L. Frank Baum (8 page)

As he comprehended the full wonder of the phenomenon he was observing
Edward uttered a low cry of amazement, but thereafter he silently gazed
upon the fierce battle that still raged far away upon the African VELD.
Before long his keen eye recognized the troops engaged and realized
their imminent danger.

"They'll be utterly annihilated!" he gasped. "What shall we do?"

"Oh, we can't do anything just now," answered Rob. "But it's curious
to watch how bravely the poor fellows fight for their lives."

The minister, who by this time was also peering into the box, groaned
aloud, and then all three forgot their surroundings in the tragedy they
were beholding.

Hemmed in by vastly superior numbers, the English were calmly and
stubbornly resisting every inch of advance and selling their lives as
dearly as possible. Their leader fell pierced by a hundred bullets,
and the king, who had known him from boyhood, passed his hand across
his eyes as if to shut out the awful sight. But the fascination of the
battle forced him to look again, and the next moment he cried aloud:

"Look there! Look there!"

Over the edge of a line of hills appeared the helmets of a file of
English soldiers. They reached the summit, followed by rank after
rank, until the hillside was alive with them. And then, with a ringing
cheer that came like a faint echo to the ears of the three watchers,
they broke into a run and dashed forward to the rescue of their brave
comrades. The Boers faltered, gave back, and the next moment fled
precipitately, while the exhausted survivors of the courageous band
fell sobbing into the arms of their rescuers.

Rob closed the lid of the Record with a sudden snap that betrayed his
deep feeling, and the king pretended to cough behind his handkerchief
and stealthily wiped his eyes.

"'Twasn't so bad, after all," remarked the boy, with assumed
cheerfulness; "but it looked mighty ticklish for your men at one time."

King Edward regarded the boy curiously, remembering his abrupt entrance
and the marvelous device he had exhibited.

"What do you call that?" he asked, pointing at the Record with a finger
that trembled slightly from excitement.

"It is a new electrical invention," replied Rob, replacing it in his
pocket, "and so constructed that events are reproduced at the exact
moment they occur."

"Where can I purchase one?" demanded the king, eagerly.

"They're not for sale," said Rob. "This one of mine is the first that
ever happened."

"Oh!"

"I really think," continued the boy, nodding sagely, "that it wouldn't
be well to have these Records scattered around. Their use would give
some folks unfair advantage over others, you know."

"Certainly."

"I only showed you this battle because I happened to be in London at
the time and thought you'd be interested."

"It was very kind of you," said Edward; "but how did you gain
admittance?"

"Well, to tell the truth, I was obliged to knock over a few of your
tall life-guards. They seem to think you're a good thing and need
looking after, like jam in a cupboard."

The king smiled.

"I hope you haven't killed my guards," said he.

"Oh, no; they'll come around all right."

"It is necessary," continued Edward, "that public men be protected from
intrusion, no matter how democratic they may be personally. You would
probably find it as difficult to approach the President of the United
States as the King of England."

"Oh, I'm not complaining," said Rob. "It wasn't much trouble to break
through."

"You seem quite young to have mastered such wonderful secrets of
Nature," continued the king.

"So I am," replied Rob, modestly; "but these natural forces have really
existed since the beginning of the world, and some one was sure to
discover them in time." He was quoting the Demon, although
unconsciously.

"You are an American, I suppose," said the minister, coming close to
Rob and staring him in the face.

"Guessed right the first time," answered the boy, and drawing his
Character Marking spectacles from his pocket, he put them on and stared
at the minister in turn.

Upon the man's forehead appeared the letter "E."

"Your Majesty," said Rob, "I have here another queer invention. Will
you please wear these spectacles for a few moments?"

The king at once put them on.

"They are called Character Markers," continued the boy, "because the
lenses catch and concentrate the character vibrations radiating from
every human individual and reflect the true character of the person
upon his forehead. If a letter 'G' appears, you may be sure his
disposition is good; if his forehead is marked with an 'E' his
character is evil, and you must beware of treachery."

The king saw the "E" plainly marked upon his minister's forehead, but
he said nothing except "Thank you," and returned the spectacles to Rob.

But the minister, who from the first had been ill at ease, now became
positively angry.

"Do not believe him, your Majesty!" he cried. "It is a trick, and
meant to deceive you."

"I did not accuse you," answered the king, sternly. Then he added: "I
wish to be alone with this young gentleman."

The minister left the room with an anxious face and hanging head.

"Now," said Rob, "let's look over the record of the past day and see if
that fellow has been up to any mischief."

He turned the cylinder of the Record to "England," and slowly the
events of the last twenty-four hours were reproduced, one after the
other, upon the polished plate.

Before long the king uttered an exclamation. The Record pictured a
small room in which were seated three gentlemen engaged in earnest
conversation. One of them was the accused minister.

"Those men," said the king in a low voice, while he pointed out the
other two, "are my avowed enemies. This is proof that your wonderful
spectacles indicated my minister's character with perfect truth. I am
grateful to you for thus putting me upon my guard, for I have trusted
the man fully."

"Oh, don't mention it," replied the boy, lightly; "I'm glad to have
been of service to you. But it's time for me to go."

"I hope you will favor me with another interview," said the king, "for
I am much interested in your electrical inventions. I will instruct my
guards to admit you at any time, so you will not be obliged to fight
your way in."

"All right. But it really doesn't matter," answered Rob. "It's no
trouble at all to knock 'em over."

Then he remembered his manners and bowed low before the king, who
seemed to him "a fine fellow and not a bit stuck up." And then he
walked calmly from the palace.

The people in the outer room stared at him wonderingly and the officer
of the guard saluted the boy respectfully. But Rob only smiled in an
amused way as he marched past them with his hands thrust deep into his
trousers' pockets and his straw hat tipped jauntily upon the back of
his head.

