Joe Strong the Boy Fire-Eater The Most Dangerous Performance on Record / Barnum, Vance

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Title: Joe Strong The Boy Fire-Eater
       The Most Dangerous Performance on Record

Author: Vance Barnum

Release Date: January 2, 2004 [EBook #10579]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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JOE STRONG THE BOY FIRE-EATER

OR

_THE MOST DANGEROUS PERFORMANCE ON RECORD_

BY VANCE BARNUM

Author of "Joe Strong, the Boy Wizard," "Joe Strong and His Wings of
Steel," "Joe Strong and His Box of Mystery," etc.

1916



JOE STRONG, THE BOY FIRE-EATER



CHAPTER I

THE VANISHING LADY


"Ladies and gentlemen, if you will kindly give me your attention for a
few moments I will be happy to introduce to your favorable notice an
entertainer of world-wide fame who will, I am sure, not only mystify you
but, at the same time, interest you. You have witnessed the
death-defying dives of the Demon Discobolus; you have laughed with the
comical clowns; you have thrilled with the hurrying horses; and you have
gasped at the ponderous pachyderms. Now you are to be shown a trick
which has baffled the most profound minds of this or any other
city--aye, I may say, of the world!"

Jim Tracy, ringmaster and, in this instance, stage manager of Sampson
Brothers' Circus, paused in his announcement and with a wave of his hand
indicated a youth attired in a spotless, tight-fitting suit of white
silk. The youth, who stood in the center of a stage erected in the big
tent, bowed as the manager waited to allow time for the applause to die
away.

"You have all seen ordinary magicians at work making eggs disappear up
their sleeves," went on the stage manager. "You have, I doubt not,
witnessed some of them producing live rabbits from silk hats. But
Professor Joe Strong, who will shortly have the pleasure of entertaining
you, not only makes eggs disappear, but what is far more difficult, he
causes a lady to vanish into thin air.

"You will see a beautiful lady seated in full view of you. A moment
later, by the practice of his magical art, Professor Strong will cause
the same lady to disappear utterly, and he will defy any of you to tell
how it is done. Now, Professor, if you are ready--" and with a nod and a
wave of his hand toward the youth in the white silk tights, Jim Tracy
stepped off the elevated stage and hurried to the other end of the
circus tent where he had to see to it that another feature of the
entertainment was in readiness.

"Oh, Joe, I'm actually nervous! Do you think I can do it all right?"
asked a pretty girl, attired in a dress of black silk, which was in
striking contrast to Joe Strong's white, sheeny costume.

"Do it, Helen? Of course you can!" exclaimed the "magician," as he had
been termed by the ringmaster. "Do just as you did in the rehearsals and
you'll be all right."

"But suppose something should go wrong?" she asked in a low voice.

"Don't be in the least excited. I'll get you out of any predicament you
may get into. Tricks do, sometimes, go wrong, but I'm used to that. I'll
cover it up, somehow. However, I don't anticipate anything going wrong.
Now take your place while I give them a little patter."

This talk had taken place in low voices and with a rapidity which did
not keep the expectant audience waiting. Joe Strong, while he was
reassuring Helen Morton, his partner in the trick and also the girl to
whom he was engaged to be married, was rapidly getting the stage ready
for the illusion.

"Ladies and gentlemen," said Joe, as he advanced to the edge of the
stage, "I am afraid our genial manager has rather overstated my powers.
What I am about to do, to be perfectly frank with you, is a trick. I lay
no claim to supernatural powers. But if I can do a trick and you can't
tell how it is done, then you must admit that, for the moment, I am
smarter than you. In other words, I am going to deceive you. But the
point is--how do I do it? With this introduction, I will now state what
I am about to do.

"Mademoiselle Mortonti will seat herself on a stage in a chair in full
view of you all. I will cover her, for a moment only, with a silken
veil. This, if I were a real necromancer, I should say was to prevent
your seeing her dissolve into a spirit as she disappears. But to tell
you the truth, it is to conceal the manner in which I do the trick.
You'd guess that, anyhow, if I didn't tell you," he added.

There was a good-natured laugh at this admission.

"As soon as I remove the silken veil," went on Joe, "you will see that
the lady will have disappeared before your very eyes. What's that?
Through a hole in the stage did some one say?" questioned Joe, appearing
to catch a protesting voice.

"Well, that's what I hear everywhere I go," he went on with easy
calmness. "Every time I do the vanishing lady trick some one thinks she
disappears through a hole in the stage. Now, in order to convince you to
the contrary, I am going to put a newspaper over that part of the stage
where the chair is placed. I will show you the paper before and after
the trick. And if there is not a hole or a tear in the paper, either
before or after the lady has disappeared, I think you will admit that
the lady did not go through a hole in the stage floor. Won't you?" asked
Joe Strong. "Yes, I thought you would," he added, as he pretended to
hear a "yes" from somewhere in the audience.

"All ready now, Helen," he said in a low voice to the girl, and an
attendant brought forward an ordinary looking chair and a newspaper.

Joe, who had done the trick many times before, but not often with Helen,
was perfectly at ease. Helen was very frankly nervous. She had not done
the trick for some time, and Joe had introduced into it some novel
features since last presenting it. Helen was afraid she would cause some
hitch in the performance.

"You'll be all right," Joe said to her in a low voice. "Just act as
though you had done this every day for a year."

Placing the chair in the center of the stage and handing Joe the
newspaper, the attendant stepped back. Joe addressed the audience.

"You here see the paper," said the "magician," as he held it up. "You
see that there is no hole in it. I'll now spread it down on the stage.
If the lady disappears down through the stage she will have to tear the
paper. You shall see if she does."

Joe next placed the chair directly over the square of paper and motioned
to Helen. Her plain black dress, of soft, clinging silk, swayed about
her as she took her place.

"I might add," said Joe, pausing a moment after Helen had taken her
seat, "that in order to prevent any shock to Mademoiselle Mortonti I am
going to mesmerize her. She will then be unconscious. I do this for two
reasons. In totally disappearing there is sometimes a shock to a
person's mentality that is unpleasant. To avoid indicting that on
Mademoiselle Mortonti I will hypnotize her.

"The other reason I do that is that she may not know how or when she
disappears. Thus she will not be able to see how I do the trick, and so
cannot give away my secret."

Of course this was all "bunk" or "patter," to use names given to it by
the performers. It kept the attention of the audience and so enabled Joe
to do certain things without attracting too much attention to them. As a
matter of fact he did not mesmerize Helen, and she knew perfectly well
how the trick was done. Those who have read previous books of this
series are also in the secret.

Joe waved his hands in front of Helen's face. She swayed slightly in her
chair. Then her eyes closed as though against her will, and she seemed
to sleep.

"She is now in the proper condition for the trick," said Joe. "I must
beg of you not to make any sudden or unnecessary noise. You might
suddenly awaken her from the mesmeric slumber, and this might be very
serious."

As Joe said this with every indication of meaning it, there was a quick
hush among the audience. Even though many knew it was only a trick, they
could not help being impressed by the solemn note in Joe's voice. Such
is the psychology of an audience, and the power over it of a single
person.

"She now sleeps!" said Joe in a low voice. As a matter of fact, Helen
was wide awake, and as Joe stood between her and the circus crowd she
slowly opened one eye and winked at him. He was glad to see this, as it
showed her nervousness had left her.

"Now for the mystic veil!" cried Joe, as he took from his helper a thin
clinging piece of black silk gauze. He tossed this over Helen and the
chair, completely covering both from sight. He brought the veil around
behind Helen's head, fastening it there with a pin.

"To make sure that Mademoiselle Mortonti sleeps, I will now make the few
remaining mesmeric passes," said Joe. "I must be positive that she
slumbers."

He waved his hands slowly over the black robed figure. A great hush had
fallen over the big crowd. Every eye was on the black figure in the
center of the raised stage in the middle of the big circus tent. All the
other acts had temporarily stopped, to make that of Joe Strong, the boy
magician, more spectacular.

As Joe continued to wave one hand with an undulating motion over the
silent black-covered figure in the chair, he touched, here and there,
the drapery over Helen. He seemed very solicitous that it should hang
perfectly right, covering the figure of the girl and the chair
completely from sight in every direction all around the stage.

The music, which had been playing softly, suddenly stopped at a wave of
Joe's hand. He stood for a moment motionless before the veiled figure.

"Her spirit is dissolving into thin air!" he said in a low voice, which,
nevertheless, carried to every one in the crowd.

Suddenly Joe took hold of the veil in the center and directly over the
outlined head of the figure in the chair. Quickly the young magician
raised the soft, black silk gauze, whisking it quickly to one side.

The audience gasped.

The chair, in which but a moment before Helen Morton had been seated,
was empty! The girl had disappeared--vanished! Joe stooped and raised
from the stage the newspaper. It showed not a sign of break or tear.

Then, before the applause could begin, the girl appeared, walking out
from one of the improvised wings of the circus stage. She smiled and
bowed. The act had been a great success. Now the silent admiration of
the throng gave place to a wave of hand clapping and feet stamping.

"Was it all right, Joe?" asked Helen, as he held her hand and they both
bowed their appreciation of the applause.

"Couldn't have been better!" he said. "We'll do this trick regularly
now. It takes even better than my ten thousand dollar box mystery. You
were great!"

"I'm so glad!"

The two performers were bowing themselves off the stage when suddenly
there came the unmistakable roar of a wild beast from the direction of
the animal tent. It seemed to shake the very ground. At the same time a
voice cried:

"A tiger is loose! One of the tigers is out of his cage!"




CHAPTER II

A DANGEROUS SWING


There is no cry which so startles the average circus audience as that
which is raised when one of the wild animals is said to be at large. Not
even the alarm that the big tent is falling or is about to be blown over
will cause such a panic as the shout:

"A tiger is loose!"

There is something instinctive, and perfectly natural, in the fear of
the wild jungle beasts. Let it be said that a tiger or a lion is loose,
and it causes greater fear, even, than when it is stated that an
elephant is on a rampage. An elephant seems a big, but good-natured,
creature; though often they turn ugly. But a lion or a tiger is always
feared when loose.

But the chances are not one in a hundred that a circus lion or a tiger,
getting out of its cage, would attack any one. The creature is so
surprised at getting loose, and so frightened at the hue and cry at once
raised, that all it wants to do is to slink off and hide, and the only
harm it might do would be to some one who tried to stop it from running
away.

Joe Strong, Jim Tracy, and the other circus executives and employees
knew this as soon as they heard the cry: "A tiger is loose." Who raised
the cry and which of the several tigers in the Sampson show was out of
its cage, neither Joe nor any of those in the big tent near him knew.
But they realized the emergency, and knew what to do.

"Keep your seats! Don't rush!" cried Joe, as he released Helen's hand
and hurried to the front of the platform. "There is no danger! The
animal men will catch the tiger, if one is really loose. Stay where you
are! Keep your seats! Don't rush!"

It is the panic and rush that circus men are afraid of--the pushing and
"milling" of the crowd and the trampling under foot of helpless women
and children.

There was some commotion near the junction of the animal tent and that
in which the main performance took place. What it was, Joe did not
concern himself about just then. He felt it to be his task to prevent a
panic. And to this he lent himself, aided by Helen, Jim Tracy, and
others who realized the danger.

And while this is going on and while the expert animal men are preparing
to get back into its cage the tiger which, it was learned afterward, had
got out through an imperfectly fastened door, time will be taken to tell
new readers something about Joe Strong and the series of books in which
he is the central character.

Joe Strong seemed destined for a circus life and for entertaining
audiences with sleight-of-hand and other mystery matters. His father,
Alexander Strong, known professionally as Professor Morretti, was a
stage magician of talents, and Joe's mother, who was born in England,
had been a rider of trick horses.

His parents died when Joe was young. He did not have a very happy
boyhood, and one day he ran away from the man with whom he was living
and joined a traveling magician, who called himself Professor Rosello.
With him Joe, who had a natural aptitude for the business, learned to
become a sleight-of-hand performer.

In the first book of the series, entitled "Joe Strong, the Boy Wizard;
Or, the Mysteries of Magic Exposed," is told how Joe got on in life
after his first start. Joe was not only a stage magician, but he had
inherited strength, skill and daring, and he liked nothing better than
climbing to great heights or walking in lofty and dizzy places where the
footing was perilous. So it was perhaps natural that he should join the
Sampson Brothers' Show. And in the second book is related, under the
title, "Joe Strong on the Trapeze; Or, the Daring Feats of a Young
Circus Performer," what happened to our hero under canvas.

Joe loved the circus life, even though he made some enemies. But he had
many friends. There was Helen Morton. Then there was Benny Turton, who
did a "tank act," and was billed as a "human fish." Jim Tracy, the
ringmaster, Bill Watson, the veteran clown, and his wife, the circus
"mother," Tom Layton, the elephant man who taught the big creatures many
tricks, were only a few of Joe's friends.

Among others might be mentioned Senor Bogardi, the lion tamer, Mrs.
Talfo, the professional "fat lady," Senorita Tanzalo, the pretty snake
charmer, and Tom Jefferson, the "strong man." Joe loved them all. The
circus was like one big family, with, as might be expected, a "black
sheep" here and there.

