UP IN THE AIR.
"Uncle Ith" was one of the city bellringers, and lived at the top of a tower a hundred feet high, which vibrated with every stroke of the great bell hanging midway between his airy perch and the ground. He was sixty years of age, and had white hair, but he was as strong as younger men, and could swing the clapper against the side of the great bell with a boom that could be heard across rivers, and far into the peaceful country, on quiet nights. His eyes were so sharp, that, without the aid of a glass, he could read names on the paddle boxes of steamboats, where the unassisted vision of most persons descried nothing but a blur. He had done duty on that tower during the six years since it was built; and he knew the section of the city which lay spread out beneath him as a man knows his own garden. In the daytime, he could always guess, within a street or two, the location of any fire in his district. He knew all the smokes from a hundred factories, foundries, distilleries, and never confounded them with the fires which it was his business to detect. The presence of a new and suspicious smoke among the black stretch of roofs, caught his eye instantly; and he could tell in a moment, by its color, its speed of ascent, and the quantity of sparks accompanying it, whether it came from a carpenter's shop, a stable, a distillery, a camphene and oil store, or some other kind of building. In the nighttime, he knew the lights which mapped out the squares and the streets within his range of observation, almost as well as the astronomer knows the other lights that shine down upon the sleeping city from the heavens. He could fix the position of a fire by night rather better than by day, because he had the red reflection of the flames on well-known steeples, and high, prominent roofs to guide him.
Such were Uncle Ith's qualifications for his place; and he was so loved and trusted by the firemen of his district, that no mayor, however beset by applicants for office, had ever dreamed of removing him. In all of Uncle Ith's limited relations with the world, he was esteemed an honest man; and his word would have possessed the literal novelty of being as good as his note, had necessity ever required him to borrow money. But Uncle Ith was frugal, and made his small salary suffice for himself and a family of seven motherless children.
He had one eccentricity--a complete indifference to newspapers. He never bought nor borrowed them. "What's the use of reading 'em?" he would say. "Why not imagine the murders, suicides, political meetings, and other trash that fills 'em, and save your money for terbacker?" This did Uncle Ith, and he flattered himself that it was wisely done.
The bell tower was not far from the boy's home, and in a few minutes he stood at the foot of it, and shouted to Uncle Ith: "Hallo, there!"
Uncle Ith, always on the alert for calls, poked his head out of the window, which he left partly open for ventilation in the coldest nights, and answered, rather gruffly, "Well, what's wanted?" He never allowed his own children, nor any persons except his nephew Bog, and a few old firemen, friends of his, to visit him in the tower at night. Uncle Ith was conscientious. The presence of his children, with whom he loved to converse, or that of strangers, who would stare vacantly all over the lighted city, and ask innumerable questions, interfered with the strictness of his watch. Uncle Ith was a little eccentric, too, in his devotion to duty.
"It's me, uncle," said Bog, screaming upward.
"Glad to see you, Bog. You can come up," shouted the old man in return. He slung a latch key, fastened to a string, out of the window. It slid down the side of the tower, into Bog's hand. He unlocked the door, and the next moment the key was jerked aloft. The boy entered the base of the tower. He was so familiar with every crook and passage, that the small light of a gas jet, inside, was not necessary to show him the way. Up he ran, sometimes clearing two steps at a jump, slipping his hand lightly along the rough wooden banister. A few spiral turns brought him to the bell, which hung in an open framework of timber. He gave the huge bronze a familiar tap as he passed, and wound on and upward until he came to a trap door, which Uncle Ith held invitingly open. Then he sprang into the little room at the top of the tower, and Uncle Ith shook him by the hand.
"You look well, I see, Bog. And how is your aunt?" Uncle Ith was mindful of the usages of society, and always asked after her.
"Oh, she's smart," said Bog, totally oblivious of her rheumatism, "and sent her love to ye." Bog was a peacemaker.
"Sent her rheumatism, I guess yer mean. No doubt she wishes I had it."
