Chapter 21

IN STRANGE PERIL

Joe was running his machine at reduced speed as he went off in the direction that had been indicated as the location of the railroad tracks. Beside him ran some of the more fleet-footed of the youths of the town, and behind them came some men. All were hurrying to see if Joe would make good his boast.

Yet, it was not so much a boast as it was a determination to do this risky act in order not to be late at the circus and so disappoint a big crowd and cause trouble for the management.

"It's my own fault for going off so far into the country," mused Joe, "and I've got to make up for it as best I can."

"Turn down here to the railroad," a lad called to Joe. "This is the short cut."

Joe steered his machine down a lane, and he soon saw stretching ahead of him the cinder-covered embankment of a single line of railroad. In the distance Joe could see a big depression where the river ran. The stream itself was not very large, but it flowed at the very bottom of a wide and deep valley, and to cross this a long trestle had been necessary.

"Think you can ride it, young man?" asked an elderly man, as Joe halted, for he had to push the machine up the embankment.

"I'm going to make a big attempt," was the answer. "You see, I'm behind my schedule and I've got to make it up."

"You're taking a big risk."

"Well, I'm used to risks," answered Joe with a smile. "I'm a circus trapeze performer."

"That accounts for part of it," went on the man with a smile. "I wish you luck."

"Thanks," murmured Joe as he began to push the heavy motor-cycle up the embankment. Willing hands assisted him, and he soon stood on the railroad tracks themselves. He found that the road-bed was in good condition. The ties, or sleepers, as the wooden supports of the rails are called, were well embedded in cinders, which had been finely pulverized by the action of the weather and by many feet walking over them, for the railroad tracks were often used as a short cut by the people of the neighborhood.

"This won't be half bad to ride on," said Joe, as he kicked at the cinders.

"No, but the trestle is the sticker," some one remarked. "You can't ride on that without being shaken to pieces on the ties."

"I'm not going to try," Joe said. "As I told you, I'm going to take to a rail."

"You'll never do it!" was the prediction. "I thought you were joking when you said that."

"It's no joke for me if I miss getting to the circus on time," said Joe grimly. "And if you watch you'll at least see me start. I'm not going to guarantee where I'll end," he concluded as he took a careful survey of the trestle which stretched out before him for more than a mile.

Joe was not going into this without having thought carefully of it in advance, in spite of the short time it had taken him to make up his mind. He was used to doing that--thinking and deciding quickly. The very nature of his calling made it necessary for him to do this. One does not have much time to make up one's mind when flying through the air from a high trapeze.

Joe felt reasonably sure that if he could get his machine started at a fast rate of speed, and could get it, at that speed, on top of the smooth, and none too wide, rail, he could hold it there. It is a well-known fact in physics that a body in motion tends to follow a straight line, until forced out of that course by some external force. If a stone is thrown it will go in a straight line until the attraction of the earth's gravitation pulls it down.

But in Joe's case gravitation would have no effect, as he would be on the ground all the while, or what was practically the ground. What he would have to guard against would be a deviation of more than an inch from left or right. If he swerved ever so little, his machine would leave the rail and he would either plunge over the side of the high trestle, or he would find himself bumping over the ties.

"And I wouldn't want either of those things to happen," mused Joe, with a grim smile on his face.

But Joe Strong knew that a swiftly moving motor-cycle or bicycle has a very strong tendency to follow a straight course. It is easy to keep one's bicycle in a straight line when going fast. There is hardly any need of balancing, and one may ride along even without having the hands on the steering bars.

A motor-cycle moves much faster than a bicycle, and so has a greater chance of keeping in a straight line. This was what Joe was counting on when he proposed to ride on the narrow rail over the high trestle.

He must work rapidly now. It was drawing nearer to the time for the opening of the afternoon performance, and Joe felt that his absence up to this time must be worrying the ring-master, who liked his performers on hand in plenty of time before the show was to open.

Joe looked about for a means of getting up on the rail. It would not do to have some one hold his machine there, and so start. For that would mean his front wheel would swerve more or less because of an endeavor to get his balance, and he would be off the rail almost as soon as he was on it.

