It was, in any case, a strange creature, with two inclined planes, one on either side, that looked like wings; and, at the back, it showed a screw-propeller sticking up in the air, like a tail. The whole thing rested on two wheels.
“And it’s a bike, too! I knew it!” cried Lily, clapping her hands. “Well done, Jimmy! And do you want me to get up on it? Come along! Just wait till I take my hat off,” she went on, drawing out the hat-pins from under her big feathers.
“Not so fast!” said Jimmy, laughing. “Keep calm! We’ll start next week. There are a good many little things to make sure of first; and then I must put up a cable in case of a fall.”
“I don’t care a hang for a fall,” cried Lily, immensely excited. “You’ll soon see if I’m afraid!”
“Be serious, Lily. Listen to me,” replied Jimmy. “Yes, you will have to stand on the back-wheel, but not to ride round the stage. You will have to start up at full speed and then go up and up, straight up, into space and then shoot out through a hole which they are making in the roof.”
“Yes,” said Lily, “I saw. . . . My, that makes a good distance! And, when I’m through the hole, what do I do up there? Go on...!”
“I’ll explain all that to you,” said Jimmy.
“Dive into the street, eh?” asked Lily, in her Spartan voice. “Well, I don’t care! Anything! I’ll do anything! And I’ll show them,” she added, to herself, “if you can do that through your gentlemen friends!”
But she calmed herself: after all, she was going to top the bill; have her name in all the papers, with her portrait; see the walls covered with her posters. What a revenge for her! That was enough, for the moment. She did not want to appear surprised before Jimmy. The right thing was to take it as something very natural, like a lady who is used to the best.
Jimmy, meanwhile, was explaining his trick: