Читать книгу Frank Merriwell's Own Company; Or, Barnstorming in the Middle West - Burt L. Standish - Страница 5

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At last the report had reached the theater that Zolverein, the great magician, was dead. It was beginning to spread among the impatient spectators, who had been clamoring for some time for the curtain to go up.

Just then a clean, bright, business-appearing young man stepped in front of the curtain and immediately began to speak:

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am here to impart to you the sad information that Gerard Zolverein, the magician billed to appear here this evening, died suddenly and unexpectedly at the Midland Hotel at five minutes to eight this evening. For a long time he has been the subject of a serious heart trouble, which he was perfectly aware would finally cause his death; but his recovery, on former occasions from the attacks led him to believe that he would be able to appear before you this evening, despite the fact that he felt the trouble coming on immediately after supper. He sent Manager Burnham an assurance that he would be able to give his regular performance to-night, and thus it happens that the doors were opened here at the time advertised. Of course Manager Burnham regrets that he opened the doors at all, and in order to satisfy everyone present, he has made arrangements whereby you will be able to witness free of charge an entertainment thirty minutes in length, of modern magic and ventriloquism. At the end of thirty minutes all who desire may leave the theater, and their money will be refunded to them at the box office. Those who desire to remain will be able to witness the 'Spirit Mysteries,' 'Talking Head,' 'Educated Fly,' and other of the most wonderful things advertised as performed only by Zolverein himself. Remember that the first thirty minutes of this entertainment will be given entirely free of charge, and that due notice will be given so that all who may wish to leave may do so and collect their money at the box office. Please keep your seats while preparations for the free entertainment are made. Prof. Pombal will delight you with some choice selections on the piano."

This little speech was delivered easily and gracefully, and it won some applause, as the youth bowed himself off the stage and the "professor" took a seat at the piano.

Not a person left the theater, although there was a buzz of talk. Frank had not announced that he was the person who would give the entertainment, therefore there was considerable speculation among those present as to who would attempt to perform Zolverein's most difficult and marvelous feats.

Frank found the magician's costumes in a dressing room, and it happened that they fitted him very well, as Zolverein had been a well-built man, so he made haste to get into one of the suits.

The magician's assistant was present, and Frank had a talk with him. The man agreed to assist Merry that evening, although he was thoroughly broken up by the knowledge of his employer's sudden death, having been sent to the theater by Zolverein to get everything ready for the evening performance, and not having entertained an idea that the magician would not recover and appear that night as advertised.

By the time Prof. Pombal had played two selections, Frank was ready to go on.

Naturally Merriwell was nervous, but he braced himself for the task before him. Having practiced amateur magic and studied the famous feats of noted conjurers and necromancers, he believed himself capable of amusing and pleasing the audience, even though not capable of giving such a finished performance as one who was practicing the feats night after night.

Frank walked out onto the stage immediately upon the rising of the curtain. He started in at once by telling a story about two Irishmen, one of whom was down in a well, into which he had fallen while looking at the reflection of the moon, which he had mistaken for a cheese, being slightly intoxicated. His friend at the mouth of the well was trying to get him out, and the talk of the two was very laughable. The voice of the intoxicated man in the well seemed to issue from deep down beneath the stage floor, and was a very clever piece of ventriloquism. A good portion of the audience was amused, but some pretended to be bored at the very start.

Merry told four stories in rapid succession, and the last one was the best of them all, giving him an opportunity to imitate the sounds produced by fowls, birds, animals and so forth. At the finish the audience burst into a round of applause, and Frank saw he had them in a good humor at last.

Then he proceeded to do a number of his own tricks, beginning with the spinning of an egg on a shallow japanned tray. To do this trick it is necessary to use a hard-boiled egg, and, having started the egg spinning on its small end, the tray should be kept moving in a small circle in the opposite direction to that in which the egg is spinning.

Then Merry produced a short, sharp sword, which he passed round for the audience to examine, warning them to be careful not to cut themselves with it. The sword was very keen, as was easily ascertained.

When the sword was returned to him, Frank proceeded to slice some sheets of paper with it, to further demonstrate its keenness. Then he took a potato and passed it to the assistant.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "I propose to cut this potato in two on the open hand of M. Mazarin with a single stroke of this sword, without leaving the slightest mark on his hand. I do this to prove to you that the magician should possess such skill that he can strike at a vital spot with a deadly weapon and check the stroke within a hair's breadth of where he may desire."