Joe became an expert on the trapeze, and, later, when Benny Turton was
temporarily in a hospital, Joe "took on" the tank trick. In the third
volume some of his under-water feats are related, while in the fourth
book Joe's acts on a motor cycle on the high wire are dealt with.

With his "Wings of Steel," Joe caused a sensation, and after an absence
from the circus for a time he joined it again, bringing this act to it.

Eventually Joe was made one of the circus owners, and now controlled a
majority of the stock. He had also inherited considerable money from his
mother's relatives in England, so that now the youth was financially
well off for one who had started so humbly.

The book immediately preceding this one is called "Joe Strong and His
Box of Mystery; Or, the Ten Thousand Dollar Prize Trick." In that volume
is related how Joe constructed a trick box, out of which he made his way
after it was locked and corded about with ropes. Helen Morton helped him
in this trick, which was very successful.

The circus management offered a prize of ten thousand dollars to
whomsoever could fathom how the trick was done. Bill Carfax, an enemy of
Joe's and a former circus employee, tried to solve the problem but
failed.

The box trick was a great attraction for the circus, and Joe was in
higher favor than before.

He had been on the road with the show for some time when the events
detailed in the first chapter of this book took place.

By dint of much shouting and urging the people to retain their seats and
not rush into danger, Joe Strong and the others succeeded in calming the
circus crowd. Meanwhile there was much suppressed excitement.

"Is the tiger caught? Is he back in his cage?" was asked on every side.

While Joe and his fellow showmen were calming the crowd, the animal men
were having their own troubles. Burma, one of the largest of the
tigers, had got loose, having taken advantage of the open door of his
cage. He rushed out with a snarl of delight at his freedom. His jungle
cry was echoed by the roar of a lion in the next cage, and this was
followed by the cries and snarls of all the wild jungle beasts in the
tent.

Fortunately the animal tent was deserted by all save the keepers, the
audience having filed into the tent where the main show was going on.

"Head him off now! Head him off!" cried Tom Layton, the elephant man, as
he saw the tiger dart out of its cage--a flash of yellow and black.
"Head him off! Don't let him get in the main top!"

"That's right! Head him off!" cried Senor Bogardi, the lion tamer. "He
won't hurt any one--he's too scared!"

This was true, but it was difficult to believe, and some of the people
seated in the "main top," or big tent, who were nearest the animal tent,
hearing the cries and learning what had occurred, spread the alarm.

Burma, the tiger, slunk around in behind the cages of the other animals.
All about him were men with clubs and pointed goads, with whips and
pistols. The circus men had had to cope with situations like this
before. They surrounded the tiger, advancing on him in an ever-narrowing
circle, and in a short time they drove him into an emergency cage which
was pushed forward with the open door toward him. Burma had no choice
but to enter, to get away from the cracking whips and the prodding
goads. And, after all, he was glad to be barred in again.

So, without causing any harm except for badly frightening a number of
people in the audience, the tiger was caged again, and the circus
performance went on.

Joe Strong did his Box of Mystery trick. The usual announcement of a
reward of ten thousand dollars to whomsoever could solve it was made,
and there was great applause when Joe managed to get out of the big box
without disturbing the six padlocks or the binding ropes.

"I'm glad Bill Carfax isn't here to make trouble, trying to show how
much he knows about this trick," said Joe to the ringmaster, as he
stepped off the stage at the conclusion of the trick.

"Yes, you put several spokes in Bill's wheels when you turned the laugh
on him that time," said Jim Tracy. "I don't believe he'll ever show up
around our circus again."

But they little knew Bill Carfax. Those who have read the book just
before this will recall him and remember how unscrupulous he was. But
his plans came to naught then. Any one who wishes to learn how the
wonderful box trick was worked will find a full explanation in the
previous volume.

Helen Morton received much applause at the conclusion of her act with
her trick horse, Rosebud. Joe Strong's promised wife was an accomplished
bareback rider, as well as one of her fiance's helpers in his mystery
tricks.

"Well, I'm glad to-day is over," said Helen to Joe that night, as they
went to the train that was to take them to the next city where the
circus performance would be given. "What with doing the vanishing lady
act for the first time in a long while and the tiger getting loose, we
have had quite a bit of excitement."

"Yes," agreed Joe. "But everything came out all right. I'm going to put
on a new stunt next week."

"What's that?" asked Helen. "Something in the mystery line?"

"No. I'm going back to some of my high trapeze work. You know, since we
lost Wogand there hasn't been any of the big swing work done."

"That's so," agreed Helen. "But I've been so busy practicing the
vanishing lady act with you on top of my other work that I hadn't given
it a thought. But you aren't going to do that dangerous trick, are you?"

"I think I am," Joe answered. "It's sensational, and we need sensational
acts now to draw the crowds. I used to do it, and I can again, I think,
with a little practice. I'm going to start in and train to-morrow."

"I wish you wouldn't," said Helen, in a low voice, but Joe did not seem
to hear her.

The big swing was a trapeze act performed on the highest of the circus
apparatus. Part of this apparatus consisted of two platforms fastened to
two of the opposite main poles, and up under the very roof of the big
top.

Midway between the platforms, which were just large enough for a man to
stand on, was a trapeze with long ropes, capable of being swung from one
resting place to the other. It was, in reality, a "big swing."

Joe's act, which he had often done, but which of late had been performed
by a man billed as "Wogand," was to stand on one platform, have the long
trapeze started in a long, pendulumlike swing by an attendant, and then
to leap down, catch hold of the bar with his hands, and swing up to the
other platform. If he missed catching the bar it meant a dangerous fall;
a fall into a net, it is true, but dangerous none the less. Its danger
can be judged when it is said that Wogand had died as an indirect result
of a fall into the net. He missed the trapeze, toppled into the net,
and, by some chance, did not land properly. His back was injured, his
spine became affected, and he died.

When circus performers on the high trapezes fall or jump into the safety
nets, they do not usually do it haphazardly. If they did many would be
killed. There is a certain knack and trick of landing in a net.

Joe Strong, ever having the interest of the circus at heart, had decided
to do this dangerous swing. He was an acrobat, as well as a stage
magician, and he had decided to take up some of his earlier acts which
had been so successful.

"But I wish he wouldn't," said Helen to herself. "I have a premonition
that something will happen." Helen was very superstitious in certain
ways.

But to all she said, Joe only laughed.

"I'm going to do the big swing," he replied simply.




CHAPTER III

TOO MANY PEOPLE


Hundreds of men toiling and sweating over stiff canvas and stiffer
ropes. The thud of big wooden sledge hammers driving in the tent stakes.
The rumble of heavy wagons, and a cloud of dust where they were being
shoved into place by the busy elephants.

On one edge of the big, vacant lot were wisps of smoke from the fires in
the stove wagons, and from these same wagons came appetizing odors.

Here and there men and women darted, carrying portions of their costumes
in their hands. Clowns, partly made up, looked from their dressing tents
to smile or shout at some acquaintance who chanced to be passing by.

All this was the Sampson Brothers' Circus in preparation for a day's
performance.

Joe Strong, having had a good breakfast, without which no circus man or
woman starts the day, strolled over to where Helen Morton was just
finishing her morning meal.

"Feeling all right?" he asked her.

"Well, yes, pretty well," she answered.

"What's the matter?" asked Joe quickly, as he detected an under note of
anxiety in the girl's voice. "Is your star horse, Rosebud, lame or off
his feed?"

"Oh, no," she answered. "It's just--Oh, here comes Mother Watson, and I
promised to help her mend a skirt," said Helen quickly, as she turned to
greet the veteran clown's wife. "See you later, Joe!" she called to him
over her shoulder as she started away.

The young magician moved away toward his own private quarters.

"I wonder what's the matter with Helen," he said. "She doesn't act
naturally. If that Bill Carfax has been around again, annoying her, I'll
put him out of business for all time. But if he had been around I'd have
heard of it. I don't believe it can be that."

Nor was it. Helen's anxiety had to do with something other than Bill
Carfax, the unprincipled circus man who had so annoyed her before Joe
discharged him. And, as Joe had said, the man had not been seen publicly
since the fiasco of his attempt to expose Joe's mystery box trick.

"Well, I suppose she won't tell me what it is until she gets good and
ready," mused Joe. "Now I'll go in and have a little practice at the big
swing before the parade."

Joe did not take part in the street pageant, though Helen did, riding
her beautiful horse to the admiration, not only of the small boys and
their sisters, but the grown-up throng in the highways as well. Helen
made a striking picture on her spirited, but gentle, steed.

It was not that Joe Strong felt above appearing in the parade. That was
not his reason for not taking part. He had done so on more than one
occasion, and with his Wings of Steel had created more than one
sensation.

But now that he did a trapeze act, as well as working the
sleight-of-hand mysteries, his time was pretty well occupied. He had
not, as yet, done the big swing in public since that act was abandoned
on the death of the man who had been injured while doing it. But Joe had
been perfecting himself in it. He had had a new set of trapezes made,
and had ornamented them and the two platforms in a very striking manner.
In other words, the trick had a new "dress," and Joe, as one of the
circus proprietors, hoped it would go well and attract attention.

This was from a business standpoint, and not only because Joe was
himself the performer. Of course it was natural that he should like
applause--all do, more or less. But Joe was one of the owners of the
circus--the chief owner, in fact--and he wanted to make a financial
success of it. Nor was this a purely selfish reason. Many persons owned
stock in the enterprise, and Joe felt it was only fair to them to see
that they received a good return for their investment. Any trick he
could do to draw crowds he was willing to attempt.

So, while the parade was being gotten ready, Joe went inside the main
top, which by this time was erected, to see about having his platforms
and trapeze put in place. In this he was always very careful, as is
every aerial performer. The least slip of a rope may cause disaster, and
no matter how careful the attendants are, the performers themselves
always give at least a casual look to their apparatus.

"All right, Harry?" asked Joe of one of the riggers who had charge of
putting up the platforms and the big swing.

"Sure, it's all right, Mr. Strong!" was the answer. "I should say so! I
don't make no mistakes when I'm putting up trapezes. You'll find
everything shipshape and proper. Going to have a big crowd to-day, I
guess."

Joe looked at Harry Loper closely. The young man had never talked so
much before, being, on the whole, rather close-mouthed. As the man
passed Joe, after giving a pull on the last rope, the young magician
became aware that Harry had been drinking--and something stronger than
pink lemonade.

"I'm sorry about that!" mused Joe, as the rope rigger passed on. "If
there's any place a man ought not to drink it's in a circus, and
especially when he has to rig up high flying apparatus for others. It
was drink that put Bill Carfax out of business. I didn't know Harry was
that kind, I never noticed it before. I'm sorry. And I'll take extra
precautions that my ropes won't slip. You can't trust a man who drinks."

Joe shook his head a bit sadly. He was thinking of Bill Carfax, and of
the fact that he had had to discharge the man because, while under the
influence of liquor, he had insulted Helen. Then Bill had tried to get
revenge on Joe.

"I hope it doesn't turn out this way with Harry Loper," mused Joe, as he
began climbing up a rope ladder that led to one of the high platforms.
And as Harry had to do with the placing of this ladder, Joe tested it
carefully before ascending.

"I don't want to fall and be laid up in the middle of the circus
season," mused the young circus man, with a frown.

However, the ladder appeared to be perfectly secure, and as Joe went up,
finally reaching the high platform, he felt a sense of exhilaration.
Heights always affected him this way. He liked, more than anything else,
to soar aloft on his Wings of Steel. And he liked the sensation when he
leaped from one platform toward the swinging trapeze bar, aiming to
grasp it in his hands and swing in a great arc to the other little
elevated place, close under the top of the tent.

There was a thrill about it--a thrill not only to the performer but to
the audience as well--and Joe could hear the gasps that went up from
thousands of throats as he made his big swing.

But, for the time being, he gave his whole attention to the platform and
its fastenings. The platforms were not very likely to slip, being caught
on to the main tent poles, which themselves were well braced.

The real danger was in the long trapeze. Not only must the thin wire
ropes of this be strong enough to hold Joe's weight, but an added
pressure, caused by the momentum of his jump. And not only must the
cables be strong, but there must be no defect in the wooden bar and in
the place where the upper ends of the ropes were fastened to the top of
the tent.

"Well, this platform is all right," remarked Joe, as he looked it over.
"Now for the other and the trapeze."

He went down the rope ladder and climbed up another to the second
platform. The show would not start for several hours yet, and the tent
was filled with men putting in place the stage for Joe's magic tricks
and other apparatus for various performers. The parade was just forming
to proceed down town.

Joe found that Harry Loper had done his work well, at least as far as
the platforms were concerned. They were firmly fastened. The one to
which Joe leaped after his swing needed to be considerably stronger than
the one from which he "took off."

The next act of the young circus performer was to climb up to the very
top of the tent, and there to examine the fastenings of the trapeze
ropes. He spent some time at this, having reached his high perch by a
third rope ladder.

"I guess everything is all right," mused Joe. "Perhaps I did Harry an
injustice. He might have taken some stimulant for a cold--they all got
wet through the other night. But still he ought to be careful. He was a
little too talkative for a man to give his whole attention to fastening
a trapeze. But this seems to be all right. I'll do the big swing this
afternoon and to-night, in addition to the box trick and the vanishing
lady. Helen works exceedingly well in that."

Having seen that his aerial apparatus was all right, Joe next went to
his tent where his magical appliances were kept. Many stage tricks
depend for their success on special pieces of apparatus, and Joe's acts
were no exception.

