Chapter XXIV: Snap's Sacrifice

That night Snap slept little. Whenever he closed his eyes visions of Fairbury floated before them, and of that kind, sweet face, with eyes shining through their tears--the one face which had always had a smile for him, which was always ready to confront those who said 'That young Hales is a thorough ne'er-do-weel, he'll never be good for anything, mark my words.' She had always believed in him; had always trusted her boys with him, though the neighbours shook their heads and thought, as one old lady said, 'that those dear lambs would never come to any good with that boy, always fighting and disgracing himself.' And then, when the expulsion from Fernhall had thrown his guardian into a white heat of virtuous indignation, and even dear old Admiral Chris had looked askance, it was the same little woman who had drawn out the whole story, had tried to look serious over it, and finally re-told it to her brother in such a way that that old warrior had forgotten his gout and roared with laughter till it sounded as if a gale was blowing.

Always Mrs. Winthrop. Whenever he opened his eyes there was the great white balloon quivering and poising in the moonlight; and whenever he closed them there was the face of the woman who had been more than a mother to him, who had put every good thought into his mind, and helped him, ever since he could remember, to grow up a gentleman. And round him lay her sons, and in his heart he knew that next to God she trusted him for their safety.

Getting up softly, he climbed into the car of the balloon, which rocked like a cradle as he sat in it. The addition of his weight made no perceptible difference to it, except perhaps to steady it. He noticed, as he sat there alone among the clouds, that, besides the box A, there were quite a dozen heavy little parcels in the car--scientific instruments for taking astronomical observations, and such like. Besides these there were a number of lumps of what appeared to be lead or iron, used obviously for ballast. Altogether, Snap thought, there was a good deal to throw out, and even four such men as Frank might possibly not be too much for the balloon. If the crew eventually appeared to be too heavy, why, then Dick and he must try to climb down, whilst the two Winthrops trusted to the ship of the sky.

That there had been a considerable escape of gas from the balloon Snap saw only too plainly; its outlines were no longer full, rounded curves, as they should have been. In places there was a deplorable flatness and falling away from the true lines of beauty. Still, knowing very little of these things, Snap thought it might do, and crept back a good deal consoled to his lair alongside Dick Wharton.

That old hero slept, like the proverbial weasel, with one eye open.

'Been overhaulin' that craft of yourn, Snap?' he whispered.

'Yes, Dick,' the boy answered in the same low tones, 'and I think she will do.'

The old fellow lay back again for a few minutes, and then began again:

'I've been thinking, Snap,' he said.

'Yes?' interrupted Snap, 'perhaps you have; I should get a better chance of sleeping if you didn't think so loud.'

'Never mind, sonny, I dare say I do breathe a bit hard at times, but I never knowed a "high-blower" yet as wasn't a good horse; what I was a-goin' to say is that if you mean goin' in that consarn I'll come along. If you ever did get down again to prairie level, you'd be like babies without Dick Wharton to tote you round.'

Snap was not going to argue about his reasons, it was enough for him that his old friend would come; so he sat up and shook hands upon it, clinching the bargain there and then.

Another day dawned, and saw the sun rise up and sink far towards the west again, before old Wharton gave up all hope of relief. He had been peering steadily down on the encampment for a couple of hours before he turned to Snap with:

'Sonny, it's got to be done. Them Redskins have almost got over their skeer, and I guess poor Warwolf has been tortured and scalped by this time.'

'Yes, Dick,' said Snap quietly; 'then suppose we get ready.'

'Why, what is there to do, pard, except get right in and go?' asked his companion.

'Well, first of all we must try whether the balloon will carry us all. She certainly won't unless we take some of the cargo out.'

'All right, bear a hand, Towzer. You are boss of this show, Snap,' was the reply.

Snap climbed into the car and handed out the instruments and a bag or two of sand, the balloon straining wildly at its moorings as he did so.

'Come in with me, Frank,' he cried, 'and help me steady her.'

Frank climbed in.

'Now, Towzer!' Snap added; and Towzer joined the other two.

'That is very nearly a load, I think,' said Snap, 'and there won't be much fear of our going up too high when Dick gets in.'

'No,' said Frank, 'we had better throw out something more.'

'Very well,' said Snap, throwing out everything he could lay his hands on, 'but if it won't carry us now I don't know what we shall do. Come on, Dick.'

Dick stepped in, and still the balloon strained upwards.

'She'll fly all right,' cried Towzer.

'Then cut the cord and take care that you don't roll out,' commanded Snap.