Bog laughed, and his uncle laughed. And then his uncle, never forgetting duty, took a sharp look out of the eight clearly polished windows that commanded a view of the surrounding district. Discovering no sign of fire, he resumed the conversation with his nephew, asking him about his business (which he was happy to learn was prosperous), and giving him a quantity of good advice which none but a genius could remember, or an angel follow. During these exhortations, Uncle Ith paced to and fro in the little room, looking out of some window at the end of every sentence. Bog sat on a three-legged stool (the only seat except a backless chair) by the side of a miniature stove, on whose top hissed the kettle, from which Uncle Ith made his pot of coffee at midnight.
The night was cold; the little fire was warm; and Bog liked to hear advice from his uncle; but his eyes would wander to a certain window, as if, for some reason, he would derive great pleasure in opening and looking out of it. This movement of his eyes was so frequent, that Uncle Ith observed it, and said:
"Ah, I see! You want to stare out of that southeast window again. Now, I think the sight is handsomer to the west, where you can see the lights of Jersey City and Hoboken, and on the ferry boats and the shipping anchored in North River. But that's a matter o' taste. Well, look out o' the window, if you want to. I guess I can trust you for fires in that quarter."
"That you may!" answered Bog, throwing open the southeast window.
The stars above twinkled crisply in the frosty air; and the sky, with its low horizon on every side, seemed infinitely vaster than it did to Bog in the narrow and high-walled streets of the city. But Bog, though he used to puzzle over the wonders of the heavens when he was a few years younger, and had picked up a little something of astronomy from his uncle Ith (who knew something of that as of many other sciences), did not turn his gaze to them. Nor did he give more than a sweeping glance at the dotted line of lights below, stretching out in long perspectives, until the two luminous points at the end seemed blended into one. There were several parks in sight, which looked like portions of the sky let down on the earth, in all but the mathematical regularity of their mock stars. But Bog's eyes passed them by. To an inquisitive mind, there was something of interest to be seen and speculated over, in the lighted windows of houses all about him. People could be seen eating their late suppers, rocking by the fire, playing the piano, dancing, taking a rubber at whist or euchre, or diverting themselves with other recreations of winter house life. In one upper chamber, a physician was presenting a child just born to the proud father. In another, there was a mysterious spectacle, which a closer examination might have proved to be the preparing of a dead body for the morrow's burial. But Bog saw none of these sights.
His eyes sought for, and found immediately, as if by instinct, one light, which, in his opinion, was the only one worth looking at on earth or sky. It was a single bright gas jet, burning very close to a window about six hundred feet distant from him in an air line. Several tall chimneys of intervening houses rose almost between him and this light, and, perhaps, their dark, spectral shapes aided him in identifying it so readily. The lower sash of the window through which the light shone was curtained, but the upper part was uncovered; and an observer on the tower, being fifty or sixty feet above the top of the curtain, could easily look into the room. Bog rubbed his eyes, into which the cold but not biting wind had brought the tears, and gazed anxiously into Mr. Minford's apartment.
The pale inventor stood a few feet from the window, attentively examining a mass of machinery before him, upon which the light shone strongly. Only the tops of the wheels and of the more complex parts were visible; but there was one lever, or bar, connected with it, which rose above the whole, and could be seen by Bog to the extent of at least two feet. This was an addition to the strange machine as Bog had last seen it, and he contemplated it with fearful interest.
Mr. Minford stood motionless for five minutes in the presence of his creation. He was ghostlike and frightful in that fixed attitude, and Bog wished that he would move. He did so, nodding his head, and smiling, as he bent down and detached some part of the machine. All but his head and his right shoulder then disappeared from view; but Bog knew, by the vibrating motion of his shoulder blade, that he was filing upon something. Mr. Minford then stooped again, as if to put the part of the machine back into its proper place. Having done this, he stood erect once more, folded his arms, and looked intently at the Mystery for the second time.