Joe saw that everything was in readiness for his sleight-of-hand work,
and then examined his Box of Mystery. As this was a very special piece
of apparatus, he was very careful about it. His ability to get out of
it, once he was locked and roped in, depended on a delicate bit of
mechanism, and the least hitch in this meant failure.

But a test showed that it was all right, and as by this time it was
nearly the hour for the parade to come back and the preliminaries to
begin, Joe went over to the circus office to see if any matters there
needed his attention.

As he crossed the lot to where the "office" was set up in a small tent,
the first horses of the returning parade came back on the circus
grounds. Following was a mob of delighted small boys and not a few men.

"Looks as if we'd have a big crowd," said Joe to himself. "And it's a
fine day for the show. We'll make money!"

He attended to some routine matters, and then the first of the afternoon
audience began to arrive. As Joe had predicted, the crowd was a big one.

The young performer was in his dressing room, getting ready for the big
swing, which he would perform before his mystery tricks, when Mr. Moyne,
the circus treasurer, entered. There was a queer look on Mr. Moyne's
face, and Joe could not help but notice it.

"What's worrying you?" asked Joe. "Doesn't this weather suit you, or
isn't there a big enough crowd?"

"That's just it, Joe," was the unexpected answer. "There's too big a
crowd. We have too many people at this show, and that's what is worrying
me a whole lot!"

Joe Strong looked in surprise at the treasurer. What could Mr. Moyne
mean?




CHAPTER IV

THE RUSTED WIRE


"Yes," went on the circus treasurer, as he rubbed his chin reflectively,
"it's a curious state of affairs, and as you're so vitally interested I
came to you at once. There's going to be trouble!"

"Trouble!" cried Joe with a laugh. "I can't see that, Mr. Moyne. You say
there's a big crowd of people at our circus--too much of a crowd, in
fact. I can't see anything wrong in that. It's just what we're always
wanting--a big audience. Let 'em fill the tent, I say, and put out the
'Straw Seats Only' sign. Trouble! Why, I should say this was good luck!"
and Joe hastened his preparations, for he wanted to go on with the big
swing.

"Ordinarily," said Mr. Moyne, in the slow, precise way he had of
speaking, brought about, perhaps, by his need of being exact in money
matters, "a big crowd would be the very thing we should want. But this
time we don't--not this kind of a crowd."

"What do you mean?" asked Joe, beginning to feel that it was more than a
mere notion on the part of the treasurer that something was wrong. "Is
it a rough crowd? Will there be a 'hey rube!' cry raised--a fight
between our men and the mill hands?"

"Oh, no, nothing like that!" the treasurer hastened to assure Joe. "The
whole thing is just this. There are a great many more people in the main
top now than there are admission prices in the treasurer's cash box. The
books don't balance, as it were."

"More people in the tent than have paid their way?" asked Joe. "Well,
that always happens at a circus. Small boys will crawl in under the
canvas in spite of clubs."

"Oh, it isn't a question of the small boys--I never worry about them,"
returned Mr. Moyne. "But there are about a thousand more persons at the
performance which will soon begin than we have admission prices for. In
other words there are a thousand persons occupying fifty cent seats that
haven't paid their half dollar. It isn't the reserve chairs that are
affected. We're all right there. But fully a thousand persons have come
into the show, and we're short five hundred dollars in our cash."

"You don't tell me!" cried Joe. He saw that Mr. Moyne was very much in
earnest. "Have the ticket men and the entrance attendants been working a
flim-flam game on us?"

"Oh, no, it isn't that," said the treasurer. "I could understand that.
But the men are perfectly willing to have their accounts gone over and
their tickets checked up. They're straight!"

"Then what is it?" asked Joe.

"That's what we've got to find out," went on Mr. Moyne. "In some way the
thousand people have come in without paying the circus anything. And
they didn't sneak in, either. A few might do that, but a thousand
couldn't. They've come in by the regular entrance."

"Did they force themselves past without tickets?"

"No, each one had the proper coupon."

"Has there been a theft of our tickets?" demanded the young magician and
acrobat.

"No, our ticket account is all right, except there are a thousand extra
entrance coupons in the box--coupons taken in by the entrance
attendants. It's a puzzle to me," confessed the treasurer. "There is
some game being played on us, and we're out to the tune of five hundred
dollars by it already."

"Is there any way of finding out who these persons are who have come in
without paying us and having them ejected?" asked Joe.

"I don't see how," admitted Mr. Moyne. "If they were in reserved seats
it could be done, but not in the ordinary un-numbered fifty cent
section. The whole situation is that we have a thousand persons too many
at the show."

"Well, we'll have a meeting of the executive body and take it up after
the performance," said Joe, as he quickly prepared to get into his
aerial costume. "We'll have to go on with the performance now; it's
getting late. If we're swamped by people coming along who hold our
regular tickets we'll have to sit 'em anywhere we can. If we lose five
hundred dollars we'll make it up by having a smashing crowd, which is
always a good advertisement. I'll see you directly after the show, Mr.
Moyne."

"I wish you would," said the harassed treasurer. "Something must be done
about it. If this happens very often we'll be in a financial hole at the
end of the season."

He departed, looking at some figures he had jotted down on the back of
an envelope.

Joe Strong was puzzled. Nothing like this had ever come up before. True,
there had been swindlers who tried to mulct the circus of money, and
there were always small boys, and grown men, too, who tried to crawl in
under the tent. But such a wholesale game as this Joe had never before
known.

"Well, five hundred dollars, for once, won't break us," he said grimly,
as he fastened on a brightly spangled belt, "but I wouldn't want it to
happen very often. Now I wonder what luck I'll have in my big swing. I
haven't done it in public for some time, but it went all right in
practice."

Joe looked from his dressing room. He was all ready for his act now,
but the time had not yet come for him to go on. He saw Helen hastening
past on her way to enter the ring with her horse, Rosebud, which a groom
held at the entrance for her.

"Good luck!" called Joe, waving his hand and smiling.

"The same to you," answered Helen. "You'll need it more than I. Oh,
Joe," she went on earnestly, "won't you give up this big swing? Stick to
your box trick, and let me act with you in the disappearing lady stunt.
Don't go on with this high trapeze act!" she pleaded.

"Why, Helen! anybody would think you'd been bitten by the jinx bug!"
laughed Joe. "I thought you were all over that."

"Perhaps I am foolish," she said. "But it's because--"

She blushed and looked away.

"I suppose I should take it as a compliment that you are so interested
in my welfare," said Joe, with a smile. "And, believe me, I am. But,
Helen, I can't back out of this act now. It's been advertised big. I've
got to go on!"

"Then do be careful, won't you?" she begged. "Oh, do be careful!
Somehow, I have a feeling that--Oh, well, I won't set you to worrying by
telling you," she said quickly, with a laugh, in which, however, there
was no mirth. She smiled again, trying to make it a bright one; but Joe
saw that she was under a strain.

"I'll be careful," he promised. "Really, there's no danger. I've done
the stunt a score of times, and I can judge my distance perfectly.
Besides there's the safety net."

"Yes, I know, but there was poor--Oh, well, I won't talk about it! Good
luck!" and she hurried on, for it was time for her act--the whistle of
the ringmaster having blown.

Joe looked after the girl he loved. He smiled, and then a rather serious
look settled over his face. Like a flash there had come to him the
memory of the too loquacious Harry Loper, who had fitted up his aerial
apparatus.

"There can be nothing wrong with that," mused Joe. "I went over every
inch of it. I guess Helen is just nervous. Well, there goes my cue!"

He hurried toward the entrance, and then he began to ponder over the
curious fact of there being a thousand persons too many at the
performance.

"We'll have to straighten out that ticket tangle after the show," mused
Joe. "It's likely to get serious. I wonder--" he went on, struck by a
new thought. "I wonder if--Oh, no! It couldn't be! He hasn't been around
in a long while."

Out into the tent, filled with a record-breaking crowd, went Joe to the
place where his high trapeze was waiting for him. The band was playing
lively airs, on one platform some trained seals were juggling big balls
of colored rubber, and on another a bear was going about on roller
skates. In one end ring Helen was performing with Rosebud, while in
another a troupe of Japanese acrobats were doing wonderful things with
their supple bodies.

Joe waved his hand to Helen in passing, and then he began to ascend to
his high platform. When he reached it and stood poised ready for his
act, there came a shrill whistle from Jim Tracy, the ringmaster, who
wore his usual immaculate shirt front and black evening clothes--rather
incongruous in the daytime.

The whistle was the signal for the other acts to cease, that the
attention of all might be centered on Joe. This is always done in a
circus in the case of "stars," and Joe was certainly a star of the first
magnitude.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" cried Jim Tracy, with the accented drawl that
carried his voice to the very ends of the big tent. "Calling your
attention to one of the most marvelous high trapeze acts ever performed
in any circus!"

He pointed dramatically to Joe, who stood up straight, ready to do his
act.

"Are you ready?" asked the man who was to release the trapeze, which
was caught up at one side of the platform opposite Joe.

"Ready," answered the young acrobat.

The man pulled a rope which released a catch, letting the trapeze start
on its long swaying swing. The man pulled it by means of a long, thin
cord, until it was making big arcs, like some gigantic pendulum.

Joe watched it carefully, judging it to the fraction of an inch. He
stood poised and tense on the gayly decorated platform, himself a fine
picture of physical young manhood. The band was blaring out the latest
Jazz melody.

Suddenly, from his perch, the young acrobat gave a cry, and Jim Tracy,
on the ground below, hearing it, held up his white-gloved hand as a
signal for the music to cease.

Then Joe leaped. Full and fair he leaped out toward the swinging bar of
the big trapeze, the snare drum throbbing out as he jumped. He was dimly
conscious of thousands of eyes watching him--eyes that looked curiously
and apprehensively up. And he realized that Helen was also watching him.

As true as a die, Joe's hands caught and gripped the bar of the swinging
trapeze. So far he was safe. The momentum of his jump carried him in a
long swing, and he at once began to undulate himself to increase his
swing. He must do this in order to get to the second platform.

As the young performer began to do this, he looked up at the wire ropes
of his trapeze.

It was a look given instinctively and for no particular purpose, as
Joe's eyes must rest, most of all, on the second platform where he
needed to land, to save himself from a bad fall.

As his eyes glanced along the steel cables on which his life depended,
he saw, to his horror, a spot of rust on one. And at the spot of rust
several of the thin strands of twisted wire were loose and frayed.

The cable seemed about to give way!




CHAPTER V

A FIRE SENSATION


Joe Strong had to think quickly. Every acrobat, every person who does
"stunts" in a circus, must; for something is always happening, or on the
verge of taking place. And when Joe looked up and saw the rusted wire
and noted the fraying strands, several thoughts shot through his mind at
once.

"That rust spot wasn't there this morning when, I looked at the
trapeze," he mused. "And it hasn't rained since. How did it get there?"

He thought of the too talkative Harry Loper, and an ugly suspicion
associated itself with him. But Joe had no time for such thoughts then.
What was vital for him to know was whether or not the thin wire cable
would remain unbroken long enough for him to reach the maximum of his
swing, and land on the platform. Or would he fall, spoiling the act and
also endangering himself?

True he might land in the net in such a way as to come to no harm, as he
had done many times, and as many performers before him had done. But
the danger was that in a sudden and unexpected drop downward he might
not be able to get his limbs in the proper landing position.

Joe Strong had nerve. If he had lacked it he would never have been so
successful. And at once he decided on a courageous proceeding.

"I'll bring all my weight suddenly on that left hand cable," he mused,
as he swung to and fro, from side to side of the big tent. "If it's
going to break it will do so then. And I'll be ready for it. I'll then
keep hold of the trapeze bar, which will be straight up and down instead
of crosswise, and swing by that. The other cable seems all right." This
was a fact which Joe ascertained by a quick inspection.

There was no time for further thought. As he swung, Joe suddenly shifted
his weight, bringing it all on the frayed and strangely rusted cable. As
he half expected, it gave way, and he dropped in an instant, but not
far.

The watching crowd gasped. It looked like an accident. And it was, in a
way, but Joe had purposely caused it. As the wire broke Joe held tightly
to the wooden bar, which was now upright in his hands instead of being
horizontal. And though it slipped through his fingers, perhaps for the
width of his palm, at last he gripped it in a firm hold and kept on with
his swing.

And then the applause broke forth, for the audience thought it all a
part of the trick--they thought that Joe had purposely caused the cable
to break to make the act more effective.

To and fro swung Joe, nearer and nearer to the second platform, and
then, reaching the height of the long arc, he turned his body and
stepped full and fair on the little square of velvet-covered boards.

With a lithe contortion, Joe squirmed to an upright position, recovering
his balance with a great effort, for he had been put out in his
calculations of distance, and then, turning, he bowed to the crowds,
revolving on the platform to take in every one.

Again the applause broke forth, to be drowned in the boom and ruffle of
the drums as the band began to play. There is little time in a circus,
where act follows act so quickly, for long acknowledgments.

The other performers came into the rings or on to the raised platforms,
and Joe descended by means of the rope ladder. Helen met him, and they
walked toward the dressing rooms.

"That was a wonderful trick, Joe," she said. "But I didn't see you
practice that drop."