"I've got to get a flying start, and hit the rail at a good pace," reasoned Joe. "How can I do it?"

Almost at once the answer came to him. Near the place where he and the curious villagers had mounted to the railroad embankment were some planks. They had been taken out of a cattle-guard, to be replaced by new ones.

"I can make a temporary runway of the old planks," reasoned Joe, "and guide myself to the rail with them."

He quickly explained to the men and boys his need. They grasped the idea at once and began to help.

In a few minutes a platform of planks was laid on either side of a rail where it was spiked to the sleepers which were embedded in the cinders. The trestle started a few feet beyond where the temporary runway, or guiding planks, ended.

Joe used three planks--that is the runway was three planks wide, and they were laid one on either side of the rail, with the middle one directly over the strip of steel. Where the runway came to an end some dirt was used to make an even slope down to the rail, thus taking up the thickness of the plank.

Joe wheeled his machine to the far end of the wooden structure which was made firm by having cinder-dust banked against it. The motor-cycle was held up by willing hands on either side, and Joe started it. With a pop, a rattle and a roar the powerful machine was in motion.

"Let go!" cried Joe, as he threw in the gear.

Off he went. Joe held the handles firm, and his eye was fixed on that shining strip of steel along which--if he had luck--he would soon be speeding.

He opened up the throttle wide. He wanted speed and he needed it as quickly as he could get it, for on speed alone could he depend to keep the machine on the narrow steel path.

Joe heard a shout behind him, and, almost before he knew it, he was at the end of the runway and his front wheel was on the rail.

"So far so good!" thought Joe grimly. If he could only keep the machine there all would be well.

And then began such a ride as probably never before was witnessed. For Joe Strong, holding his machine with firm muscles, his nerves as quiet as only he knew how to make them, his eyes fixed on that shiny strip of steel, was driving his motor-cycle across the high trestle on a single rail.

Below him, at his right hand, was the deep valley, more than a hundred feet down. It was covered with trees and rocks, with here and there a grassy patch.

"If I fall on that side I hope I can pick out a bit of turf to land on," thought Joe. But he did not intend to fall.

Straight and true he held the front wheel. It needed no pressure on the handle bars. It would keep straight of itself now, for the motor-cycle was going at great speed. That alone would keep it in a true course if no pressure from Joe swerved it. And his hands were on the bars with as delicate a touch as a woman might have used.

In about half a minute Joe was out over the stream which the trestle spanned.

"This would be the best place of all to take a tumble," mused the lad. He knew if he did fall here he would at least have a chance for his life. For he could kick the machine away from him, and dive into the water. And he felt that it was not too high a fall to take with comparative safety if there was any depth at all to the stream.

But almost before Joe realized it he had flashed over the water, and he was again speeding over the valley itself, with hard ground, rocks, stones and sharp-pointed trees beneath him.

Of course, in case Joe's machine did leave the rail he might fall on the other side. There would be comparative safety, save that he might be badly cut and bruised by the motor-cycle falling on top of him.

On and on he sped. True to the rail he held the front wheel. He was at the height of his speed now, and every second added to his safety, for the faster he went the nearer true to a straight line could he hold the machine.

"Almost over," thought Joe. A quick glance ahead showed him where the trestle came to an end. He had nearly made good his boast.

It was a good mile across the high trestle, and Joe said afterward that he made it in less than a minute. And he must have done so. That rate of speed was necessary in order to keep the machine straight.

Joe looked down. No longer did he see below him the open ties.

He was over the trestle!

He had done what he had said he would do, and crossed on the rail.

With a movement of the handle bars he sent the front wheel down on the cinder bed. He could ride on a broader path now. A little jar, as first one wheel and then the other left the rail, told him that his daring ride was over.

Joe slowed down, and turned to wave a reassuring hand to the crowd at the other end of the trestle. They waved their hands in return, and doubtless they cheered, though Joe could not hear them, as the wind was in the wrong direction.

"Well, that's over!" he said, thankfully enough, though his heart was beating scarcely faster than if he had done some trapeze act, and his nerves were under perfect control.

"I'm glad I didn't meet any train," thought Joe. But he had inquired of his new friends before undertaking the ride about the time of the trains, and had learned that none was scheduled to cross the trestle for some time. Of course there might have been a special, but that did not happen.

