"Never you mind, Dad!" Tom exclaimed."We'll get along all right now.You'd better go up to the house.Mr.Damon will go with you.
"Yes, of course!" exclaimed the odd man, catching a wink from Tom, who wanted his father not to get too excited on account of his weak heart."Come along, Professor Swift.The danger is all over.""All right," assented the aged inventor, with a look at the still smoking shed.
"And, Dad, when you haven't anything else to do," went on Tom, rather whimsically, "you might be thinking up some plan to take up the recoil of those guns on my aerial warship.I confess I'm clean stumped on that point.""Your aerial warship will never be a success," declared Mr.Swift."You might as well give that up, Tom.""Don't you believe it, Dad!" cried Tom, with more of a jolly air of one chum toward another than as though the talk was between father and son."You solve the recoil problem for me, and I'll take care of the rest, and make the air warship sail.But we've got something else to do just now.
Lively, boys."
While Mr.Swift, taking Mr.Damon's arm, walked toward the house, Tom, Ned, Koku, and some of the workmen began carrying out the explosives which had so narrowly escaped the fire.With long hooks the men pulled the shed apart, where the side walls had partly been burned through.Tom maintained an efficient firefighting force at his works, and the men had the proper tools with which to work.
Soon large openings were made on three sides of the red shed, or rather, what was left of it, and through these the dangerous chemicals and carbide, in sheet-iron cans, were carried out to a place of safety.In a little while nothing remained but a heap of hot sand, some charred embers and certain material that had been burned.
"Much loss, Tom?" asked Ned, as they surveyed the ruins.They were both black and grimy, tired and dirty, but there was a great sense of satisfaction.
"Well, yes, there's more lost than I like to think of," answered Tom slowly, "but it would have been a heap sight worse if the stuff had gone up.Still, I can replace what I've lost, except a few models I kept in this place.I really oughtn't to have stored them here, but since I've been working on my new aerial warship I have sort of let other matters slide.I intended to make the red shed nothing but a storehouse for explosive chemicals, but I still had some of my plans and models in it when it caught.""Only for the sand the whole place might have gone," said Ned in a low voice.
"Yes.It's lucky I had plenty of ballast aboard the dirigible.You see, I've been running it alone lately, and I had to take on plenty of sand to make up for the weight of the several passengers I usually carry.So I had plenty of stuff to shower down on the fire.I wonder how it started, anyhow? I must investigate this.""Mr.Damon and Eradicate seem to have seen it first," remarked Ned."Yes.At least they gave the alarm.Guess I'll ask Eradicate how hehappened to notice.Oh, I say, Rad!" Tom called to the colored man.
"Yais, sah, Massa Tom! I'se comin'!" the darky cried, as he finished piling up, at a safe distance from the fire, a number of cans of carbide.
"How'd you happen to see the red shed ablaze?" Tom asked.
"Why, it was jest dish yeah way, Massa Tom," began the colored man."I had jest been feedin' mah mule, Boomerang.He were pow'ful hungry, Boomerang were, an', when I give him some oats, wif a carrot sliced up in 'em--no, hole on--did I gib him a carrot t'day, or was it yist'day?--I done fo'got.No, it were yist'day I done gib him de carrot, I 'member now, 'case-- ""Oh, never mind the carrot, or Boomerang, either, Rad!" broke in Tom, "I'm asking you about the fire.""An' I'se tellin' yo', Massa Tom," declared Eradicate, with a rather reproachful look at his master."But I wanted t' do it right an' proper.I were comin' from Boomerang's stable, an' I see suffin' red spoutin' up at one corner ob de red shed.I knowed it were fire right away, an' I yelled.""Yes, I heard you yell," Tom said."But what I wanted to know is, did you see anyone near the red shed at the time?""No, Massa Tom, I done didn't."
"I wonder if Mr.Damon did? I must ask him," went on the young inventor."Come, on, Ned, we'll go up to the house.Everything is all right here, I think.Whew! But that was some excitement.And I didn't show you my aerial warship after all! Nor have you settled that recoil problem for me.""Time enough, I guess," responded Ned."You sure did have a lucky escape, Tom.""That's right.Well, Koku, what is it?" for the giant had approached, holding out something in his hand.
"Koku found this in red shed," went on the giant, holding out a round, blackened object."Maybe him powder; go bang-bang!""Oh, you think it's something explosive, eh?" asked Tom, as he took the object from the giant.
"Koku no think much," was the answer."Him look funny." Tom did not speak for a moment.Then he cried:
"Look funny! I should say it did! See here, Ned, if this isn't suspicious I'll eat my hat!" and Tom beckoned excitedly to his chum, who had walked on a little in advance.