"I didn't practice it," he remarked dryly. "I did it on the spur of the
moment."

"Joe Strong! wasn't it dangerous?"

"Well, a little."

"What made you do it?"

"I couldn't help it."

"You couldn't help it? Joe--do you mean--?" She sensed that something
was wrong, but walking around the circus arena, with performers coming
and going, was not the place to speak of it. Joe saw that she
understood.

"I'll tell you later," he said. "We have to get ready for the trick box
and the vanishing lady stunt now."

"Oh, Joe! were you in much danger?" she asked in a low voice.

"Oh, not much," he answered, and he tried to speak lightly. Yet he did
not like to think of that one moment when he saw the rusted and broken
wire.

While Joe and Helen are preparing for the box act, which has been
treated fully in the previous volume, the explanation of how the
vanishing lady trick was accomplished will be given, though that, too,
has been explained in an earlier volume.

A large newspaper is put on the stage and the chair set on the paper,
thus, seemingly, precluding the possibility of a trap door being cut in
the stage through which the lady in the chair might slip. The word
"seemingly" is used with a due sense of what it means. The newspaper was
not a perfect one. On one of its sides which was not exhibited to the
audience, there was cut an opening, or trap, that exactly corresponded
in size with a trap door on the stage. The paper, as explained in the
previous book, is strengthened with cardboard, and the trap is a double
one, being cut in the center, the flaps being easily moved either way.

The audience thinks it sees a perfect newspaper. But there is a square
hole in it, but concealed as is a secret trap door.

When Joe laid the paper on the stage he placed it so that the square,
double flap in it was exactly over the trap in the stage floor. He then
drew the page of the paper that he had held out to the audience toward
himself, exposing the trap for use, but because it was so carefully
made, and the cut was so fine, it was not visible from the front.

Helen took her place in the chair, which, of course, was a trick one. It
was fitted with a concealed rod and a cap, and it was over this cap,
brought out at the proper moment, that Joe carefully placed the black
veil, when he was pretending to mesmerize Helen. There was a cross rod,
also concealed in the chair, and on either end of this, something like
the epaulettes of a soldier, so that when these ends were under the veil
and the cap was in place it looked as though some one sat in the chair,
when, really, no one did.

Helen was in the chair at the start. But as soon as she was covered by
the veil she began to get out The seat of the chair was hinged within
its frame As Helen sat on it, and after she had been covered with the
veil, she rested her weight on her hands, which were placed on the
extreme outer edges of this seat frame. She pulled a catch which caused
the seat to drop, and at the same time the trap beneath her, including
the prepared newspaper, was opened by an attendant. The black veil all
about the chair prevented the audience seeing this.

Helen lowered herself down through the dropped seat of the chair,
through the trap, and under the stage. And while she was doing this it
still looked as if she were in the chair, for the false cap and the
extended cross rod made outlines as if of a human form beneath the black
veil.

As soon as Helen was out of the chair and beneath the stage an attendant
closed the newspaper and wooden floor traps. Joe then suddenly raised
the veil, taking in its folds the false cap and the cross piece which
had represented Helen's shoulders. They were thin and light--these
pieces of trick apparatus--and no one suspected they were in the veil.
The hinged seat of the chair snapped back in place by means of a spring,
and when Joe stepped aside, holding the veil, there was the empty chair;
and the newspaper, which he picked up, seemed to preclude the
possibility of there having been a trap in the stage. But Joe was
careful how he exhibited this paper to his audience.

And so it was that the lady "vanished."

"And now, Joe, tell me all about it!" demanded Helen, when the circus
was over for the afternoon, and the box and vanishing tricks had been
successfully performed. "What happened to your trapeze?"

"Some one spilled acid on one of the wire ropes, and it ate into the
metal, corroding it and separating a number of the strands so that a
little extra weight broke them," said Joe.

"Acid on the cable?" cried Helen. "How did you find out?"

"I just examined the wire. I knew it couldn't have rusted naturally in
such a short time. There was a peculiar smell about the wire, and I know
enough of chemistry to make a simple acid test! What kind of acid was
used I don't know, but it was strong enough to eat the steel."

"Who could have put it on?"

"That I've got to find out!"

"Was it Harry Loper?"

"I taxed him with it, but he swears he knew nothing of it," said Joe.
"I'm inclined to believe him, too. I charged him with drinking, and he
could not deny that. But he said he met some old friends and they
induced him to have a little convivial time with them. No, I don't
believe he'd do it. He's weak and foolish, but he had no reason to try
to injure me."

"Who would, Joe? Of course there's Bill Carfax, but he hasn't been seen
near the circus of late."

"No, I don't believe it could have been Bill. I'll have to be on my
guard."

"Do, Joe!" urged Helen. "Oh, I can't bear to think of it!"

"Don't then!" laughed Joe, trying to make light of it. "Let's go down
town and I'll buy you some ice cream."

"But you're not going to give up trying to find out who put acid on the
trapeze, are you?"

"No, indeed!" declared the young performer. "I have two problems on my
hands now--that and trying to learn how too many persons came to the
circus this afternoon," and he told Helen about the extra tickets.

"That's queer!" she exclaimed. "Some jinx bug must be after us!"

"Don't get superstitious!" warned Joe. "Now we'll forget our troubles.
They may not amount to anything after all."

But, though he spoke lightly, Joe was worried, and he was not going to
let Helen know that. They went into an ice-cream parlor and "relaxed,"
as Helen called it.

The two were on their way back to the circus lot, intending to go to
supper and prepare for the evening entertainment, when there was a
sudden alarm down the street, and, in an instant, the fire engines and
other apparatus dashed past.

"A fire!" cried Joe. "Come on, Helen! It's just down the street!"

They could see smoke pouring from a small building and a crowd rushing
toward it. Thither, also, the fire apparatus was dashing. Joe and Helen
were among the early arrivals.

"What is it?" asked Joe of an officer. "I mean what sort of place is
that?" and he pointed to the building, which was now obscured by smoke.

"Dime museum," was the answer. "Lot of fakes. I sent in the alarm. A
fire-eater was trying some new stunt and he set the place ablaze, so the
boss yelled to me. Come now, youse all have to git back!" and he
motioned to the crowd, which was constantly increasing, to get beyond
the fire lines.




CHAPTER VI

SOMETHING NEW


What with the clanging of the gongs on the engines and on the red
runabouts that brought two battalion chiefs to the fire; the pall of
smoke, with, here and there, the suggestion of a red blaze; the swaying
excitement of the crowd; the yells of harassed policemen; the scene at
the blaze of the dime museum was one long to be remembered by Joe Strong
and Helen Morton--particularly in the light of what happened afterward.

"Joe, did you hear what he said?" asked Helen, as she moved back with
the young acrobat in conformity with the officer's order.

"You mean that we've got to slide?"

"No, that a fire-eater started the blaze. Does he mean a professional
'fire bug,' as I have heard them called?"

"Oh, not at all!" exclaimed Joe. "A fire-eater is a chap who does such
stunts in a museum, theater, or even in a circus. Sampson Brothers used
to have one, I understand, from looking over the old books. But it
wasn't much of an act. Golly, this is going to be some blaze!"

That was very evident from the increased smoke that rolled out and the
crackle of fire that now could be heard above the puffing of the engines
and the shouts of the mob.

"A regular tinder box!" muttered the officer who had told Joe the origin
of the blaze. "Place ought to have been pulled down long ago. Git back
there youse!" he yelled to some venturesome lads. "Want to git mushed
up?"

The blaze was a big one, considerable damage was done, and several
persons were injured. But quick work by an efficient department
prevented the flames from spreading to the buildings on either side of
the one where it had started.

Joe and Helen stayed long enough to see the menace gotten under control,
and then they departed just as the ambulance rolled away with the last
of the victims.

"That's the fire-eater they're taking to the hospital now," said the
policeman who had first spoken to the young circus performers. "They
took him into a drug store to wrap him in oil and cotton batting."

"Will he live?" asked Helen.

"Just a chance," was the answer. "Say, if I had to get my living eating
fire I'd starve," confided the policeman. "It must be some stunt! I
always thought it was a fake, but this fire burned real enough."

"Oh, it isn't all fake," said Joe, "though of course there's a trick
about it."

"You seem to know," said the policeman, and he smiled at Joe and Helen.
His chief troubles were about over with the departure of the ambulance
and the knowledge that filtered through the crowd that the most of the
excitement was over.

"Oh, I'm in the circus business," confessed Joe. "I never ate fire," he
went on, "but--"

"Oh, I know you now!" cried the officer. "I was on duty out at the
circus grounds this afternoon, and I went into the tent when you did
that box act. Say, that's some stunt! Do they really pay ten thousand
dollars to the fellow who tells how it's done?"

"Well, we've never paid out the money yet," said Joe, with a smile. "But
it's there, waiting for some one to claim it."

"Then I'm coming to-night to watch you," said the officer, who appeared
delighted that he had recognized one of the "profesh."

"Come along," replied Joe. "Here, wait a minute! There are a couple of
passes. Come and bring a friend. If you tell how I do the trick you'll
get the ten thousand. Only you'll have to post a hundred dollars as a
forfeit to the Red Cross in case you don't guess right. That's included
in the offer."

"Oh!" The officer did not seem quite so pleased. "Well, I'll come
anyhow," he went on, accepting the passes Joe handed him. The policeman
had allowed Joe and Helen to stay in an advantageous place where they
could watch the fire.

"Where are they taking the man who did the dangerous trick that caused
all the trouble?" asked Helen, as she prepared to walk on with Joe.

"To the City Hospital, Miss. He's a bad case, I understand."

"Poor fellow," murmured Helen. "Do you think we could go to see him, and
do something for him, Joe?" she asked solicitously. "He's in almost the
same line of business as ourselves."

"Well, I don't know," was the slow answer.

"I can fix it up if you want to see him--that is, if the doctors and
nurses will let you," said the policeman. "I know the hospital
superintendent. You just tell him that Casey sent you and it will be all
right."

"Thanks; perhaps we will," said Joe.

There was a little time after supper before the performers had to go on
with their acts, and Helen prevailed on Joe to take her to the hospital
whither the injured fire-eater had been removed. They found him swathed
in bandages, no objection being made to their seeing him after the magic
name of "Casey" had been mentioned to the superintendent.

"We came in to see if you needed any help," said Joe to the pathetic
figure in the bed. "We're in the same line of business, in a way."

"Are you a fire-eater?" slowly asked the man.

"No," Joe told him. "But I'm in the circus--Sampson Brothers'."

"Oh, yes, I've heard about it. A partner of mine was with 'em for years.
Gascoyne was his name."

"That was before my time," said Joe. "But how are you getting on? Can we
be of any help to you? We professionals must help one another."

"That's right. We get knocked often enough," was the reply. "Well, I'm
doing as well as can be expected, the doctor says. And I'm not really in
need of anything. The museum folks were pretty good to me. Thank you,
just the same."

"How did it happen?" asked Helen.

"Oh, just my carelessness," said the man. "We get careless after playing
with fire a bit. I put too much alcohol on the tow, and there was a
draft from an open door, some draperies caught, and it was all going
before I knew it. I tried to put it out--that's how I got burned."

"Then you really didn't eat fire?" asked Helen.

Joe and the man swathed in bandages looked at one another and a
semblance of a wink passed between them.

"Nobody can eat fire, lady," said the museum performer. "It's all a
trick, same as some your husband does in the circus."

Joe blushed almost as much as did Helen.

"We're not married yet, but we're going to be," explained Joe, smiling.

"Lucky guy!" murmured the man. "Well, as I was saying, it's all a
trick," he went on. "Strong alum solution in your mouth, just a dash of
alcohol to make a blaze that flares up but goes out quickly if you
smother it right. You know the game," and he looked at Joe.

"Well, not exactly," was the reply. "I've read something of it. But,
somehow, it never appealed to me."

"Oh, it makes a good act, friend!" said the man earnestly. "I've done a
lot of museum and circus stunts, and this always goes big. There's no
danger if you handle it right. I'll be more careful next time."

"You don't mean to say you'll go back to it, do you?" asked Helen.

"Sure, lady! I've got to earn my living! And this is the best thing I
know. I'll be out in a week. I didn't swallow any, thank goodness! Oh,
sure I'll go at it again."

Joe and Helen cheered the sufferer up as much as they could, and then
departed. Joe privately left a bill of substantial denomination with the
superintendent to be used for anything extra the patient might need.

On the way back to the circus, where they were soon to give their
evening performance, Joe was unusually quiet.

"What's the matter?" asked Helen. "Are you thinking of that accident on
the trapeze?"

"No," was the answer. "It's something different. I've got to get up a
new act for the show. That trapeze act, even the way I had to do it this
afternoon, isn't sensational enough. I've got to have something new, and
I've about decided on it."

"What?" asked Helen.

"I'm going to become a fire-eater!" was the unexpected, reply.




CHAPTER VII

THE PAPER EXPERT


For a moment Helen Morton stared at Joe Strong as though not quite sure
whether or not he was in his proper mind. Then, seeing plainly that he
was in earnest, she seemed to shrink away from him, as he had noticed
her shrink away, for a moment, from the burned man suffering there in
the hospital.

"What's the matter, Helen?" asked Joe, trying to speak lightly. "Don't
you want to see some more sensational acts in the show?"

