CHAPTER VIII.
A CALL FOR HELP.
"Well, sizzlin' thunderbolts!" gasped the amazed Burton.
At first, Ben Ali sat blinking at those before him, apparently toodazed to move.
"He's an eavesdropper!" cried McGlory, "and this ain't the first timewe've caught him at it, either. Grab him, Matt! Wring that thin neck ofhis!"
Ben Ali regained his wits, then, and very suddenly. With a panther-likespring, he cleared the wagon on the side opposite that where MotorMatt was standing, dodged McGlory, who tried to head him off, shooka glittering knife in Boss Burton's face, and vanished under thewall of the menagerie tent. It was all so neatly done that the threein the calliope lean-to were left staring at each other in helplessastonishment.
McGlory rushed furiously at the menagerie tent wall, lifted the canvas,then dropped it and rushed back.
"Not for me!" he breathed. "Rajah is right there, teetering back andforth from side to side, and winding his trunk around everything insight."
"Where was Ben Ali?" demanded Burton, a glitter rising in his eyes.
"Getting out under the cages on the other side of the tent," repliedMcGlory. "I'll see if I can't head him off."
With that the cowboy shot out of the lean-to. Matt didn't think theeffort to catch Ben Ali worth while, and once more dropped down on thepile of straw.
For a few moments Boss Burton walked back and forth in front of him,hands behind his back, head bowed in thought, and a black frown on hisface. Abruptly he halted in front of Matt.
"The infernal Hindoo drew a knife on me!" he scowled.
Matt nodded. The fact had been too plain to call for comment.
"I'd pull the pin on Ben Ali in half a minute," continued Boss Burton,"if it wasn't for Haidee."
"Where did you pick up Ben Ali and Haidee?" inquired Matt.
"In Wisconsin," was the answer, "just as the show was starting out ofits winter quarters. Rajah had run amuck, wounded a horse, smashed awagon, and come within an ace of killing his keeper. Ben Ali appliedfor the job of looking after him, and I let him have it. He's been theonly one, so far, who could take care of Rajah."
"Where did the girl come in?"
"She came in with her uncle, of course. Ben Ali said his niece was goodon the flying bar, and he brought her to see me. When she came she wasin one of her spells, and looked and acted like a puppet, with some onepulling the wires. I wasn't much impressed with her, but gave her atry-out. She recovered from the spell and acted just as she did to-day,when she went up with the _Comet_--perfectly natural. She gave a goodperformance--mighty good--and I made a deal with her uncle. That's theway I got tangled up with the pair. Why?"
The showman transfixed Matt with a curious glance.
"Oh, nothing," said Matt carelessly. "The Hindoo and the girl havealways been something of a mystery to me, and I wanted to find out whatyou knew about them. Where did they come from?"
"Give it up. I never look into the past of people who hire out to me.If they're capable, and do their work, that's enough. From what McGlorysaid, and from what I've seen, Ben Ali appears to have been sneakingaround here, listening to what you and your friends were saying. If hehadn't inadvertently touched the keyboard of the calliope we shouldn'thave known he was under the cover. Have you any notion what he means bythat sort of work?"
"No."
"Well, it's deuced queer, and that's all I can say. Do you think heought to be bounced?"
"Yes, but I wouldn't do it."
"On Haidee's account?"
"Partly that; partly, too, because, if you keep him on the pay roll,we may be able to learn something about him and the girl. I'm a bitcurious about them, Burton."
"It's a bad habit--this of getting too curious. It's dollars and centsfor me to have the two with the show. What's more," and his remarkstook a more personal turn, "it's money in my pocket to have the _Comet_go up this afternoon with Haidee shooting Roman candles from thetrapeze. When are you going to get busy with the repairs?"
"After I eat something."
"Well, rush the work, Matt. Do the best you can."
"It won't be Haidee who rides the trapeze next time the _Comet_ takesto the air," said the king of the motor boys firmly.
"Well, Archie le Bon, then," returned Burton, with much disappointment.
As he went out, McGlory came in, passing him in the entrance.
"Nothing doing," reported the cowboy. "Where the Hindoo went is aconundrum. I couldn't find anybody about the grounds who had even seenhim since he walked Haidee away from the burning a?roplane."
