CHAPTER X
UP IN A DIRIGIBLE
"Help! Oh, help! I must have some air," whined Stubby. "I am gettingseasick!" But neither Billy nor Button heard him as the noise of theengine and propellers drowned all other sounds in the balloon.
"If there was only a deck I could get out on! I wish I had not come! Ijust hate this way of traveling! It is worse than being in an elevatorin a high building and having the car shoot from the bottom floor tothe top in one bound. This thing is worse for it decides to stop,dropping and then shooting up again without warning, and it runsupside down and every other way but straight ahead. Oh, oh, oh! Ican't stand it another minute. I must have air!"
So Stubby crawled out from under his chair and climbed up on a long,narrow window seat directly under an open window and hung out hishead. He could only just reach the window by standing on his hind legsas he was so short and the window ledge was so far above the seat. Ashe looked out he could see the earth fast receding from him. He feltas if it were the dirigible that was standing still and the earth thatwas dropping from them. By this time they were so high in the airthat the fields and forests looked like squares on a checkerboard andthe broad rivers were mere silver threads across it. As for thechurches and houses, they looked like card houses or toy papervillages. People he could see none; they were too small to be seenfrom this height. He became so interested looking that he forgot hisseasickness, and he was very much surprised when they ran into araincloud and he felt the raindrops on his face. But what surprisedhim most was to see lightning darting all around him and so near itseemed to go through the dirigible and come out the opposite side. Asfor the thunder, you people who have never been up in the clouds andheard it close at hand have no idea of the terrific noise and of theterror it causes one.
By this time the big dirigible was floundering in the stormclouds as aship does in a heavy sea, only ten times more so. A dirigible islighter than a ship and the wind at this altitude much stronger. Itwould catch the balloon up and carry it for miles out of its course onone of its fierce currents. Then without warning it would suddenly diedown and the big balloon would drop hundreds of feet only to be caughtup by another blast and twirled around or carried up again as the casemight be, while constantly the lightning flashed and the thunderrolled and our Chums thought the very next gale would double them upand dash them to their death.
While Stubby was at the window, Billy was having his own troubles. Hehad tried to find a better place to hide than under the table and hadcome out to do so when an extra hard lurch of the balloon had sent himheadlong the entire length of the dining saloon. He hit his headagainst the partition at one end of the room and then was flung backto the other end again. As the balloon was changing its course everyminute, he could not regain his bearings. One minute the balloon wouldbe standing almost perpendicularly, climbing to higher altitudes totry to get above the stormclouds. The next a heavy gust of wind woulddrive it back, or the gale would die down altogether and the dirigiblewould drop into a pocket of the atmosphere, or, worse yet, would betwirled around and around like a ship in a whirlpool of water.
Poor Billy went slipping head foremost from one end of the saloon tothe other, sometimes sitting on his tail, at others rolling over andover until he felt like a jellyfish. But still the storm continued,and he could not find a place of safety.
As for Button, he had the best of it for when the balloon rolled ordove, he simply dug his claws further into the curtain pole and hungon for dear life. Once the dirigible sailed for hundreds of feetupside down. Button simply dug in deeper and hung upside down too.
The jerking of the dirigible knocked Stubby off the window seat andfor many minutes he had been rolling from one end of the saloon to theother on one side of the table while Billy took the same journeys onthe other side of the table, only it was not hurting Stubby so much asit was Billy. He had curled himself into a tight ball which made himroll easily. He looked like a ball of scraggly worsted. As for Billy,try as he would he could not curl up in a tight ball as his legs weretoo long and his horns much too sharp.
"Oh, my, will this storm ever be over? Why did we ever let ourcuriosity get the better of us and entice us to try a ride in thisdangerous thing? No more dirigibles for me if I live to get out ofthis one, which I am very much afraid I won't!"
In less than five minutes from the time Billy thus spoke thedirigible had weathered the storm and was flying in clear blue sky athousand feet above the still raging storm. They could still hear thethunder and see the vivid flashes of lightning.
"Gee! What a place to see the moon and stars," thought Billy. "Now thedanger seems to be over, I wish we would stay away up here until darkso I could see what the moon and the stars look like when we are sonear them. If we get near enough the moon, I should like to jump offand make a visit there."
Poor stupid Billy! He knew nothing of the thousands and thousands ofmiles between him and the moon, though it might look so very near.
When the dirigible was sailing quietly along, a waiter came in andbegan setting the table. He did not see our friends, and wentwhistling about his task. What most aroused the Chums' curiosity werethe funny little fences he fastened on the table. Then when everythingwas ready, he sprinkled water on the tablecloth until it was quitewet.