"Yes, but not that kind," she answered with a shudder she could not
conceal. "Oh, Joe, if you were to--" She could not go on. Her breast
heaved painfully.

"Now look here, Helen!" he exclaimed with good-natured roughness, "that
isn't any way to look at matters; especially when we both depend on
sensations for making our living.

"You know, as well as I do, that in this business we have to take risks.
That's what makes our acts go. You take a risk every time you perform
with Rosebud. You might slip, the horse might slip, and you'd be hurt.
Now is this new act I am thinking of perfor--"

"Yes, I may take risks, Joe!" interrupted Helen. "But they are perfectly
natural risks, and I have more than an even chance. You might just as
well say you take a risk walking along the street, and so you do. An
elevated train might fall on you or an auto run up on the sidewalk. The
risks I take in the act with Rosebud are only natural ones, and really
shouldn't be counted. But if you start to become a fire-eater--Oh, Joe,
think of that poor fellow in the hospital!"

"He didn't get that way from eating fire--or pretending to eat it--for
the amusement of the public. He might just as easily have been burned
the way he is by lighting the kitchen stove for his wife to get
breakfast. His accident was entirely outside of his act, you might say.
Why, I use lighted candles in some of my tricks. Now, if some one
knocked over a candle, and it caused a fire on the stage and I was
burned, would you want me to give up being a magician?"

"Oh, no, I suppose not," said Helen slowly. "But fire is so dangerous.
And to think of putting it in your mouth! How can you do it, Joe? Oh, it
can't be done!"

"Oh, there's a trick about it. I haven't mastered all the details yet,
so as to give a smooth performance, but I can make an attempt at it."

"Joe Strong! do you mean to say you know how to eat fire?" demanded
Helen, and now her eyes showed her astonishment.

"Well, not exactly eat it, though that is the term used. But I do know
how to do it. I learned, in a rudimentary way, when I was with Professor
Rosello--the first man who taught me sleight-of-hand. He had one
fire-eating act, but it didn't amount to much. He told me the secret of
it, such as it was.

"But if I put on that stunt I'm going to make it different. I'm going to
dress it up, make it sensational so that it will be the talk of the
country where circuses are exhibited."

"And won't you run any danger?" questioned the girl quickly.

"Oh, I suppose so; just as I do when I work on the high trapeze or ride
my motor cycle along the high wire. But it's all in the day's work. And
now let's talk about something pleasant--I mean let's get off the shop."

Helen sighed. She was plainly disturbed, but she did not want to burden
Joe with her worries. She knew he must have calm nerves and an
untroubled mind to do his various acts in the circus that night.

After supper and before the evening performance Joe made a careful
examination of his trapeze apparatus. Beyond the place where the acid
had eaten into the wire strands, causing them to become weakened so that
they parted, the appliances did not appear to have been tampered with.
Nor were there any clews which might show who had done the deed. That it
could have happened by accident was out of the question. The acid could
have gotten on the wire rope in one way only. Some one must have climbed
up the rope ladder to the platform and applied the stuff.

"But who did it?" asked Jim Tracy, when Joe had told him of the
discovery of the acid-eaten cable.

"Some enemy. Perhaps the same one who was responsible for our loss in
tickets this afternoon," answered the young magician.

"Carfax?" asked the ringmaster.

"It might be, and yet he isn't the only man who's been discharged or who
has a grudge against me. There was Gianni with whom I had a fight."

"You mean the Italian? Yes, he was an ugly customer. But I haven't heard
of him for years. I don't believe he's even in this part of the
country."

"And we haven't any reason to suppose that Carfax is, either, after his
fiasco in trying to expose my Box of Mystery trick. But we've got to be
on our guard."

"I should say so!" exclaimed the ringmaster. "And now about your
trapeze act, Joe! Are you going to put it on again to-night?"

"Of course. It's billed."

"Then you'll have to hustle to rig up a new rope."

"I'm not going to put on a new rope," declared Joe. "The act went so
well when I seemed about to fall, that I'm going to keep that feature
in. I'll rig up a catch on the severed cable. At the proper time I'll
snap it loose, seem to fall, swing by the dangling bar as I did before,
and land on the platform that way. It will be more effective than if I
did it in the regular way."

"But won't it be risky?"

Joe shrugged his shoulders.

"No more so than any trapeze act. Now that I'm ready for the sudden drop
I'll be on my guard. No, I can work it all right. And now about these
extra admissions? What are we going to do about them?"

"Well," said the ringmaster, "maybe we'd better talk to Moyne about
them. If they ring an extra thousand persons in on us again to-night the
thing will be getting serious."

The treasurer was called in consultation with Joe and Tracy and other
circus officials, and it was decided to keep a special watch on the
ticket wagon and the ticket takers that night.

Joe quickly made the change in his trapeze and tested it, finding that
he could work it perfectly. Then he began to think of his new
fire-eating act. He was determined to make that as great a success as
was his now well advertised ten thousand dollar mystery box act.

The evening performance had not long been under way, and Joe had done
his big swing successfully, when he was sought out by Mr. Moyne.

"The same thing has happened again," said the treasurer.

"You mean more people coming in than we have sold tickets for?"

"That's it."

"Well, where do the extra admissions come from? I mean where do the
people get their admission slips from--the extra people?"

"That's what we can't find out," the treasurer aid. "As far as the
ticket takers can tell only one kind of admission slip for the fifty
cent seats is being handed them. But the number, as tallied by the
automatic gates, does not jibe with the number of ordinary admissions
sold at the ticket office. To-night there is a difference of about eight
hundred and seventy-five."

"Do you mean," asked Joe, "that that number of persons came in on
tickets that were never sold at the ticket wagon?"

"That's just what I mean. There is an extra source from which the
ordinary admission tickets come. As I told you this afternoon, we are
having no trouble with our reserved seats. There have been no duplicates
there. But there is a duplication in the fifty cent seats, where one may
take his pick as to where he wants to sit."

"Don't we have tickets on sale in some of the downtown stores?" Joe
asked.

"Oh, yes, several of the stores sell tickets up to a certain hour. Then
they send the balance up here for us to dispose of."

"How about their accounts? Have you had them gone over carefully?"

"They tally to a penny."

"How about the unsold tickets these agents send back to us? Isn't there
a chance on the way up for some one to slip out some of the pasteboards,
Mr. Moyne?"

"There is a chance, yes, but it hasn't been done. I have checked up the
accounts of the stores, and there is the cash or the unsold tickets to
balance every time. But somehow, and from some place, an extra number of
the ordinary admission tickets are being sold, and we are not getting
the money for them."

"It is queer," said Joe. "I have an idea that I want to try out the
first chance I get. Save me a bunch of these ordinary admission tickets.
Take them from the boxes at random and let me have them."

"I will," promised the treasurer. "There is nothing we can do to-night
to stop the fraud, is there?" he asked. Mr. Moyne was a very
conscientious treasurer. It disturbed him greatly to see the circus lose
money.

"I don't see what we can do," said Joe. "If we start an inquiry it may
cause a fight. Let it go. We'll have to charge it to profit and loss.
And don't forget to let me have some of those tickets. I want to examine
them."

Mr. Moyne promised to attend to the matter. Joe then had to go on in his
Box of Mystery trick, and when this was finished, amid much applause, he
caused Helen to "vanish" in the manner already described.

The circus made considerable money in this town, even with the bogus
admissions, and as the weather was fine and as the show would exhibit
the next day in a big city for a two days' stand, every one was in good
humor. Staying over night in the same city where they exhibited during
the day was always a rest for the performers. They got more sleep and
were in better trim for work.

The last act was finished, the chariot races had taken place, and the
audience was surging out. The animal tent had already been taken down
and the animals themselves were being loaded on the railroad train.

As Joe, Helen, and the other performers started for their berths, to
begin the trip to the next town, the "main top" began coming down. The
circus was on the move.

Soon after breakfast the next morning, having seen that all his
apparatus had safely arrived, Joe visited Mr. Moyne in the latter's
office.

"Have you a bunch of tickets for me?" asked the young magician.

"Yes, here they are--several hundred picked at random from the boxes at
the entrance. I can't see anything wrong. If you're looking for
counterfeit tickets I don't believe you'll find them," added Mr. Moyne.

"I don't know that I am looking for counterfeits," said Joe. "That may
be the explanation, or it may be there is a leak somewhere in the ticket
wagon."

"I'm almost sure there isn't," declared the treasurer. "But of course no
one is infallible. I hope you get to the bottom of the mystery."

"I hope so myself," replied Joe, with a smile, as he put the tickets in
a valise.

A little later he was on his way downtown. He had several hours before
he would have to go "on," as he did not take part in the parade, and he
had several matters to attend to.

Joe made his way toward a large office building, carrying the valise
with the circus tickets. A little later he might have been seen entering
an office, the door of which bore the name of "Herbert Waldon,
Consulting Chemist."

"Mr. Strong," said Joe to the boy who came forward to inquire his
errand. "Mr. Waldon is expecting me, I believe."

"Oh, yes," said the boy. "You're to come right in."

Joe was ushered into a room which was filled with strange appliances,
from test tubes and retorts to electrical furnaces and X-ray apparatus.
A little man in a rather soiled linen coat came forward, smiling.

"I won't shake hands with you, Mr. Strong," he said, "for I've been
dabbling in some vile-smelling stuff. But if you wait until I wash I'll
be right with you."

"All right," assented Joe. And then, as he caught sight of what seemed
to be a number of canceled bank checks on a table, he smilingly asked:
"Have you been paying your income tax?"

"Oh, no," answered the chemist with a laugh. "Those are just some
samples of paper sent in for me to test. An inventor is trying to get up
an acid-proof ink. I'm a sort of paper expert, among my other chemical
activities, and I'm putting these samples through a series of tests.
But you'll not be interested in them."

"I don't know but what I shall be," returned Joe, with sudden energy.
"Since you are a paper expert I may be able to set you another task
besides that of showing me the latest thing in fire-resisting liquids.
Yes, I may want your services in both lines."

"Well, I'm here to do business," said Mr. Waldon, smiling.




CHAPTER VIII

JOE EATS FIRE


The chemist led the way into a little office. This opened off from the
room in which was the apparatus, and where, as Joe had become more and
more keenly aware, there was a most unpleasant odor.

"I'll open the window, close the laboratory door, and you won't notice
it in a little while," said Mr. Waldon, as he observed Joe's nose
twitching. "I'm so used to it I don't mind, but you, coming in from the
fresh air--"

"It isn't exactly perfume," interrupted Joe, with a laugh. "But don't be
uneasy on my account. I can stand it."

However, he was glad when the fresh air came in through the window. The
chemist washed his hands and then sat down at a desk, inviting Joe to
draw up his chair.

"Now, what can I do for you?" asked Mr. Waldon. "Is it fire or paper?"

"Well, since I know pretty well what I want to ask you in the matter of
fire," replied Joe, "and since I've got a puzzling paper problem here,
suppose we tackle the hardest first, and come to the known, and easier,
trick later."

"Just as you say," assented Mr. Waldon. "What's your paper problem?"

Joe's answer was to take from the valise several hundreds of the circus
tickets. They were the kind sold for fifty cents, or perhaps more in
these days of the war tax. They entitle the holder to a seat on what, at
a baseball game, would be called the "bleachers." In other words they
were not reserved-seat coupons.

However, these tickets were not the one-time blue or red pieces of stiff
pasteboard, bearing the name of the circus and the words "ADMIT ONE,"
which were formerly sold at the gilded wagon. These were handed in at
the main entrance, and the tickets were used over and over again.
Sometimes the blue ones sold for fifty cents, and a kind selling for
seventy-five cents entitled the purchaser to a seat with a folding back
to it, though it was not reserved.

But Joe had instituted some changes when he became one of the circus
proprietors, and one was in the matter of the general admission tickets.
He had them printed on a thin but tough quality of paper, and each
ticket was numbered. In this way it needed but a glance at the last
ticket in the rack and a look at the memorandum of the last number
previously sold at the former performance, to tell exactly how many
general admissions had been disposed of.

These numbered tickets were not used over again, but were destroyed
after the day's accounts had been made up. At first Joe and some others
of the officials had had an idea that the man who was charged with the
work of destroying the tickets, instead of doing so, had kept some out
and sold them at a reduced price. But an investigation proved that this
was not the case.

"Some one is ringing in extra tickets on us," stated Joe to the chemist.
"We want to find out who it is and how the trick is worked. So far, we
haven't been able to find this out. As a matter of fact, we don't know
whether there are bogus tickets in our boxes or not. We haven't been
able to detect two kinds. They all seem the same."

"Some numbers must be duplicated," said Mr. Waldon, as he picked up a
handful of the slips Joe had brought. "That's very obvious. The numbers
must be duplicated in some instances."

"Yes, we have discovered that," returned Joe. "But the queer part is,
taking even two tickets with the same number, we don't know which was
sold at our ticket wagon and which is the bogus one. Here's a case in
point."

He picked up two of the coupons. As far as eye or touch could tell they
were identical, and they bore the same red number, one up in the
hundred thousands.

"Now," continued Joe, "can you tell which of these two is the official
circus ticket and which is the bogus one?"

The chemist thought for a moment.

"Have you a ticket--say one issued some time ago--which you are positive
is genuine?" he asked.

