CHAPTER I—AN ECCENTRIC INVENTOR
Jack Chadwick stepped from the door of the shed where he and Tom Jesson, his cousin—and, like Jack, about seventeen years old—had been busy all the morning getting the Flying Road Racer back into shape, after that wonderful craft’s adventurous cruise along the Gulf Coast of Mexico.
“Almost eleven o’clock,” said Jack, and, thrusting his hand into the breast pocket of his khaki working shirt, he drew out a rather crumpled bit of yellow paper.
“What time did Mr. Pythias Peregrine say he’d be here?” inquired Tom, who, like Jack, was attired in a business-like costume of khaki, topped off with an automobile cap.
Jack, who had been busy perusing the telegraphic message inscribed on the bit of yellow paper, read it aloud.
“‘Jack Chadwick, High Towers, Nestorville, Mass.:
“‘Can I see you about noon on Thursday next? Wish to talk over a new invention with you and your father. Wire if you can see me at that time and I will call on you.
“‘Pythias Peregrine.
“‘Pokeville, Mass.’”
“Wonder what he can want?” mused Professor Chadwick’s son, in a speculative tone. “Pythias Peregrine is one of the best-known inventors in the country. I guess we all ought to feel honored by his wanting to consult with us, Tom.”
“You bet we ought. Wonder what sort of a man he is. I suppose he’ll be inclined to look down upon us as a couple of kids when he does see us. But—hello, Jack!” he broke off suddenly—“what’s that off there in the sky—over there to the northwest?”
“That speck yonder? It looks like—yes, by ginger, it is—it’s an aëroplane of some sort!”
“That’s what.”
A sudden idea struck Tom.
“Say, Jack, don’t you recall reading about Mr. Peregrine and his aëroplane Red Hawk?”
“Yes, I do, very well indeed. He captured the Jordan Meritt speed and long-distance cup with it.”
“That’s right, and I’m willing to bet the hole out of a doughnut that that is the Red Hawk approaching right now. Pokeville is sixty miles off in that direction, and what more natural than that Mr. Peregrine should take an up-to-date way of paying his call?”
“I do believe you’re right, Tom,” said Jack. “Let’s go in and spruce up a bit, and then we’ll come out and meet him.”
In the rear of the work shed, which housed the Flying Road Racer, was a washroom, and to this the boys hastened to remove some of the grime of their morning’s work. While they are thus engaged, and the aëroplane is winging its way rapidly toward High Towers, it is a good time to tell something about the two lads and their adventures.
As readers of the first volume of this series—“The Boy Inventors’ Wireless Triumph”—are aware, Jack Chadwick was the wide-awake, good-looking son of a man well known for his achievements in science. The name of Chester Chadwick was one of the best known in the world along the lines of his chosen field of endeavor. Tom Jesson, almost as bright a lad as his chum and cousin, was, like Jack, motherless. His father, Jasper Jesson—Mr. Chadwick’s brother-in-law—lived at High Towers, the remainder of which establishment was composed of Mrs. Jarley, a motherly old housekeeper, two under servants, and Jupe, a colored man-of-all-work about the place.
High Towers, Professor Chadwick’s estate, was, as we already know from the address on Mr. Peregrine’s telegram, located near the village of Nestorville, not far from Boston. It was a fine old place, and consisted of a big, rambling house set in the midst of oaks and elms with broad lawns and fields stretching on every side. But the most interesting features of the place were a big lake and a group of sheds, workshops and laboratories in which Professor Chadwick and his son and nephew worked over their inventions.
For Jack and Tom were more like chums to Professor Chadwick than son and nephew. Together the three had devised the Flying Road Racer, the Chadwick gas gun, and many other remarkable devices. From his patents Professor Chadwick had amassed a considerable fortune, thus disproving the popular idea that inventors are, of necessity, shiftless or needy.
The present story opens on a day not long after the three, together with Mr. Jesson, had returned from an adventurous trip in the neighborhood of the semi-savage country of Yucatan. As readers of “The Boy Inventors’ Wireless Triumph” know, Jack and Tom, accompanied by Jupe, had been despatched mysteriously to Lone Island, a desolate spot of land off the mouth of the Rio Grande. Here they had awaited a wireless message from Professor Chadwick, who was cruising on a chartered steam yacht, the Sea King. At last the eagerly expected message came, and the boys set out on a gasolene motor boat to find the Sea King, which, the message had informed them, was disabled.
