Billy Whiskers' Travels

by Frances Trego Montgomery

Policemen, by this time, were coming running from every direction and one of them, who turned off a side street just then, thinking the fat man must be a thief, got right in his road and opened up his arms. The fat man, who had scarcely any strength left, fell right against the policeman who was also a very heavy fellow, and just at that time Billy overtook them and gave the man he was chasing all that was coming to Hans Zug. Down in a pile together went the fat man and the policeman. The policeman had not seen the goat and for a moment imagined that the fat man had jumped upon him and was trying to overpower him, so he pulled out his club and, though he was underneath, began, in a way that was comical, to try to pound the fat man.

They lay there, a struggling, wriggling mass, the policeman with his short arms trying to reach around the big round man on top of him in order to hit him some place. Billy Mischief had stopped and backed up to give his fallen enemy another bump, and was just in the air after his spring when the manager of the store caught his hind leg, and he also was dragged on top of the struggling two on the ground. The manager held to Billy's leg, however, and the crowd which had been following them closely now crowded around them. The manager scrambled to his feet, still holding the kicking Billy by the hind leg, and it would, probably have been all up with the goat if a big, strong man had not at that moment come up and putting his great arms around Billy, jerked him loose. Billy squirmed and struggled, but it was no use. The big man held him tightly and began to run. The store manager got to his feet and started after them, followed by his two clerks, but the big strong fellow who was carrying Billy darted down an alley, then through another alley, and before the pursuers could see where they had gone, the man darted through the back gate of a high board fence with Billy, closed the gate after him, ran along the side of a great building which was blazing with lights, ran down some cellar steps, opened the door, went in, closed it after him, turned on a light and set Billy down.

"There, you fool goat!" exclaimed the man. "I'll wash the blood off of you and nobody will know that you have been out."

The big man was the porter and he had brought Billy back to the little basement room under the hotel. So ended Billy's first night in a big city.

All that night, all the next day and night, and all the following day, Billy was cooped up in that little basement room with no chance to get out, and with only Frank Brown and the porter to visit him twice a day. How he did fret. The porter kept him well fed and saw that he had good bedding and plenty of water, but he gave Billy no more chances to escape and see the city. He watched carefully as he opened and closed the door that the goat should not again scramble between his legs or butt him over. On the third evening, however, the porter forgot to completely close the door which led into the other part of the basement, and you may be sure that Billy lost no time in finding out what was in there. The room next to his led up into the kitchen and it was stocked with vegetables and all sorts of kitchen stores.

Billy was not very hungry, but he nibbled at everything as he went along, pulling the vegetables out of place, upsetting a barrel half filled with flour in his attempt to see what was in it and working the faucet out of a barrel of syrup in his efforts to get at the sweet stuff which clung to it. Licking up all of the syrup that he cared for, Billy went on to investigate another barrel which lay on its side not far away, and knocked the faucet out of it. This, however, proved to be wine and he did not like the taste of it at all, so he trotted on out of the store-room into the laundry, leaving the two barrels to run to waste.

Pulling the vegetables out of place.

Everybody in the laundry had gone up into the servants' hall for their suppers, and the coast was clear for Billy. They had just finished ironing, and dainty white clothes lay everywhere. From a big pile of them that lay on a table, a lace skirt hung down, and Billy took a nibble at it just to find out what it was. The starch in it tasted pretty good, so he chewed at the lace, pulling and tugging to get it within easier reach, until at last he pulled the whole pile off the table on the dirty floor.

Hearing some steps then, he scampered out through the storeroom and into another large room where stood a big, brass-trimmed machine which he did not at all understand. It was a dynamo, which was run by a big engine in the adjoining engine-room, and it furnished the electric lights for the hotel. Two big wires ran from it, heavily coated with shellac and rubber and tightly-wound tape to keep them from touching metal things and losing their electricity. These crossed the basement room to the further wall, where they distributed the electric current to many smaller cables.