"I'm ready for you there," answered Joe. "Here's a coupon that happened
to escape destruction. It was one sold several weeks ago at our ticket
wagon, before we noticed this trouble. I bought the ticket myself, so I
know. I happened to be passing the wagon, and a boy was trying to reach
up to buy a fifty cent seat. He wasn't quite tall enough, so I reached
for him.

"Then, when I looked at him, I saw that fifty cents meant a lot to him.
I gave him back his half dollar out of my own pocket, and passed him in
to a reserved seat. But I forgot to turn the ticket in to the wagon, and
it's been in my pocket ever since. Now I'm glad I saved it, for it will
serve as a tester."

"Yes," admitted the chemist, "it will. It's a good thing you have this.
But, Mr. Strong, this is going to take some time. I'll have to compare
all these tickets with the admittedly genuine one, and I'll have to make
some intricate tests."

"Well, I hoped you might be able to tell me right off the reel which of
these coupons were good and which bad," said Joe. "But I can appreciate
that it isn't easy. We certainly have been puzzled. So I'll leave them
with you, and you can write to me when you have any results. I'll leave
you a list of the towns where we'll be showing for the next two weeks.
And now suppose we get at the fire-eating business."

"All right," was the reply of the chemist. "But with the understanding
that you do all the eating. I haven't any appetite that way myself."

They both laughed, and then, for some hours, Joe Strong was closeted
with the chemist.

When Joe emerged from the office of Mr. Waldon there was a look of
satisfaction on the face of the young magician.

"I think I can make quite an act, after what you've told me," he said.
"As soon as I get it perfected I'll send you word and you can come to
see me."

"I will, if you aren't too far away," promised the chemist.

That night, following the closing of the performance, Joe invited Helen,
Jim Tracy, and a few of his more intimate friends and associates into
his private dressing tent.

"I have the nucleus of a new act," he said, when they were seated in
chairs before a small table, on which were several pieces of apparatus.
"Just give me your opinion of this."

Joe lighted a candle, picked up on a fork what seemed to be a piece of
bread, and touched it to the candle flame. In an instant the object that
was on the fork burst into a blaze, and, before the eyes of his friends,
Joe calmly put the flaming portion into his mouth.

He closed his lips, seemed to be chewing something, opened his mouth,
and showed it empty.

"A little light lunch!" he remarked, but his smile faded as Helen
screamed in horror.




CHAPTER IX

THE CHEMIST'S LETTER


"Oh, Joe, you'll surely burn yourself!" exclaimed the startled bareback
rider.

"Did you get burned?" questioned Mrs. Watson.

"Some trick!" declared the snake charmer.

For the moment there was some excitement, for this was a new act for the
circus people.

Helen soon recovered her customary composure, and then she explained the
cause of her excitement and the startled cry she had given. She had, of
course, expected some trick with fire when Joe had summoned her and the
others to his own private part of the dressing tents. But she had not
expected to see him actually put the blazing material in his mouth.

"I thought there was some sleight-of-hand performance about it," she
said. "I had an idea that you only pretended to put the blazing stuff in
your mouth, Joe. And when I saw it I was afraid you'd breathe in the
flames and--and--"

She did not need to go on, they all understood what she meant, for
every one in the circus knew that Helen and Joe were engaged.

"I once saw a little boy burned at a bonfire at which he was playing,"
went on Helen. "He died. Since then the sight of fire near a human being
has always a bad effect on me. But I suppose I can get over it, if I
know there is no danger," she said with a slight smile at Joe.

"Well, I can assure you there isn't the slightest danger," he declared.
"If there was, I should be the first to give it up. I am as fond of
living as any one."

"You don't show it, young man, in some of the tricks you do," commented
Mrs. Watson, with the freedom befitting a "circus mother," and the
privilege of an old friend. "You must remember that you don't live only
for yourself," and she looked significantly at Helen.

"Oh, I'll be careful!" promised Joe. "And now I'll do the trick again
for you, and let you see that it's absolutely harmless. Any of you could
do it--if you knew how."

"Excuse me!" exclaimed Jim Tracy. "Not for mine!"

However they all watched Joe eagerly and interestedly, even Helen. He
did not seem to make any unusual preparations. He merely took a drink of
what seemed to be water. Then he ignited something in the flame of the
candle and placed the burning stuff in his mouth, seeming to chew it
with gusto.

"Oh!" exclaimed Helen. But beyond that and a momentary placing of one
hand over her heart, she did not give way to emotion. Then, as Joe did
the fire-eating trick again, Helen forced herself to watch him closely.
As he had said, he took no harm from the act.

"Tell us how you do it," begged Bill Watson. "When I get over being
funny--or getting audiences to think I am--I may want to live on
something hot. How do you work it?"

"Well," said Joe, "if it's all the same to you, I'd rather not tell. It
isn't that I'm afraid of any of my friends giving the trick away, and so
spoiling the mystery of it for the crowds. It's just as it was in my box
act. If any of you are asked how I do this fire trick you can truly say
you don't know, for none of you will know by my telling, not even Helen,
though she is in on the box secret. I'll only say that I protect my face
and mouth, as well as hands, in a certain way, and that I do, actually,
put the blazing material into my mouth. I am not burned. So if any one
asks you about the act you may tell them that much with absolute truth.
Now the question is--how is it going to go with the audiences? We need
something--or, at least, I do--to create a sensation. Will this answer?"

"I should say so!" exclaimed Jim Tracy. "That ought to go big when it's
dressed up."

"Oh, this is only the ground work," said Joe. "I'm going to elaborate
this fire act and make it the sensation of the season. I've only begun
on it. I got from a chemist the materials I want with which to protect
myself, and I have shown, to my own and your satisfaction, that I can
eat fire without getting harmed. So far all is well. Now I'm going to
work the act up into something really worth while."

"But you'll still be careful, won't you, Joe?" asked Helen.

"Indeed I will," he assured her.

"Do the trick once more, Joe," suggested Bill Watson. "I'm coming as
close as you'll let me, and I want to criticize it from the standpoint
of a man in the audience."

"That's what I'm after," said Joe. "If there are any flaws in the act,
now is the time to find it out."

Once more he set the material ablaze and put it into his mouth. Bill
Watson watched closely, and, at the end, the old clown shook his head.

"I saw you actually put the fire in your mouth," he testified. "No one
can do more than that. It takes nerve!"

Of course, no one can actually swallow fire and live. The slightest
breath of flame on the lungs or on the mucous membrane of the throat
and passages is fatal. So when the terms "fire-eating" or "fire-eater"
are used it will be in the sense of its being a theatrical act. There is
a trick about it, and the trick is this:

In the first place, the flame itself is produced by blazing alcohol.
This produces a blaze, and a hot one, too, but there is no smoke. In
other words, the combustion is almost perfect, there being no residue of
carbon to remain hot after the actual flame is extinguished.

And now as to the actual putting into one's mouth something that is
blazing hot: It all depends on a very simple principle.

If the hand be thoroughly wet in water it may be safely thrust for a
fraction of a second into a flaming gas jet. But mark this--for the
_fraction of a second only_. The water forms a protecting film for the
skin, and before it is evaporated the hand must be taken out of danger.
In other words, there is needed an appreciable time for the fire to beat
the skin to the burning point.

This immunity from burns, to which the professional fire-eaters owe
their success, comes from this film of moisture on their skin. They do
not always use water--in fact, this is only serviceable for a momentary
contact with flame, and, at that, on the hands or face. In case a longer
contact is desired, a fire-resisting chemical liquid is used.

It is about the contact of flame with the tender mucous membrane
surfaces of the mouth and throat that Joe, as a fire-eater, was most
concerned.

In the first place, there is a constant film of the secretion called
saliva always flowing in the mouth. It comes from glands in the throat
and mouth, and is very necessary to good digestion.

Now, for a very brief period this saliva, which is just the same as a
film of water on the hand, resists the fire. But professional
fire-eaters do not depend on saliva alone. They use a chemical solution,
and this is what Joe did when he drank something from a glass.

What that chemical solution was, Joe kept as a closely guarded
professional secret. He feared, too, that some boy might make it, rinse
his mouth out with it, and then, getting an audience of his chums
together, might try to eat some blazing coals. He might, and very likely
would, be severely burned, and his parents or those in charge of him
would blame Joe for allowing such dangerous information to leak out.

So, though he guarded all his secrets of magic, he was particularly
careful to keep this one to himself.

But Joe protected his mouth and throat with a fire-resisting liquid, the
formula for which was given him by the chemist to whom he submitted the
circus tickets.

The success of Joe and others of his kind depends also in this on a
well known natural law. It is that there can be no combustion in the
ordinary sense where there is no oxygen. As a candle will surely go out
if enclosed in an air-tight receptacle--that is, it will go out as soon
as it has burned up all the oxygen--just so surely will flame of any
kind go out when a person closes his mouth on it. And as there is
scarcely any air in the closed mouth--all of it going down the bronchial
tubes into the lungs--it follows that the flame dies out almost
instantly. That fact being considered, and the mouth and throat having
been previously treated with the secret chemical, there is really not so
much danger as appears.

As a matter of fact, a person inadvertently swallowing hot tea or coffee
will burn or scald his mouth or tongue much more painfully than will a
professional fire-eater. Most people know how painful a burned tongue
is.

Joe told something of the history of fire-eating "champions" to his
audience of friends, for it appeared that he had been reading up on the
subject and was well informed. Then he announced that the private
rehearsal was over.

"But I'm going to work this fire-eating up into something that will
cause a sensation," he said. And he made good his promise.

It was about a week after this, and the circus had been traveling
about, playing to good business, when Joe received a letter. In the
upper left-hand corner was the imprint of Herbert Waldon, Chemist.

"I hope he has some news about the circus tickets!" exclaimed Joe. For
the show had been losing money steadily by means of the bogus coupons;
not as much as at first, but enough to make it necessary to discover the
fraud. And, so far, Mr. Moyne had not been successful.

"Perhaps this explains the mystery," mused Joe as he opened the letter.




CHAPTER X

THE PET CAT


The typewritten sheet of the letter from Mr. Waldon enclosed two of the
engraved circus coupons. They fluttered to the floor of Joe's private
tent as he tore open the envelope.

"Well, either he has discovered something, or he has sent them back and
given up," mused the young magician. "Let's see what he says."

Joe quickly took in the contents of the letter. In effect it stated that
Mr. Waldon had discovered which were the bogus and which were the real
circus tickets. He first gave an explanation of the chemical tests he
used. Joe read this hastily, but carefully, then passed to the
conclusions arrived at by the expert, who was an authority on various
kinds of paper, as well as chemicals.

"The ticket I have marked No. 1 is a genuine coupon, issued by your
circus corporation," said Mr. Waldon in his letter. "The slip marked by
me as No. 2 is a counterfeit. You will observe that they both bear the
red ink serial number 356,891.

"If you were a paper expert you would observe that the paper used in
the two tickets is different. There is not a very great difference, and
I am inclined to think that both the genuine and the counterfeit tickets
were made on paper from the same mill, but of a different 'run.' That
is, it was made at a different time.

"The printer who manufactured your tickets bought his paper from a
certain mill making a specialty of this particular kind. Then some one,
who must know something of your financial and business interests, had
the bogus tickets made, and on the same kind of paper. But there is a
slight difference, which I was able to detect by means of chemical
reactions. The coloring matter used varied slightly, though the texture
of the two kinds of paper is almost exactly similar.

"Now, having settled that point, the solution of the remaining equations
of the problem rests with you. I can not tell who had the bogus tickets
printed. You will have to go to the mill making the paper and find out
to whom they sold this kind. In that way you will learn the names of all
printers, using it, and by a process of elimination you will get at the
one who printed the counterfeits.

"This printer may be an innocent party, or he may be guilty. That is for
you and the detectives to determine. I hope I have started you on the
right track. I shall be interested to hear, my dear Mr. Strong, how you
make out in your fire-eating act."

"I'll tell him as soon as I try it on a real audience," said Joe, with a
smile, as he folded the letter. "And so counterfeit tickets have been
rung in on us! Well, I suspected that, since our own men were thoroughly
to be trusted. Now to get at the guilty ones. And I shouldn't be
surprised if I could name one of the men involved. But I'll call a
meeting, and lay this before the directors."

The Sampson Brothers' Show was incorporated and was run strictly on
business lines. There was a board of directors who looked after all
business matters, and Joe was soon in consultation with them, laying
before them Mr. Waldon's letter and the two marked tickets.

"It would take an expert to tell them apart," said Mr. Moyne, as he
examined the coupons closely. "Well, what are we to do?"

"In the first place," declared Joe, "we must change our form of general
admission tickets at once. That will stop the fraud, graft, or whatever
you want to call it. Then we must do as Mr. Waldon says--look for the
guilty parties. We'll have to hire some detectives, I think."

This plan was voted a good one, and steps were at once taken to change
the form and style of the general admission tickets. Joe also wired for
a man from a well known detective agency to meet the show at the next
town. Then the printing shop which made the circus tickets was
communicated with.

That was all that could be done at present, and Joe gave his attention
to perfecting his new fire-eating act.

He did not give up his mystery box trick, and he still presented the
vanishing lady illusion, Helen assisting in both of these. Joe also did
the big swing, which always caused a thrill on account of the danger
involved. Careful watch was kept over the trapeze and other apparatus so
that no more dangerous tampering could he attempted, and Joe always
looked over everything with sharp eyes before trusting himself high in
the air.