They found her, and also discovered that she was in peculiar trouble. The rascally governor of the province of Yucatan, off which she lay, had, so they learned, imprisoned Professor Chadwick, Mr. Jesson and some sailors. The boys found that the Sea King carried on board the Flying Road Racer—of which more anon—and they determined to utilize this craft of the land and air in the work of rescue.
How Tom was re-united to his father, the explorer who had been given up as lost in the wilderness of Yucatan for many years, cannot be told in detail here; nor can we go into the surprising incident of the three colored gems contained in a silver casket which caused a lot of trouble for the boys and the others. But all came out well, and wireless played a considerable part in getting the party out of many dilemmas.
It will also be recalled by readers of the volume whose contents we have lightly sketched, that the Flying Road Racer—the aerial auto—had been badly damaged, so far as her raising apparatus was concerned, when she was blown to sea in a hurricane, during which those on board narrowly escaped with their lives. Since their return to High Towers, the boys had been engaged in refitting the craft on new principles, and Professor Chadwick had been busy in Washington in connection with some patents. Mr. Jesson had interested himself in scientific farming, and, at the very moment that the boys had hastened into the shed to make swift preparations to receive what they believed to be Mr. Peregrine’s Red Hawk, he was busy in a corn patch with Jupe, the colored man.
Jack had just given a hasty dab with the brush and comb to his hair, and Tom’s face was still buried in a towel when from the rear of the shed where the corn patch was came the sound of angry and alarmed voices.
“Hyar, you, wha’ fo’ yo’ don’ look out? Wha’ fo’ yo’ mean come floppin’ lak an ole buzzard inter dis yar cohn patch—huh?”
Then, in milder tones:
“My dear sir, I beg of you, be careful. This corn is a particular kind. If you alight here you’ll ruin several hills of it.”
“That’s Jupe and Uncle Jasper,” exclaimed Jack, throwing down the brush and comb and rushing out; “wonder what’s up?”
Tom hastily followed his cousin.
“Sounds as if somebody’s trying to spoil dad’s corn patch,” he murmured, as he ran.
As they rounded the corner of the Flying Road Racer’s shed, the boys came on an astonishing sight—if anything can be called astonishing in this century of marvels.
Above Mr. Jesson’s corn, of which he was justly proud, hovered a beautifully finished monoplane with bright red planes. Its propeller was buzzing like an angry bee—or rather like a dragon-fly, which it resembled with its long tail and bright gossamer wings.
In the air ship was seated a small, rather stout figure, whose countenance was almost hidden by goggles and a black leather skull cap pierced with holes. As this brilliant apparition of the skies swooped over the corn, so low that it almost mowed the feathery heads of the topmost stalks, Jupe made angry passes at it with his hoe.
Mr. Jesson, less strenuous but equally alarmed for his corn, had his arms raised imploringly.
“Yo’ jes git out of hyar, or I gib yo’ one wid dis yar hoe!” Jupe was exclaiming angrily, as the boys came on the scene.
“Why, I—bless my soul—I won’t hurt you,” came reassuringly in sharp, nervous tones from the occupant of the red aëroplane, which, the boys had already guessed, was the Red Hawk, and their visitor, Mr. Peregrine. “I merely dropped to inquire if this is High Towers?”
“Ya’as, dis am High Towers, an’ we got ’nough sky schooners ’roun’ hyar now widout you drappin’ in on our cohn patch,” angrily cried Jupe.
“Jupe! Jupe!” shouted Jack, “be more respectful. That’s Mr. Peregrine!”
“Don’t cahr ef he is Jerry Green,” grunted Jupe, “he don’ wan’ ter fustigate dis yar cohn patch wid dat red bug oh hisn.”
“Don’t be alarmed—won’t hurt it—very sorry—watch!”
With these jerky sentences, the occupant of the monoplane pulled a lever and turned a wheel on the side of the body of his machine. Instantly it rose, as gracefully as a butterfly, skimmed above the corn patch, circled around the boys’ astonished heads, and then dropped lightly in front of the shed which housed its ponderous rival of the skies.
As it came to a standstill the boys ran up to greet its operator, who, although he appeared rather fat and podgy, had already leaped nimbly to the ground.
“This is Mr. Pythias Peregrine?” inquired Jack politely.
“My name—glad to see you—dropped in, as it were—how do you do?—quite well?—glad to hear it.”
“Mah goodness,” exploded Jupe, leaning on his hoe and scratching his woolly head, “dat dar Jerry Green talks lak he had a package of firecrackers in him tummy.”