While McGlory, disgusted with his ill success and the turn events weretaking, there on the banks of the Wabash, slumped down on a bucket andmopped his perspiring face, Motor Matt dropped into a brown study.
"These Hindoos are crafty fellows, Joe," he remarked, after a while."They're clever at a great many things we Americans don't understandanything about. I knew one of them once. He was the servant of a manwho happened to be the uncle of one of the finest young fellows thatever stepped--brave Dick Ferral. This particular Hindoo I was able tostudy at close range."
"What are you leading up to by this sort of talk?" asked McGlory,cocking his head on one side and squinting his eyes.
He had this habit when anything puzzled him.
"I'm leading up to the element of mystery that hangs over the eventsof to-day. India is a land of mystery. The people are a dreamy set,and now and then one of them will go off into the woods, or thedesert, and spend several years as a devotee. When he comes back tocivilization again he's able to do wonderful things. I've heard thatthese fakirs can throw a rope into the air and that it will hang there;and that they can make a boy climb the rope, up, and up, until hedisappears. Then rope, boy, and all but the fakir will vanish."
"Fakes," grunted Joe. "Such things ain't in reason, pard. You know whata fakir is in this country, and I reckon he's not much better in India."
"Of course it's a fake," said Matt, "but it's a pretty smooth pieceof magic. The Hindoo devotees could give Hermann and all the othermagicians cards and spades and then beat them out."
"I'm blamed if I can see yet where all this talk of yours leads to."
"I'm only, what you might call, thinking out loud," laughed Matt."Haidee's actions puzzle me. Her uncle is a Hindoo, and he may be anadept in magic. If he is, just how much has the girl's queer actions todo with Ben Ali? It's something to think about. I'm glad Burton isn'tgoing to cut loose from the Hindoo and the girl. The more I see ofthem, the more curious I'm becoming."
"Ben Ali, pard," grinned McGlory, "is a little bit curious about us, Ireckon, from the way he's pryin' around. How do you account for that?"
Matt shook his head.
"I can't account for it, Joe, but perhaps we'll be able to do solater." He got up. "How about something to eat?" he asked. "We'll haveto have dinner, then take something to the boys, and get busy patchingup the a?roplane."
"Did you ever know me to shy at a meal?" asked McGlory, promptlygetting up. "We'll hit the chuck layout, and then----"
It was nearly time for the doors to open, and inside and out the twobig "tops" there was a bustle of preparation. The "spielers" in theticket stands at the side-show were yelling, people were crowding aboutthe ticket wagon, where they were to buy pasteboards admitting them tothe "big show," and a band was playing in the road beyond the grounds.
Above all these various sounds there came a call, wild and frantic.It reached the ears of the two boys in the calliope tent with strangedistinctness, and cut McGlory short while he was talking.
"Helup! Helup, somepody, or I vas a goner!"
The cowboy gave a jump for the door, only a foot or two behind Matt.
"Was that your Dutch pard?" cried McGlory.
"It was his voice, plain enough," answered Matt, looking around sharply.
"What could have gone wrong with him?"
"I can't imagine--here, in broad daylight, with the grounds full ofpeople."
"It's trou
ble of the worst kind if we're to take the words as theysounded."
Matt believed this fully. Carl Pretzel was not the lad to give a falsealarm, and he had clearly put his whole heart into the words Matt andMcGlory had heard.
"Where did the call come from?" went on McGlory, mystified.
"It seemed to come from everywhere, and from nowhere," replied Matt."Look into the menagerie tent, Joe."
While McGlory was lifting the canvas and taking a look through theanimal show, Matt rounded the outside of the lean-to, searching everyplace with keen eyes.
Carl was nowhere to be found. As Matt drifted back toward the door ofthe calliope tent, McGlory emerged and joined him.
"He's not mixed up with the animals," reported the cowboy.
"And I can't get any trace of him out here," said Matt. "Let's walkover to the a?roplane. Carl and Ping were to watch the machine, andI'm pretty sure neither of them would leave it without orders unlesssomething pretty serious had gone wrong."
Vaguely alarmed, the two chums pushed their way through the crowdtoward the place where the _Comet_ had been left.