He then took the potato and sliced off a thin piece from one side, returning it to the assistant, who held his hand outstretched with the potato upon it.

Then Merriwell thrust back his cuff and carefully poised the sword, as if gauging the exact force he would put into the stroke. Then he made a savage feint, stopping short of touching the potato. Next time, however, he seemed to strike swift and hard, and the potato was divided in two parts upon the assistant's hand, and, as Merry had predicted, the keen edge of the sword left no mark on the man's flesh.

As this did not seem to impress the audience very much, Frank next proposed to divide a potato placed upon the neck of the assistant.

"You will realize, ladies and gentlemen," he said, "that I could quite as easily strike Monsieur Mazarin's head from his body. In fact, should I fail to check the descent of the sword at exactly the proper instant, I must inflict a fatal wound."

Now there was a rustling in the audience.

"Ach-ew! a-chew!" sneezed an old farmer in the front row. "Gol darn this cold!" he muttered, in a stage whisper. "I hev to sneeze ev'ry time jest at the p'int where he's doin' somethin' I want to see."

This caused a slight titter, and Frank spotted the possessor of the cold.

"I'll attend to your cold later, sir," he said. "Without doubt it is very annoying to you, but I will show you how to make it profitable. Whenever I catch cold, I retire from active life and do my best to cultivate that cold, for I find I can make more money sneezing than in any other way."

The old fellow was in a bad humor, and he promptly retorted:

"I didn't come here to be made fun of, young man! Yeou jest attend to your business, an' I'll attend to mine. Ker-chew! ker-chee-eew! ker-chee-ee-eew!"

Some of the audience laughed outright, while others showed sympathy for the afflicted farmer.

"I assure you, my dear sir," smiled Merry, from the front of the stage. "I have no thought of making fun of you. If I do not keep my word and show you how to turn every sneeze into good hard money, I will apologize to you before the audience. But first I must complete what I have started to do."

He picked up another potato and sliced off a thin piece from one side of it. Then he placed a chair, on which the assistant sat, leaning far forward and bowing his head, so the back of his neck was a horizontal plain.

Frank carefully placed the potato on the back of the man's neck. Then he stepped back and lifted the sword.

"Hold on, b'gosh!" cried the farmer, rising from his seat. "I want to—ker-chew! ker-chew! ker-chew!—see this here—ker-chew! ker-chew!—piece of business! An' I want to tell yeou that yeou had better—ker-chew! ker-chew!—go purty dad-dinged keerful, for if yeou cut that feller's head off. I'll—ker-chew! ker-chee-ew! ker-chee-ee-eew!"

The old fellow went off into such a violent fit of sneezing that he could not finish what he was trying to say.

"Too bad!" sighed Frank, in a drolly ludicrous manner. "If I had that cold it would be worth a fortune to me. How I envy you, sir!"

The old fellow dropped into his seat, still sneezing and gasping.

Frank made a flourish with the sword, and out in the audience a nervous woman uttered a little cry. The bright blade glittered and flashed through the air, the keen edge struck the potato, and it seemed that it must cleave potato and sever Monsieur Mazarin's head from his body. But the potato simply dropped to the floor in two pieces, and the assistant straightened up, smiling and unscathed.

Some of the spectators clapped their hands. A voice cried "Fake!"

Frank simply laughed.

"In this world," he said, placidly, "fifty per cent. of the things we see are fakes. In modern magic about one hundred per cent. is a fake. That's what makes it interesting. Explain the fakes—if you can."

This was said so good-naturedly that Frank won the sympathy of the audience.

Indeed, the potato-cutting trick was a fake. A needle had been inserted crosswise in each potato, near one side. When the time came to do the trick, Frank sliced off the portion of the potato near the needle, pretending to do it so the potato would lay perfectly level. Then he struck with sufficient force to divide the potato, but when the edge of the sword struck the needle, which lay crosswise to the sword, the keen weapon could go no further, and the potato fell apart.

It was a very simple little trick, but it looked like a rather remarkable feat.

"Ker-chew!" sneezed the old farmer in the front row. "That's purty good, but that air Zolverein could knock the spots offen that, an' he never made no bluffs abaout turnin' sneezin' inter money."

"Nor do I make any bluffs, sir," said Frank, pleasantly. "If you will come up here onto the stage, I'll show you how to make your cold pay you well."

"Oh, yeou ain't goin' to git me up there an' then make a gol darn guy of me for northin'."