The cord was cut, and suddenly the earth and the mountain peak began to recede from the balloon. At least so it seemed to the boys. As for the balloon, it seemed exactly poised in the air, steady as an eagle on widespread wings, and even as they sat and gazed the earth drew back and faded until it was gone, and they hung alone, in a sad and absolute silence, whither no voice of bird or insect ever penetrated.

The boys were smitten as it were with dumbness. No one spoke, though, strangely enough, no fear possessed them--only a great stillness and peace. The balloon had now apparently reached that point at which it could rest in equilibrium, and hung motionless over the peak from which the boys had risen. The cold had grown intense, and the evening was approaching, though the sun's rays still spread colour through the great cloudland below them. At last Frank broke the silence:

'What is this, Snap,' he said, 'floating round the car?' and he drew in his hand covered with minute fragments of ice.

'It looks like powdered ice,' replied Snap.

'I don't much fancy this country to winter in,' broke out Dick; 'I suppose, Snap, you couldn't get this craft of yours to go down a bit, could you?'

Even as Wharton spoke the balloon seemed to have heard him, or at any rate the clouds seemed to be drawing nearer, and the storm of ice-morsels grew thicker.

'I guess this ice, or snow, or hoar-frost, or whatever it is, won't make our shay any lighter,' remarked Dick; 'do you see how it rests on the car and seems to thicken round the balloon?'

'Yes,' said Frank, 'and if it rests on the edge of the car what must it do on the broad top of the balloon?'

'Dick,' whispered Snap at this moment, 'what is that?' and he pointed to the side of the great bubble above them, from which a long wreath of thin white smoke was trailing into space.

Dick looked.

'I'm blowed if I know,' he replied.

'Then I'll tell you,' Snap hissed in his ear: 'the balloon has sprung a leak, that is the gas escaping; the weight of this stuff' (touching the snow) 'on the top has done it, and we are going down fast enough even to suit you. Out with that sack of ballast,' he added, and Wharton and Frank sent the only sand-bag over the side.

This sent the balloon up again a little way, but they were now comparatively near the earth. Round them a regular snow-storm was raging. The particles of ice which they had met with in the higher layer of atmosphere had now gathered into snowflakes. The storm, such as it was, lasted but a few minutes, and then the sinking sun lit up the scene below them.

As they looked down, the boys saw a great billowy ocean of thick, rosy fog. Wave upon wave it seemed to roll, opaque, soft, and beautiful in colour, and as they looked it came up and up to meet them. The snow upon the top of the balloon was still too heavy for them, and they were sinking fast. In another minute the car was engulfed in the rosy clouds, which were already turning to a more sombre colour, and later on changed from rose to purple, and then to sullen grey.

As the balloon passed out of fog-land the sun set, and a quick darkness began to settle on the land. All sounds of the earth had long since been plain to them: indeed, when in the fog, it seemed as if every sound was right alongside. Now they could see as well as hear. They were comparatively close to the earth, much nearer than they had been for days. They were skimming over the prairie some 1,500 feet from the ground, and drifting straight to the Indian encampment, sliding as it were down a gentle descent, the end of which seemed likely to be right amongst the enemy's watch-fires.

'Dick,' cried Snap, 'if we don't lighten the balloon we are lost. She is going to settle right amongst the Crows.'

'Well, sonny, there's only our clothes left to throw away now. I don't mind sacrificing my hat and boots,' said Dick, and, suiting the action to the word, he denuded himself of everything except his flannel shirt and trousers. All followed his example.

'Wal,' he remarked, 'I never knowed it rain ready-made clothes afore. Perhaps them Injuns didn't neither.'

'It hasn't done us much good either, Dick,' said Frank, 'I fancy we are still sinking.'

'We are,' replied Snap; 'but if we could only manage to clear their camp and fall a mile or two beyond them in the forest I should be content to take my chance. We can't hope for much more, I am afraid, now.'

'Much more?' muttered Towzer, 'I shouldn't much care if we did fall amongst the Crows, if they would give us something to eat before scalping us.'

Even at this supreme moment Towzer was true to his schoolboy instincts: as for the others, they had almost forgotten their hunger in the excitement of the scenes which they were passing through.

At this moment they heard a loud shouting in the Indian camp. They were dashing backwards and forwards among the tents, horses were being caught, and the wild yells of the bloodthirsty savages rang in their ears.

'Encouraging sort of welcome to mother earth, isn't it?' said Snap.

'It's strange too,' added Wharton; 'of course they've seen us and know we are dropping like a ripe plum into their mouths, but I wonder at their making such a noise about it. It's not like 'em!'

