CHAPTER VIII.--FATE OF THE STEAK A LA BRIGAND.
Jimmie lay stretched at full length under one of the discolored sheltertents in a little cup in the heart of the Rocky Mountains. Frank and Patand Jack were moving restlessly about, looking up at the blue skyexpectantly. Ned had not returned from his trip to San Francisco, andthe boys were anxious as to his safety.
"He should have taken me with him," Jimmie drawled, presently, whenFrank threw himself down by the tent. "Then he'd have been all right."
"It is a wonder that he got along in the world at all before he fellunder your protecting care," Frank replied, with a grin.
"Oh, he managed in some way," Jimmie answered, "but he never got up inthe world until he took me into partnership," with a wink at his chum.
"He's been up in the world since then, all right," Frank said,suggestively.
"Too high up," Jimmie grinned. "Too high up for me, anyway. I thoughtI'd die up there, on the night of the fire."
"In all the history of air navigation," Frank observed, soberly, "therewas never a trip like that. When I think of the quick start, and thewind and the rain, the whole thing seems like a dream. How did he everdo it?"
"I don't know," Jimmie replied. "He boosted me into the seat, and thenext I knew we were off, an' the fire was dropping away from us, an' themountains were growing smaller, an' the peaks looked like warts on theworld. I felt like I was fallin' over the edge of somethin'."
"And the wind?" questioned Frank. "Didn't it take your breath away?"
"Wind, nothin'," the boy said, scornfully. "There wasn't any wind wherewe were. We went along with it. It was like sailin' on a swift stream.Ned tuned the engine up to keep steerway, an' shut his teeth. Then, inhalf a minute, we were above the clouds, an' the moon an' stars wereaskin' what we were doin' up there."
"You're saying it well," Pat said, joining the little group. "If youwere going so merrily before the wind, why did he want steerway?"
"You don't know much about the atmosphere," laughed Frank, answering forJimmie. "If you did, you'd know that the air blanket of the earth is agood deal like a river. It has eddies, and currents, and ripples, andholes, too."
"You're good, too!" exclaimed Pat. "Holes in the air is about the best Iever heard!"
"Of course there are holes in the air," Frank replied, with the air ofone imparting valuable information, "especially when there are firesbeneath. And, let me tell you this, you old red-head," he added, with anexasperating grin, "when the air, driven swiftly by the wind, or what wecall the wind, comes to mountain peaks, and tall trees, andsky-scrapers, it just backs up, just the same as water does when itcomes to a dam, or any obstruction."
"Go it!" Pat cried. "Make it a good one! Where does this air go when itbacks up?"
"It just hunches up," Frank replied, gravely, "and checks the flow backof it, and then eddies and swirls away, fit to twist an aeroplane intokindling wood."
"Of course," broke in Jimmie. "I've often read of aeroplanes dropping athousand feet into holes in the air, and of their being swept againsttall trees and buildings by eddies. It takes a cool head to run an airmachine in a storm of wind, and that is where Ned won out."
"If he hadn't kept the aeroplane going with the wind at full speed,"Frank added, "he would have been in a wreck the first half mile."
"The more I learn about the atmosphere," Pat said, "the less I like it.When you get me up in an aeroplane, just send word to the folks that I'mtired of life."
"Ned ought to have a Carnegie medal for what he did that night," Jackremarked, "and I'm going to speak to father about it when I get home."
"There is no doubt that he ought to have one," Frank said, "but the menwho really deserve Carnegie medals never get them."
"You're an anarchist!" roared Pat.
"All right," was the sober reply, "but if I had the giving out of themedals I'd present them to men who work twelve hours a day and providefor families of eight on nine dollars a week--the men who never getrested, and who never have enough to eat. They are the ones who ought tohave the medals."
"Most of them would sell the medals," Jack said, cynically.
"Well," Frank replied, "I shouldn't blame them if they did. I'd ratherhave a porterhouse steak in the interior than a piece of bronze on theoutside."