"Some one evidently has a grudge against me as well as against the
circus in general," he said to Jim Tracy.

"Maybe it's the same person," suggested the ringmaster.

"Perhaps. Well, as soon as we get some word from the detectives we can
start on the trail."

The circus had arrived at a large city, where it was to show three days
and nights, and preparations were made for big crowds, as the city was
the center of a large number of industries, where many thousands of men
were employed at good wages.

"We'll play to 'Straw Room Only' at every performance," said Mr. Moyne,
rubbing his hands with glee as he thought of the dollars that would be
taken in. "And I'm glad we discovered the bogus tickets in time. We'd be
out a lot of money if the counterfeits were to be used here."

"Yes," agreed Joe. "But we aren't out of the woods yet. The same man who
imitated the light green tickets may have the bright blue ones which we
now use for general admission duplicated and sell them."

"We'll have to take that chance," said the treasurer. "But I'll instruct
the ticket takers to be unusually careful."

That was all that could be done. The detective had reported that he was
making an examination, starting at the paper mill, and was endeavoring
to learn where the bogus tickets had been made.

The circus parade had been held and witnessed by enthusiastic crowds
lining the streets. Then was every prospect of big business, and it was
borne out.

Joe wished he had prepared his fire act earlier but it could not be
helped.

"I'll have it ready for to-morrow, though," he said to Jim Tracy, at the
conclusion of the first afternoon in the big city where they were to
stay three days.

"Then I'm going to have it advertised," said the ringmaster, who also
sometimes acted as assistant general manager. "We'll bill it big. You're
sure of yourself, are you?"

"Oh, yes," answered Joe with a laugh. "I'll give 'em their money's worth
all right, but it won't be the big sensation I'm planning for later on.
That will take time."

"Well, as long as it's a fire act it will be new and novel, and it will
draw," declared Jim Tracy.

It was later in the afternoon, when the circus performance was over,
that Joe and Helen strolled downtown, as was their custom. Some
convention was being held in the city, and across one of the principal
streets was stretched a big banner of the kind used in political
campaigns.

It was hung from a heavy, slack wire from the brick walls of two
opposite buildings, and the banner attracted considerable attention
because of a novel picture on it.

Joe and Helen were standing in the street, looking up at the swaying
creation of canvas and netting, when a woman's cry came to their ears.

"Look! Look! The cat! The cat is walking the wire!" she exclaimed.

Joe and Helen turned first to see who it was that had cried out. It was
a woman in the street, and with her parasol she pointed upward.

There, surely enough, half way out on the thick, slack wire, and high
above the middle of the street was a large white cat. It was walking
the wire as one's pet might walk the back fence. But this cat seemed to
have lost its nerve. It had got half way across, but was afraid to go
farther and could not turn around and go back.

As Joe and Helen looked, a woman appeared at the window of one of the
buildings from the front walls of which the banner was suspended, and,
pointing at the cat, cried:

"A hundred dollars to whoever saves my cat! A hundred dollars reward!"




CHAPTER XI

THE RESCUE


The tumult which had arisen in the street beneath the banner when the
crowd caught sight of the cat was hushed for a moment after the woman's
frantic cry. Before that there had been some laughter, and not a few
cat-calls and exaggerated "miaows" from boys in the street. But now
every one, even the mischievous urchins, seemed to sense that something
unusual was about to take place.

"Come back, Peter! Come back!" cried the woman, stretching out her arms
to the cat from the window out of which she leaned. "Come back to me!"

The white cat on the wire heard the voice of the woman and seemed to
want to return to its mistress. But either the cat was not an adept at
turning on such a narrow support, or it was afraid to try.

And, likewise, it was afraid to go forward. There it stood, about in the
middle of the wire, high above the street, and it clung to its perch by
its claws.

The banner was hung from the cross wire by means of several loops of
rope, and it was in some of these loops that the cat had stuck its
claws, and so hung on.

As the cat remained there, suspended, the crowd in the street below
increased in size. But from the time the woman had so frantically called
there had been no more of the cries from the crowd that might be
expected to frighten the animal.

"Will some one get my cat?" cried the woman in a shrill voice, which
could easily be heard by Joe, Helen, and nearly every one else. "I'll
give one hundred dollars in cash to whoever saves him!" she went on.
"Come back, Peter! Come back!" she appealed.

There was a thoughtless laugh from some one at the woman's anxiety, and
some one cried:

"There's lots of cats! Let Peter go!"

"The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals ought to get after
whoever that was," said Helen indignantly, and there was an approving
murmur from some of those near her.

"Does any one know that lady?" asked Joe, pointing at the figure in the
window. A pathetic figure it was, too, of an old woman clad in black, as
though she had lost all her friends.

"Yes, she's a queer character," said some one who seemed to know. "Lives
up there all alone in the old house that, except for the upper part
where she is now, has been turned into offices.

"She's rich, they say. Owns that building and a lot of others on this
street. But she lives all alone in a few rooms, and has a lot of pet
cats. I guess that's one which got away."

"It got away all right," said another man. "And I don't believe she'll
ever get it back. The cat's scared to death."

"Why doesn't it jump?" asked some one. "I heard that cats always land on
their feet, no matter how far they fall."

"A fall from there would kill any cat," said Joe, as he handed Helen a
small package he had been carrying--a purchase he had made at one of the
stores.

"What are you going to do?" she asked, sensing that Joe Strong had some
object in mind.

"I'm going to get that cat," he said in a low voice. "I can't bear to
see it harmed, and it can't cling there much longer. Night's coming on,
too, and if it isn't rescued soon it won't be until morning. I know what
it is to have a pet suffer. I'm going to get that cat!"

"Oh, mister, you can't!" cried a small girl who was standing near by and
overheard this remark.

"I should say not!" exclaimed the man who had given a little personal
sketch of the woman in black. "The longest ladder in the fire department
won't reach up to that wire, and they can't use extension ones, or
scaling ones as they could on a building. You can't get that cat, sir,
though I wish some one could. I don't like to see dumb brutes suffer.
But you can't get it!"

"Perhaps I can!" said Joe modestly.

He started toward the street entrance of the old building, from the
upper window of which leaned the pathetic figure of the woman calling to
her cat out on the swaying wire.

"Oh, Joe," Helen began, "are you really going to--" and then she
stopped.

"I am!" he answered, for he knew she understood. "Wait here for me. I
won't be long."

Only a few in the crowd had heard what Joe said, or understood his
intentions as he made his way through the press of people. The woman at
the window was unaware of the fact that some one had heard her and was
about to heed her appeal.

"A hundred dollars to whoever saves my cat!" she cried again.

This time no one laughed.

Joe Strong, acrobat, athlete, magician, and possessed of many other
muscular accomplishments started up the stairs. The lower part of the
office building was deserted at this hour, but he made his way to the
place where he judged the woman lived alone. He was confirmed in this
belief by hearing from behind a closed door the barking and whining of
dogs.

"She must keep a regular menagerie," mused Joe. "Probably these are all
the friends she has, poor old lady!"

He knocked on a door that seemed to be the entrance to the living
apartments. There was a cessation of the barking and whining, and a
moment later a querulous voice asked:

"Who is there? What do you want?"

"Is that your cat out on the wire?" asked Joe.

"Yes! Oh, yes! That's Peter! My favorite cat! Oh, have you saved him?
Have you got him down? No, you can't have! He's out on that wire yet!"
she cried. And then she opened the door.

Joe was confronted by the same woman he had observed leaning from the
window. Her face was pale, and she was quite elderly. But there was a
kind and pathetic look about her eyes. Once, she must have been
beautiful.

Joe had no time to speculate on what might have been the romantic
history of the woman. She looked eagerly at him.

"What do you want?" she demanded. "I never see any one. I live here
alone. I must beg you to excuse me. I have to see if some one will not,
save my cat."

"That is just what I came up for," said Joe, smiling. "I am a lover of
animals myself. I'd like to save your pet."

"Oh, if you will, I'll pay you the hundred dollars!" cried the woman. "I
have it!" she went on eagerly. "It's in here," and she motioned to the
rooms. They were tastefully, but not lavishly, furnished.

"We'll talk about that later," said Joe, with a smile. "The point is let
me get the cat first."

"But you can't get him from here--from these rooms!" the woman in black
exclaimed. "He's out on the wire! You'll have to climb up in some way!
Oh, I don't know how you can do it!" There were tears in her eyes and
she clasped her hands imploringly.

"I can't get your cat from the street," said Joe. "That's why I came up
here. I must walk out on the wire from your window. Have you a pair of
slippers? The older and softer the better--slippers with thin, worn
soles."

"Why, yes, I have. But you--you can't walk out on the wire! It is too
small, almost, for my cat! You can't do it! It is impossible!"

"Oh, no," answered Joe gently, "it isn't impossible. I have done it
before. If you'll let me get to a window near which the wire is
stretched, and if you will let me take a pair of old slippers."

"Come in!" interrupted the eccentric old woman, opening wide the door.
"I don't in the least know what you intend to do, but something seems to
tell me I can trust you. And if only you can save Peter--"

"I'll try," said Joe simply.

The woman began to search frantically in a closet, throwing out shoes,
dresses, and other feminine wearing apparel. As she delved among the
things, a shout arose from the street, the noise of the voices floating
in through the open window. Joe looked out.

"Oh, has Peter fallen?" cried the woman.

That, too, had been Joe's thought.

"No," he answered, as he took an observation. "Your cat has only changed
his position a little. I suppose the crowd thought it was going to fall,
but it's all right. I'll soon have it back to you. Is it a vicious cat?"

"Oh, no indeed. He's as gentle as can be. But perhaps he might be so
scared now that he wouldn't know what he was doing. I see what you mean.
Here, I'll give you an old pair of gloves for your hands."

"That's what I want," said Joe. "I can't afford to have my hands
scratched, as I do some legerdemain tricks. But I need some soft-soled
slippers more than I need gloves."

"Here is a pair," said the woman. "They're mine. I wear large ones, for
I like to be comfortable."

"They'll fit me," decided Joe, after an inspection. "Just what I want,
too!"

He began to take off his shoes.

"Do you really mean you are going to walk out on that wire and get my
cat?" asked the woman, comprehending his intention as she saw Joe
putting on the slippers and drawing on the old gloves she had given him.
They were a man's size, and he judged she must have used them in rough
work about the house.

"I'm going out on the wire to get your cat," he said.

"Oh, but I ought not to let you! You may fall and be killed! When I said
I'd give a hundred dollars to whoever would save Peter, I did not mean
that any one should risk his life. Much as I love my cat, I couldn't
allow that."

"I'll be all right," said Joe easily. "Walking wires is part of my
business. Now don't worry. And please don't scream if you are going to
watch me."

She looked at him curiously.

"I am not in the habit of screaming," she said quietly.

"Well, I thought it best to mention it," said Joe.

He was now ready for his most novel form of walking the wire. He moved
toward the window from which the woman had leaned. It was the same
casement whence the cat had started on its perilous journey. Joe felt
sure of himself. The slippers were just what he needed, with soft,
pliable soles, worn thin. They were the best substitute he could have
found for his circus shoes.

The wire from which the banner was suspended was fast to an eye-bolt
set in the brick wall of the building a little below the sill of the
window. It had been easy for the cat to step out and get on the cable.

Joe appeared at the window. He had taken off his coat and, in his white
shirt, blue tie, and black trousers, he made a striking figure in the
brilliant sunset light.

Instantly the crowd in the street saw him and divined his intention. Joe
doubted not that Helen was looking up at him.

It was an easy step for him from the window sill to the wire from which
was suspended the banner. He knew it would support his weight in
addition to the big net affair. The size of the cable and the manner in
which it was fastened told him that. Still he cautiously tried it with
one foot before trusting all his weight to it. The spring of the wire
told him all he needed to know.

Pausing a moment to make sure of himself, Joe Strong started to walk
across the wire toward the clinging cat. The crowd gave one roar of
welcome and approval, and then became hushed. This was what Joe wanted.

Now it was just as if he were doing the act in the circus. Only there
was this difference--there was no safety net below him. But it was not
the first time Joe had taken this risk. True, beneath him were the hard
stones of the street, but a fall from the height at which he now was
would be fatal, no matter what the character of ground under him. He
dismissed all such thoughts from his mind.

Slowly, and with the caution he always used, Joe started on his journey
across the wire. The cat felt his coming, and turned its head, as it
crouched down, and looked at him. But it did not move. The creature was
literally "scared stiff."

Foot by foot Joe progressed. Below him the crowd watched breathlessly.
Joe knew Helen was there, praying for him, though he could not see her.
In the window stood the figure in black, a silent, hopeful but much
worried woman. She kept her promise not to scream, but Joe realized that
the crucial moment was yet to come.

On and on he went nearer and nearer to the crouching cat. If only the
animal would have sense enough to lie still and not make a fuss when he
picked it up, Joe felt that all would be well.

But would Peter behave? That was the question.

Joe was now almost over the middle of the street. Far below him was the
crowd--a sea of upturned faces, reddened by the reflected rays of the
setting sun. The throng was silent. Joe was glad of that.

"Keep still now, Peter, I'm coming for you!" said Joe in a low voice.