"I have no idea of doing that, sir. If you are not well paid for your time and trouble, I will refund you the money you paid to get in here to-night, and you shall stay through the entire entertainment without paying."

"That's fair, b'gosh!" exclaimed the man, as he started to get up.

At this point, a quiet little woman who had been sitting at his side caught him by the coat-tail and pulled him back into his seat.

"Jo-si-ah!" she whispered, shrilly, "don't yeou go up there! Yeou can't tell whut he'll be doin' to ye."

"Waal, if he tried to—ker-chew! ker-chew!—do anything that I don't like, I'll jest mop up the platform with him! Let me 'lone, Nancy!"

"Yeou set still, Josiah!"

"See here, old lady, I usually let yeou do the bossin', but I kainder guess I'll do as I darn please this—ker-chew!—time."

There seemed danger of a family row there in the front row, but Merry said:

"If I fail to satisfy you, sir, I will also refund the price of your wife's admission."

"Hear that, Nancy! Jeeminy! This is the chance to make a dollar, fer he'll hev a darn hard time satisfyin' me!"

That brought down the house. There was a roar of laughter, and, in the midst of it, the old farmer broke away and scrambled for the stage.

There were some steps at one end, and Frank assisted the man up those, grasping his hand and shaking it warmly as he led him to a seat in the center of the stage.

"Oh, sir!" sighed Merry, with apparent sincerity, "if I had your beautiful cold, I could sneeze out a barrel of money in a very short time."

"You're gassin'."

"Certainly not. After I made the discovery of how easy it is to turn sneezing into good money, I tried to keep a cold all the time. Before that I could not seem to get rid of a cold when I caught it. Since then I am not able to keep one after I have caught it. I used to have a cold in the fall, the winter, the spring, the summer. When I didn't have a cold, I had hay fever. I sneezed till I was sore and weary of life. Then I sat down and set to work on a plan to turn my sneezing into money. I studied over it for many moons, and finally I hit upon a plan. I put it to the test, and the very first day of my experiment I succeeded in sneezing about a peck of copper cents. I was not satisfied with that, and I sought to improve the system. Before the end of the second day, I was able to sneeze five and ten-cent pieces, but my cold was getting better. On the third day I became sufficiently skillful to sneeze silver quarters, but, to my intense regret, I found I could not sneeze very often. The next day I only sneezed seven times, but every sneeze brought me a good new half dollar. When the fifth day came I sneezed just twice, but each time I got a silver dollar. And the following day I was unable to sneeze at all, so I ceased to advance in skill, but I am satisfied I should have been able to sneeze ten-dollar gold pieces within a few more days. Since then I have done everything in my power to catch a good, fat, sneezing cold, but fate is against me. I expose myself to all kinds of wretched weather, but I can't get a cold that will stay with me more than a couple of sneezes. It is a sad, sad fate for one who has made such an important discovery."

"Waal, I wisht you could have this cold. It keeps me jest—ker-chew! ker-chew——"

"Hold on! hold on!" cried Frank, bustling about; "don't waste such splendid sneezes! It is too bad!"

"Have to let 'em come when they come, b'jee!"

"Well, we'll soon turn them to account. Are you in favor of free silver?"

"I be, b'gosh!"

"I thought so. That will make it all the easier to turn those sneezes to account."

Frank borrowed a hat from a man in the audience.

"This will do to catch the money in," he said, showing that it was quite empty. "Of course there are no holes in it."

Then he proceeded to poke his index finger at the hat, and apparently thrust it through the crown.

"My! my!" he exclaimed, wiggling his finger and looking at it ruefully. "That's too bad! I'm afraid I have spoiled the hat. It was very tender, or I could not have thrust my finger through it so easily."

Then he seemed to pull his finger out, but when he looked for the hole the hat was not damaged in the least.

Of course this was a simple trick, done with a false finger, but Frank sandwiched it in with the rest, and it "went."

"I think this hat will do, after all," he observed. "Now, sir, as you are in favor of free silver, I want you to put your mind upon one thing. I want you to think constantly of silver dollars. When you feel that you must sneeze, keep repeating to yourself, 'Come, silver dollars—come, come, come!' I assure you that you will be astonished by the result. I see that you are about to—— Ah! there you go!"

Frank held one hand over the man's head, while the other hand held the hat inverted before him.

The old fellow caught his breath and threw back his head. Forward he came, and a most explosive sneeze burst from him.

It seemed that four or five shining silver dollars burst from his mouth and nose and fell jingling into the hat!