"Don't talk about porterhouse steak!" pleaded Jimmie.
"Hungry, little man?" asked Pat.
"Hungry! I'm like one of the men Frank has been telling about. I neverget rested, never have enough to eat."
The boys fell upon Jimmie and rolled him out of the tent.
"You get busy with fuel," Pat said, after they had given him plenty of"movements," "and I'll cook a steak a la brigand."
"We ain't got no steak," complained Jimmie.
"We've got potatoes, and bacon, and onions," Pat said, "and cannedbeefsteak. You just watch me. I used to cook steak a la brigand in thePhilippines."
"Get busy, then," Jimmie said, "and Jack will help get the green wood."
"If you bring green wood here for me to cook with, I'll roast you overit," Pat said. "You get a lot of good dry wood that will make coals, andI'll show you how to broil a steak a la brigand."
"Why do you call it a brigand steak?" asked Jimmie.
"Because it takes a red-headed brigand to cook it," suggested Jack,dodging out of Pat's reach.
"Never you mind the name," Pat replied. "Get the dry wood and I'll broila steak that will melt in the mouth."
"That old canned stuff?" asked Frank.
"Get the wood," ordered Pat, "and I'll show you."
There were a few dead trees--the sole reminders of a former forest firein that green valley--close at hand, and the wood was soon gathered andplaced in a great pile near two rocks which Pat had rolled to within ayard of each other.
"Here!" Jack called out, as Pat transferred the whole supply to thespace between the stones, "there's enough fuel there for a week'scooking. Quit it!"
"My son," Pat replied, with a provoking air of patronage, "what youdon't know about broiling a steak a la brigand would make acongressional library."
While the wood was burning down to coals, Pat cut a green slip about aninch in diameter at the bottom and peeled and smoothed it nicely.
"Is that to be used to enforce the eating of the steak?" asked Frank,winking at the others.
"To keep you from gorging yourselves," Pat replied, going on with hiswork.
In a short time he had the potatoes cut into half-inch slices. Jack hadpeeled them and, following directions with many grins, had also cut around hole an inch in size in the middle of each slice.
"He's going to wear 'em around his neck, like beads," Jimmie suggested,looking carefully over the heaped-up dish.
The bacon was now sliced thin, as were the onions, and in the center ofeach slice a round hole was made. Then Pat opened a couple of tins ofbeefsteak--so called by the packers--and cut a hole in the middle ofeach slice. Then he strung a slice of potato on the spit, then a sliceof bacon, then a slice of onion, then a slice of beef, until there wasnearly a yard of provisions.
"I begin to feel hungrier than ever!"
Jimmie was dancing around the fire as Pat turned the spit. There wereonly coals now, and Pat kept the toothsome collection turning slowly, soas to broil without scorching. The smell of the cooking bacon and onionsset the boys to getting out the tin plates and making the coffee.
The sun, which had been shining fiercely all day, now seemed to beworking his way through a mist. The atmosphere appeared to be tintedwith the yellow haze one sees in the northern states in autumn.
As the boys were keeping watch for Ned and the aeroplane, they noticedthe change in atmospheric conditions, but attributed it to the risingvapor brought out by the heat of the sun.
"Say," Jimmie said, presently, "I smell smoke. I wonder if there's goin'to be another forest blaze here?"
"Of course you smell smoke," Jack said, watching the broiling supper."We're cooking a steak a la brigand, ain't we?"
br /> "Smells like burnin' leaves," Jimmie insisted.
"More like onions," Pat observed.
The boys crouched about the fire for some moments longer and then Jimmiearose and began to climb the wall of the cup to the west.
"I'm goin' to see about this," he said.
Frank laid a hand on his arm.
"You wait a minute," he said. "You can't climb that slope in less thanhalf an hour, and Ned will be here before that. Look! He's coming now,like the wind!"
The aeroplane, high up in the hazy sky, was indeed making good progresstoward the little cup in the mountain side. While the boys looked theysaw it shift away to the west, whirl back to the east, dart off to thenorth and back again.