"That's right, Peter!" added the woman. "Be a good cat now. You are
going to be saved! Keep still and don't scratch!"

Whether the cat heard and understood it is hard to say. But it uttered a
pitiful:

"Mew!"

Inch by inch, foot by foot Joe advanced. He was quite sure of himself
now. He felt that he could easily have walked across the wire from
building to building, with the street chasm below him, and even could
have made the return trip. But picking up the cat and carrying it back
was another thing. It would have been easier for Joe to have carried a
man across on his back. He could direct the motions of the man. Could he
those of the cat?

Still he was going to try.

On and on he went. The woman in black was leaning from the window,
holding out her arms as though to catch Joe should he fall.

But he did not think of falling.

In another few seconds he was standing right over the cat. He could see
the animal's claws tensely clinging to the rope strands that held the
banner. Now came ticklish work.

"Easy, Peter! Go easy now!" said Joe soothingly.

He slowly and carefully stooped down. It was a trick he had often
performed in the circus on the high wire. But never under circumstances
like this.

Joe's hands came in contact with the fur of the cat's back. He gently
stroked the animal, murmuring:

"Come on now, Peter! Let go! Loosen your claws! I'm not going to hurt
you. Let me pick you up!"

Again it is hard to say that the cat knew what Joe was saying, but it
certainly made its body less tense. The claws were loosed. Joe
straightened up, holding the cat in his arms. He could feel its heart
beating like some overworked motor.

A roar arose from the crowd, but it was instantly hushed. The throng
seemed to realize that the return journey was infinitely more perilous
than the outward one had been.

Joe could not turn. He must walk backward to the window, carrying the
cat, which at any moment might become wild and scramble from his arms,
upsetting his balance.

Yet Joe Strong never faltered.




CHAPTER XII

THE FIRE ACT


Realizing that he must use every caution, Joe Strong had two things to
think of. One was himself, and the other the cat. He could not carry the
creature in his arms, as he needed to extend them to balance himself. He
had walked short distances along slack wires without doing this, but in
those cases he had been able to run, and his speed made up for the lack
of balancing power of the extended arms. Now, however, he needed to
observe this precaution.

What could he do with the cat?

In that moment of peril a boyhood scene arose to Joe's mind. He recalled
that on the farm where he had lived there was a pet cat which liked to
crawl up his back and curl on his shoulders, stretching out completely
across them and snuggling against the back of his head.

"If I can get this cat to do that I'll be all right," thought Joe. "I'll
try it."

Balancing himself, he changed the cat's position and put it up on his
shoulder. Even if it rested on only one it would leave his hands free
and he could extend his arms and balance himself. But Peter seemed to
know just what was wanted of him. With a little "mew," the animal took
the very position Joe wanted it to--extended along his back, close to
his head.

And not until then did Joe begin to step backward. Breathlessly the
crowd watched him. Step by step he went, feeling for the wire on which
he placed his feet. And each step made him more confident.

The crowd was silently watching. It was reserving its wild applause.

Step by step Joe walked backward until he heard the low voice of the
woman at the open window.

"Shall I take Peter now?" she asked.

"Can you reach him?" asked Joe. He knew he was close to the building.

"Yes," she answered.

"Then do," said Joe. "He may try to spring off when he sees himself so
close to you. Take him. I'll stand still a moment."

He felt the cat stirring. The next instant he was relieved of Peter's
weight, and then, with a quick turning motion, Joe himself was half way
within the window and sitting on the sill.

He had walked out on the wire, stretched a hundred feet above the
street, and rescued the cat. The pet was now in the arms of the woman in
black.

And then such a roar as went up in the crowd! Men thumped one another
on the back, and then shook hands, wondering at their foolishness and
why there was such a queer lump in their throats.

"Oh! Oh!" gasped the woman, as she hugged Peter to her. "I can never
thank you enough--not in all my life. It may be foolish to care so much
for a cat. But I can't help it. It isn't all that. I couldn't have borne
it to have seen him fall and be killed."

"He's all right now--after he gets over being scared," said Joe, as he
stroked the cat in the arms of the woman in black.

"And now will you let me know to whom I am indebted?" she asked. "Please
come in, and I'll pay you the reward."

"Well, I'll come in and put on my shoes," said Joe, with a smile. "I
didn't need the gloves," he added. "Peter was very gentle."

"Oh, he's a good cat!" said his mistress. "And now," she added, when Joe
had resumed his shoes and coat, "will you please tell me your name and
how you learned to walk wires and rescue cats?"

"I never rescued cats before," Joe returned, smiling. "It's something
new. But walking wires is my trade--or one of 'em. I'm with the circus.
I do some tricks and--"

"Oh, are you the man who gets out of the box?" she cried. "I have read
about that trick."

"It is one of mine," said Joe modestly.

"I'm so glad to know you!" exclaimed the woman. She seemed less of a
recluse than at first. "I haven't been to a circus for years--not since
I was a child," she continued, half sadly, Joe thought. "But I'm coming
to-night!" she exclaimed. "I'll have the janitor look after my cats and
dogs, and I'll go to the circus. I want to see you act. It will bring
back my lost youth--or part of it," she murmured.

"Allow me to make sure that you will be there," said Joe. "Here is a
reserved ticket. I will look for you."

"And now let me give you the reward I promised," begged the woman, as
Joe was about to leave. "I have the money here--in cash," she added
quickly. She went to a bureau, putting Peter down on a cushion. The cat
observed Joe intently. The woman came back with a roll of bills.

"No, really, I couldn't take it!" protested Joe. "I didn't save your cat
for money. I was glad enough to do it for the animal's sake."

"Please take it!" she urged. "I--I am well off, even if I live here,"
she said hesitatingly. "I shall feel better if you take it."

"And I shall feel better if you give it to the Red Cross," said Joe.
"That needs it, to help the stricken, more than I do. I make pretty good
money myself," he added. "And I didn't do this for a reward."

"But I promised it!"

"Well, then consider that I took it, and you, in my name, may pass it on
to the Red Cross," said Joe. "And now, may I ask your name?"

The woman told him. It was Miss Susan Crawford. The name meant nothing
to Joe, though he afterward learned she was a member of an old, wealthy
and aristocratic family. She had had an unfortunate love affair, and,
her family having all died, she made for herself a little apartment in
one of her many buildings and lived there with her pets--a recluse in
the midst of a big city. It was a pathetic story.

"I wish you would let me reward you in some way," said Miss Crawford
wistfully, as Joe left. "You did so much, and you get nothing out of
it."

"Oh, yes I do," returned the young acrobat. "I'll get a lot of
advertising out of this, and it will be the best thing in the world for
the circus."

And Joe was right. The next day the papers all carried big stories of
his wire-walking feat to save the cat that had ventured out over the
street and was afraid to go back. Bigger crowds than ever came to the
circus.

As she had promised, Miss Crawford was at the evening performance, and
Joe introduced a little novelty in one of his "magic stunts," producing
a cat instead of a rabbit from a man's pocket. As he held it up he
looked over and smiled at the old lady in black, for he had given her a
seat near his stage. She smiled back.

Joe never saw her again. She was found dead a few months later in her
lonely rooms, with her cats and dogs around her. But Joe always
remembered her.

The street wire-walking feat was the talk of the city, and when, the
following day, Joe announced that he was ready to put on his fire act,
which had been well advertised, every one was on figurative tiptoes to
see what it would be.

Joe had made all his preparations, and he had taken care to provide
against danger and accidents. He realized the risk he was running in
handling fire in a circus tent before crowds of people. But
extinguishers were provided, and one of the fire-fighting force of the
circus was constantly on hand.

After the preliminary whistle of the ringmaster which ended the other
acts and prepared for Joe's new one, the young magician advanced to the
platform and gave a little "patter."

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "in introducing my new act I wish,
first of all, to assure you that there is no danger. Even though I seem
to be in the midst of fire, do not be alarmed. I shall be safe, and no
harm will come to you."

Joe did this to forestall a possible panic.

"You have all heard of the ancient salamanders," he went on. "It is
reputed that this animal was able to live in the midst of fire. As to
the truth of that I can not say. I never saw a salamander, that I know
of. But that fire may safely be handled by human beings, and not at the
risk of being burned, I am about to demonstrate to you. I shall first
show you how to carry fire about in your hands, so that if you run short
of matches at any time you will not lack means of igniting the gas,
starting your kitchen range, or enjoying your smoke. While the stage is
being made ready for my main act, I will show you how to carry fire in
your hands."




CHAPTER XIII

A SENSATIONAL DIVE


Striking a match, Joe ignited two candles that stood on a little table
at one side of his stage. On the other side his assistants were setting
up the apparatus he intended to use in his more elaborate experiments.

"You observe that the trick has not yet begun," said Joe, with a laugh,
as he blew out the match. "In other words, I am lighting these candles
in the ordinary way--just as any one of you would do it, if he needed
to. In a moment I will show you how to light the candles in case one is
accidentally blown out and you have no match."

Allowing both candles to burn up well, with clear, bright flames, Joe
suddenly blew out one.

"Now," he said, "I will show you how to carry fire in your hands from
the lighted to the unlighted candle. Watch me closely!"

Joe cupped his hands around the lighted candle, seeming to take the
flame up in his fingers. When he removed his hands, which he still held
in cup, or globular, shape, the second candle had been extinguished.
Both were now out.

"You will notice that I am carrying the flame in my hands from one
candle to the other," said Joe, in a loud voice, as he walked across the
stage.

For an instant he spread his hands, cup fashion, around the candle he
had first blown out. Suddenly he withdrew his hands, holding them wide
apart and in full view of the audience, and, lo! the unlighted candle
was glowing brightly.

There was a moment of silence, and then the applause broke forth. Joe
bowed and said:

"That is how to carry fire in your hands. But please don't any of you
try it unless you get the directions from me."

"Tell us how to do it!" piped up a small boy.

"Come and see me after the show!" laughed Joe.

And, while on this subject, it might be well to explain how Joe did the
trick. It is very simple, but it takes practice, and an amateur may
easily be fatally burned in the attempt, simple as it is.

Joe lighted the candles in the usual way, with a match, as already
explained. There was no trick about this, nor about blowing out one. But
immediately after that the trick started. Joe placed a little piece of
waxed paper between the first and second fingers of his left hand as
soon as he had blown out the first candle. This paper was a slender
strip, and could not be seen by the audience.

When he cupped his hands around the remaining lighted candle Joe
ignited this waxed strip, taking care to work it away from his palms and
fingers. It burned with a tiny flame and with scarcely any heat in the
middle of the hollow cup formed by his hands.

As soon as he had ignited the paper Joe, by pressing the lower edges of
his palms against the blazing wick of the candle, extinguished it. This
had the same effect as though he had "pinched" out the flame with finger
and thumb, as many country persons put out, or "snuff," candles
to-day--for candles are still much used in some places.

Now we have Joe with a little blazing taper concealed in his cupped
hands, advancing to the candle he first blew out. He placed his hands
around this, lighted the wick from the taper, which he at once crushed
between his fingers, and the trick was done.

The candle was lighted, the remains of the little taper were concealed
between Joe's fingers, and it looked as though he had really carried
fire in his hands. The quickness with which he pinched out the candle
flame, and also smothered the taper after he had used it, prevented him
from being burned in the slightest. But it is best for a boy unpracticed
and without the dexterity of a professional prestidigitator not to
undertake to play with fire.

Joe Strong believed in doing his tricks and acts artistically and
elaborately. He had watched other performers "dress their act," and he
had often improved on what even stage veterans had done. His
apprenticeship had been a stern but good one.

And now he was going to introduce something novel in his fire-eating
tricks, but he was also going to add to that. He had read considerable
of late about the fire-eating tricks of the old "magicians" and had
delved into many curious old books. Now he was going to give his
audience some of this information.

"There is a trick in everything," said Joe, as he faced his audience in
readiness for the fire-eating act. "If I told you that I actually
swallowed blazing fire, any physician would know that I was not telling
the truth. I do not really eat the fire. I only seem to do so. But if in
doing so I can deceive you into thinking I do, and you are thrilled and
amused, you get your money's worth, I earn mine, and we are all
satisfied. So don't be alarmed by what you see.

"The resistance of the human body to heat is greater than many persons
suppose," said Joe. "And there is a vast difference between wet heat and
dry heat. Water, above one hundred and fifty degrees, would be
unbearable. It would really burn you badly. Water, as you know, boils at
two hundred and twelve degrees Fahrenheit. But before this point is
reached it is capable of ending life.

"Dry heat, however, is different. Men have frequently borne without
permanent discomfort dry heat up to three hundred degrees. This heat is
often reached in the drying rooms of oilcloth and oiled silk factories.

"Now the fire I handle is dry heat. I would no more think of pouring
boiling water over my hands than I would of taking poison. And yet I
will show you that I can thrust my hand into a blazing fire and suffer
no harm.

"In an old book I read that to enable one to thrust one's hands into the
fire all you had to do was to anoint them with a mixture of _bol
armenian_, quicksilver, camphor and spirits of wine. I should prefer to
leave that mixture alone, though in the book it is said that if one puts
that mixture on his hands he may handle boiling lead.

"Perhaps some ancient magician did this, but I think he depended more on
water than on anything else. If your hands are wet there is formed on
them a film of mo