"What in the world is he wetting that perfectly clean cloth for? Ishould like to know that," mused Billy. "I'll just watch and see."
Then before the waiter put down his sprinkling can, he took a plateand set it on the cloth to see if it was wet enough to keep the platefrom slipping if the dirigible tipped or rolled to one side. Findingit was wet enough, he left the saloon and came back with a tray ofgoblets. These he fitted in holes made for them in the little railingthat ran around the whole table.
"Well, I never!" exclaimed Billy. "Did you ever see anything as slickas that? Now the people won't have their plates or goblets slip intotheir laps as they eat. I wonder who ever thought of that schemefirst. I should like to see how the kitchen looks. It must be as tinyas those on the Pullman cars. And I bet they have some new fandangledcontraptions to keep the boilers of hot stuff and the frying pans fromslipping off the stove when cooking. I'd go and try to get a peek atit but I'm afraid of being discovered and thrown overboard."
At this moment the waiter returned with a tray of spoons, knives andforks. As the swinging door closed behind him, he found himself facinga rolling ball of string coming straight toward him. As it reached hisfeet, he stepped to one side and the ball hit the door with such forcethat it flew open and the ball of string rolled through.
The waiter was so astonished that he braced himself against thepartition while trying to catch his breath. As he stood there staring,he happened to glance up and there clinging to the curtain pole he sawa big, black cat staring back at him with wide open yellow eyes. Thiswas too much for that waiter. He dropped the tray of silver and fledto the kitchen, but as the swinging door flew open to let him through,he bumped into the cook, who was in turn fleeing from the ball ofstring or worsted that was rolling around his kitchen floor, givingforth yelps like a dog. The two men clung to each other, their hairstanding straight on end, and their knees knocking together.
As they stood thus, one of the officers of the dirigible having heardthe racket as the silver fell to the floor, came in the saloon fromthe other end to discover what the trouble might be. Just then thecraft gave a lurch which sent the folds of the tablecloth swinging outso that it disclosed Billy hiding underneath. The officer stared,wiped his eyes, and then stared some more. At this moment Billydecided to come out and go through the door the officer was holdingopen.
When the officer saw a big, white goat rising from under the table hewas so frightened that his legs shook together and he pulled the doorshut. By this time Billy had up too much speed to slow down, so whenhis head hit the door he simply went through it as if it had been madeof paper.
The noise of the splintering door brought the officer to his senses,and he called for help, but no one h
eard him. He was about to go tosee where everybody was when the swinging door to the kitchen flewopen and in rolled a yelping ball of string. At the same moment hespied Button staring down at him. He simply turned and fled to hisberth, where he covered up his head so he could not see things, for hewas fully convinced he was seeing things not of flesh and blood.
When Stubby in his mad rolling came to the door Billy had buttedthrough, he bounded through the hole as a rubber ball might, and wentbounding down the long narrow passage until he came up against a wallin a dark closet, as he supposed. But in reality he had rolled throughan open door into the stateroom of the officer who had fled fromButton and Billy, and had Stubby only known it at that very moment hewas under his berth.
While all this had been taking place, the dirigible was fastdescending toward its home hangar and in a few minutes they would bedown to the earth again. And it was a good thing for the Chums thatthey were for when Billy was discovered by the Captain he ordered himthrown overboard with the dog and the cat. But if you think it an easymatter to catch as big and strong a goat as Billy with the fightingpropensities he had and two lively animals like Stubby and Button, youare badly mistaken.
Two or three aviators tried to corner him and tie him up so theycould pitch him overboard, but he butted and kicked so they could notlay hands on him. No more hands could be spared from the crew to help,as it required all the rest to manage the ship. Stubby and Button alsoput up a stiff fight as the men chased them all over the dirigiblefrom under chairs and tables in this stateroom and that, where theyupset things generally as the aviators tried to hit them with brooms,mops and whatever came handy.
While this was going on, the dirigible had quietly glided into itshangar and was quickly being tied up. An aviator was chasing Stubbywith a long-handled brush when a man on the outside opened a door inthe side of the dirigible just as Stubby was passing and quick as awink he took advantage of it and jumped out, much to the surprise ofthe man who had opened it. After him came Button and Billy, and whenthe Chums' feet touched terra firma again they lost no time in leavingthat aviation field. When they had found a nice, quiet, safe place torest and were reviewing this last adventure, Billy said, "No moredirigibles for me! I never want even to see one again!"
"Nor I!" said Stubby. "I am one mass of black and blue bruises fromhitting the furniture and door jambs as I rolled from one end of thatlong saloon to the other."
"And I still feel sick from hanging with my head down so long whenthat old dirigible traveled upside down," declared Button.