Rob passed the remainder of the day wandering about London and amusing
himself by watching the peculiar ways of the people. When it became so
dark that there was no danger of his being observed, he rose through
the air to the narrow slit in the church tower and lay upon the floor
of the little room, with the bells hanging all around him, to pass the
night.

He was just falling asleep when a tremendous din and clatter nearly
deafened him, and set the whole tower trembling. It was the midnight
chime.

Rob clutched his ears tightly, and when the vibrations had died away
descended by the ladder to a lower platform. But even here the next
hourly chime made his ears ring, and he kept descending from platform
to platform until the last half of a restless night was passed in the
little room at the bottom of the tower.

When, at daylight, the boy sat up and rubbed his eyes, he said,
wearily: "Churches are all right as churches; but as hotels they are
rank failures. I ought to have bunked in with my friend, King Edward."

He climbed up the stairs and the ladders again and looked out the
little window in the belfry. Then he examined his map of Europe.

"I believe I'll take a run over to Paris," he thought. "I must be home
again by Saturday, to meet the Demon, so I'll have to make every day
count."

Without waiting for breakfast, since he had eaten a tablet the evening
before, he crept through the window and mounted into the fresh morning
air until the great city with its broad waterway lay spread out beneath
him. Then he sped away to the southeast and, crossing the channel,
passed between Amiens and Rouen and reached Paris before ten o'clock.

Near the outskirts of the city appeared a high tower, upon the flat
roof of which a man was engaged in adjusting a telescope. Upon seeing
Rob, who was passing at no great distance from this tower, the man
cried out:

"APPROCHEZ!—VENEZ ICI!"

Then he waved his hands frantically in the air, and fairly danced with
excitement. So the boy laughed and dropped down to the roof where,
standing beside the Frenchman, whose eyes were actually protruding from
their sockets, he asked, coolly:

"Well, what do you want?"

The other was for a moment speechless. He was a tall, lean man, having
a bald head but a thick, iron-gray beard, and his black eyes sparkled
brightly from behind a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. After
attentively regarding the boy for a time he said, in broken English:

"But, M'sieur, how can you fly wizout ze—ze machine? I have
experiment myself wiz some air-ship; but you—zere is nossing to make
go!"

Rob guessed that here was his opportunity to do the Demon a favor by
explaining his electrical devices to this new acquaintance, who was
evidently a man of science.

"Here is the secret, Professor," he said, and holding out his wrist
displayed the traveling machine and explained, as well as he could, the
forces that operated it.

The Frenchman, as you may suppose, was greatly astonished, and to show
how perfectly the machine worked Rob turned the indicator and rose a
short distance above the tower, circling around it before he rejoined
the professor on the roof. Then he showed his food tablets, explaining
how each was stored with sufficient nourishment for an entire day.

The scientist positively gasped for breath, so powerful was the
excitement he experienced at witnessing these marvels.

"Eet is wonderful—grand—magnifique!" he exclaimed.

"But here is something of still greater interest," continued Rob, and
taking the Automatic Record of Events from his pocket he allowed the
professor to view the remarkable scenes that were being enacted
throughout the civilized world.

The Frenchman was now trembling violently, and he implored Rob to tell
him where he might obtain similar electrical machines.

"I can't do that," replied the boy, decidedly; "but, having seen these,
you may be able to discover their construction for yourself. Now that
you know such things to be possible and practical, the hint should be
sufficient to enable a shrewd electrician to prepare duplicates of
them."

The scientist glared at him with evident disappointment, and Rob
continued:

"These are not all the wonders I can exhibit. Here is another
electrical device that is, perhaps, the most remarkable of any I
possess."

He took the Character Marking spectacles from his pocket and fitted
them to his eyes. Then he gave a whistle of surprise and turned his
back upon his new friend. He had seen upon the Frenchman's forehead
the letters "E" and "C."

"Guess I've struck the wrong sort of scientist, after all!" he
muttered, in a disgusted tone.

His companion was quick to prove the accuracy of the Character Marker.
Seeing the boy's back turned, he seized a long iron bar that was used
to operate the telescope, and struck at Rob so fiercely that had he not
worn the Garment of Protection his skull would have been crushed by the
blow. At it was, the bar rebounded with a force that sent the
murderous Frenchman sprawling upon the roof, and Rob turned around and
laughed at him.

"It won't work, Professor," he said. "I'm proof against assassins.
Perhaps you had an idea that when you had killed me you could rob me of
my valuable possessions; but they wouldn't be a particle of use to a
scoundrel like you, I assure you! Good morning."

Before the surprised and baffled scientist could collect himself
sufficiently to reply, the boy was soaring far above his head and
searching for a convenient place to alight, that he might investigate
the charms of this famed city of Paris.

It was indeed a beautiful place, with many stately buildings lining the
shady boulevards. So thronged were the streets that Rob well knew he
would soon be the center of a curious crowd should he alight upon them.
Already a few sky-gazers had noted the boy moving high in the air,
above their heads, and one or two groups stood pointing their fingers
at him.

Pausing at length above the imposing structure of the Hotel Anglais,
Rob noticed at one of the upper floors an open window, before which was
a small iron balcony. Alighting upon this he proceeded to enter,
without hesitation, the open window. He heard a shriek and a cry of
"AU VOLEUR!" and caught sight of a woman's figure as she dashed into an
adjoining room, slamming and locking the door behind her.

"I don't know as I blame her," observed Rob, with a smile at the panic
he had created. "I s'pose she takes me for a burglar, and thinks I've
climbed up the lightning rod."

He soon found the door leading into the hallway and walked down several
flights of stairs until he reached the office of the hotel.

"How much do you charge a day?" he inquired, addressing a fat and
pompous-looking gentlemen behind the desk.