"He's huntin' for us," Jimmie said.
"He's investigating!" Frank cut in.
"Investigating what?" Pat demanded. "He's smelling of this steak a labrigand and is hunting for it. Let be. He'll find us."
The sky was growing more uncertain every minute, and puffs of smoke wereseen out in the west, over the rim of the cup.
"The world is on fire, I tell you!" Jimmie cried, presently. "That'swhat Ned is shiftin' about for. If the blaze wasn't high up on themountains we couldn't see the columns of smoke over the rim of thevalley."
"Well," Pat observed, "the fire can't get in here. Nothing to burn."
"It can fill the cup with hot air and scorch us to death," Frank said,uneasily. "I think we'd better be looking about for a place to crawlinto."
"Wait until Ned comes," Jimmie suggested. "He'll know what to do."
The aeroplane acted badly in the currents caused by the burning forest,but Ned finally managed to bring it down in the valley. The boysgathered about him, all excitement, and the steak a la brigand was forthe moment forgotten in the joy at the return of the patrol leader andthe anxiety to learn something of conditions out in the woods.
"It's going to be a great conflagration," Ned said, "but I think theaeroplane will be safe here. The whole slope is on fire."
"I wouldn't take chances on leaving it here," Frank advised. "I'd jumpover the divide with it."
"I have been in the air three hours now," Ned replied, "and must have arest. Besides, we must remain where we can, if necessary, help head offthe flames. That is what we are here for, remember."
"Not to fight fires," corrected Frank, "but to find out who sets them."
"Anyhow," Ned replied, "we must fight the fire, if it gives us a chance,now that we are here. Now, what do you think that is?" he added, as achorus of howls and cries came up from the slope on the west.
"Sounds like a country circus!" Jimmie laughed.
"That is just what it is!" Ned exclaimed. "Here! Help me roll theaeroplane into that nook, where it won't be trampled into splinters. Nowyou boys get behind it, and I'll get in front. Whatever you see or hear,don't shoot unless you are actually attacked."
The boys obeyed the commands without a word of comment, well knowingwhat was coming next. A breeze was sliding up the slope, bringing withit flying masses of smoke. Presently birds began to stagger through theheavy atmosphere, flying low, almost within reaching distance, as theyhad fled long before the mounting flames and were exhausted.
"I wish this would let up a moment," Pat said, "long enough for us toreach that steak a la brigand. It must be about done by this time."
"I'll go an' get it," volunteered Jimmie. "An' eat most of it on the wayback."
"Then bring the coffee," cried Jack.
"Why can't we all go out there and eat?" asked Frank.
The boys were about starting with a rush when Ned caught two of them bythe arm and stopped the others by a quick call. Through the smoke andthe hot air on the rim of the cup, a great head, a head neither whitenor black, but grizzly, was seen. Then a deer bounded over and croucheddown in the valley. Next two mountain lions raced over the lip of thevalley and halted growling, within a few yards of the boys.
"There goes our steak a la brigand!" Jimmie cried, as the rush offrightened animals showed under the smoke. "I'll eat one of them deer topay for this," he added.
"You'll be lucky if one of these wild animals doesn't eat you," Jacksaid. "How would you like to be back in little old Washington Squarejust now?"
"Forget it!" was the boy's only reply.
"Will the fire get here?" Frank asked of Ned, as the wild creatures ofthe forest poured into the valley, regardless of the presence of theboys, unmindful of the proximity of each other.
"I don't think the flames will come into the cup," Ned replied, "but ifthe smoke settles here we shall have a hot time of it."
"Huh!" Jimmie cried. "The whole valley is full of mountain lions, an'bears, an' deer, an' snakes, an' rabbits. There ain't no room for anysmoke!"
Then the smoke rolled away for an instant, showing a sun as red as apiece of molten iron; showing, too, a huddle of forest animals crowdingtogether in the center of the valley. In their terror of the fire theyhad forgotten to be afraid of mankind--of each other!