'Snap,' said Frank, 'I think we can sell them now. If you fellows tied me up a little so as to help my bad arm, we could all hold on to the ring above the car or the cords it is fastened to, and cut the car adrift.'

I suppose most of my readers have seen a big balloon--if not, a word of explanation may be necessary here. The body of the balloon is, of course, a great sack or bag of some excessively fine and light material, such as silk, or layers of india-rubber, between sheets of linen covered with thick coats of varnish. Over the balloon is a kind of net-work of rope. This is its harness and comes to a point towards the bottom, where all the ropes are attached to a great wooden hoop, from which again hang the ropes to which the car itself is attached. Frank's idea was to climb up into the ring and cut the car adrift.

'You've hit the nail on the head, my lad, plum centre this time,' said Wharton, 'but can you get up to the ring yourself?'

'I'll try,' replied Frank, 'but there isn't a moment to lose. Give me a hand, Towzer.'

Between them the others got Frank up into the rigging of the balloon, and tied him securely to the ring, so that he would not be entirely dependent upon his one arm for support.

'Are you all right?' cried Snap from his perch.

'All right, old chap.'

'All right,' came the answers.

'Then cut the ropes near you all together, so as not to drag the balloon, over on one side,' he cried. 'Now!'

Each boy sawed away at the ropes near him with a will, but old Dick did not get his rope cut through quite as soon as the others. The result was that the balloon gave a furious plunge, and then, as the last rope broke, righted herself and darted upwards once more.

Snap looked white and scared, but the colour came back to his face when he saw all his comrades in their places, and old Wharton chimed in with:

'Dang me if this here balloon hasn't got all the vices of a cayuse, and more. Loses its wind and wants to stop, leastways come down, and then, as for bucking, a half-broke cayuse is a fool to it!'

For a while the balloon sailed along on a higher level, but all the time the thin wreath of white vapour marked a leak and a constant escape of gas. Besides this, the evening damp collected and settled on the envelope of the balloon, and all tended to weigh it down.

'We are sinking again,' cried Towzer, 'sinking faster than ever before. Look how the prairie is rushing up to meet us!' and indeed it seemed so, and there was absolutely nothing left to throw out.

'Wal, you may as well go too,' said Dick with a sigh, and he drew his revolver from his breast and dropped this his most precious possession to the earth.

The boys looked at it as it shot downwards swift and straight, swifter and straighter than a skylark falls, and they thought of what might any moment be their own lot, and it made the boldest of them grip the ropes with fresh energy.

'Dick,' said Snap, 'in another five minutes at most we shall drop right among the Crows. They are so still now that one might fancy no one was in camp, but there are the fires, and I can even in this gloom make out the tops of the teepees. I wish something would break the silence to tell us how far we are from the ground.'

'Yes, pard,' replied Dick, 'one can't see much through this mist.'

'If there was not such a crowd of them waiting for us,' said Frank, 'this fog might give us our best chance of escape.'

'Listen!' said Dick, 'if we do come down amongst them, do each of you run for your lives, and each one in a different direction. If anyone gets safely through, let him try to make off to the dead-wood track and hide where Snap fell down until he can get a chance of getting clear back to Rosebud. But it ain't no good talking,' he muttered with a sigh, 'who is a-goin' to get through that crowd of Crows without even a six-shooter? Great Scott! if we could only get beyond 'em in this mist!' he added.

'Yes, we could slip them well if we did, and all would be saved?' said Snap in a questioning tone, with a strange little shake in his voice which no one ever noticed before. 'Do you think, Dick, you could get us all back to Rosebud if we did drift by the camp in this fog to-night?' he asked again.

'Sure, lad! but what's the good of talking?' he replied.

'No, it isn't, Dick,' said Snap, his face strangely white and drawn, and the big brown eyes looking misty and dim; 'but if any of us do get through (it will be over in a minute now) let the others tell the story at home. Frank, old boy, give the mother my love; tell her Snap did his best.'

The voice was so strange (there was almost a sob in it) that all three turned their eyes from the scene below--the approaching tents and fires, right below them--to Snap. It was too late! As they turned they saw him slip from his seat on the ring; for one moment the strong brown hands clung to it, the brave face looked at them; the fearless lips murmured 'Good-bye, save them Dick!' and then the balloon sprang up again, and, as poor, half-maddened Wharton said, 'twelve stone of the bravest flesh as God ever put breath into' dropped through the darkness, there was a faint thud, heard even by those in the rapidly rising balloon, and Snap had done his duty. He had given his life for his friends. More than that no man can do.