Joe was safe. He rode along the even road-bed for some distance and then, following the directions the villagers had given him, he turned down the embankment into a country road. A little later he was on the highway that led to the town where the circus was showing.

"I'll get there just about in time," thought Joe as he looked at his watch.

"Well, I was just thinking about sending out a searching party for you, Joe," remarked Jim Tracy, as our hero rode swiftly up to the show grounds.

"I'm not late," was the reply.

"No. But it was getting near your time, and I wanted to make sure you were on hand."

"Well, I am," replied Joe. But he did not tell until some time afterward what a narrow escape he had had from being late, nor what a risky ride he had taken.

"Oh, Joe, how dared you do it?" asked Helen, when he mentioned it to her. "How dared you? It was so dangerous!"

"Why, I guess I just didn't think anything at all about the danger," said Joe with a smile. "I knew it was the only way, and so----"

"You took it," finished Helen. "That's just like you, Joe."

Joe went through his trapeze work in the big tent that afternoon with as much vim and vigor as though he had not, an hour before, taken such a chance with his life. And he followed that up by doing his tank act with his usual success. He did not stay under water quite so long, however, as he found that he was tiring a little, and he wanted to save himself for the night's performance, when a bigger crowd would be present.

And at night Joe went two seconds ahead of his previous best record.

"You'll crowd the world's record yet," predicted Jim Tracy.

The show moved on, and at the next town it received an unexpected bit of advertising. For a reporter in the town where Joe had started on his sensational trestle ride had been given the facts by some of the eyewitnesses, to whom Joe had given his name.

The reporter wrote a thrilling story, and it was published in the paper of the city where the circus was billed the following day.

It was not until then that most of Joe's fellow performers heard about his feat, and it made a great sensation.

"Why didn't you save that act for the circus?" asked Jim Tracy. "It would have made a big hit and brought a crowd."

"I didn't have time to stage it properly," Joe said. "I was thinking of saving myself a fine for being late at the show."

But an unusually big crowd came to the show anyhow, brought by having read of Joe's thrilling ride. He was a sort of center of attraction as he went through his trapeze and tank acts.

Unexpected and impulsive as Joe's ride was, it formed the forerunner of what was afterward a big feature in his life, as will appear in due time.

For a week or more the circus moved along its mapped-out route, and nothing of moment occurred. The usual crowds came and went, the performers went through their acts successfully, and Joe and his trained seal did their turns to the great amusement and entertainment of the audiences, as well as satisfaction to the circus management. The swimming of Joe and the seal, the showy goldfish and the general setting of the act made it a most novel one.

"Is there any more word from Benny?" asked Helen one day.

"Nothing definite," Joe said. "He is still in the same condition. I have written to the doctor to make inquiries and find out if there is, in this country or abroad, any new means of treatment that could be given. Often foreign doctors know things those over here haven't heard of yet."

"Oh, I do hope they discover something," sighed Helen. "Poor Benny! I feel so sorry for him!"

The circus grounds in the town of Westford were located near a great reservoir which supplied water to several neighboring municipalities. And Westford was reached by the Sampson Brothers' Show about two weeks after Joe's sensational ride on the trestle.

After breakfast Joe and Helen strolled about the grounds, and having seen that the performing horse and the glass tank had reached the grounds safely, Joe proposed that he and Helen go for a little motor-cycle ride.

"But you'll have to promise not to take me over any railroad trestles," Helen warned him.

"I'll promise," agreed Joe.

They did not go far, and on their way back, as they passed the reservoir, they saw a big crowd gathered on the bank near a gate-house.

"Looks as if something was going on," said Joe, stopping the machine.

"Maybe some one is rivaling you in a high diving stunt," said Helen, half playfully.

They alighted and made their way into the throng.

"What's up?" asked Joe of a man.

"A diver is caught down in the outlet pipe," was the unexpected answer.

"A diver!" repeated Joe.

"Yes. A man in a diving suit went down to fix something that went wrong with one of the valves, and they can't get him up. He's been down several hours now and they're afraid he's dead!"