, the three of us, and hauled It in. I have seen feverish activity on several occasions. I have seen men try to carry pianos and coal buckets out of burning houses, and I myself have argued with as many as four hundred bumblebees at one time when a boy. But those were moments of leisure compared with the next halfhour. We dried that motor with everything 'in the boat. Luckily it had stopped raining. We poured gasolene on It and burned the gasolene—nice, safe job In a greasy boat. We oiled it and greased it all over. Then we bolted It down,, connected everything up and cranked It She started on the ninety-sixth yank. We paid the clammer and sent him on the locks, rejoicing. The Peggy wobbled up stream, and we ran her, watch in hand, praying and hoping. She sneezed and sh« back-fired, and she skipped about three shots out of five. But she kept going, while we patted her engine and dosed her with oil whenever she faltered. Jnst as the clocks were striking seven we ran into the dock, yelled to the boy to take care of her, and sprinted for the street cars. In fifteen minutes we were at my home. In twenty more we were ont of a hot bath and In dry clothes. In fifteen minutes more, full of hot coffee and whatever we could find, Jones and I were seated on my front porch, he In my clothes, two sizes too long for him, reading the Sunday papers and smoking—and waiting for Banbnry. When we had waited about ten minutes a street car stopped and a horrible object got off. it was soggy and crumpled, it had cockle burs on its legs and Spanish needles In its hair. It had lost its hat. It was plastered with mud where It had fallen down. It didn't have any coat. It wobbled when it walked. It was Banbury. "Hello, old man," said Jones, as it went past, "why didn't yon come on with ns? You must have had an awful walk." The object turned round and raised Its fist. "If you ever speak to mc again, either of you, I'll kill you!" it shrieked. No, I don v t ride in Banbury's auto any more. Neither does Jones. We are glad, because we are afraid of motor can.