BRUNTON’S MACHINE
A Chicago Drummer’s Trip Around the World in 28 Hours
CHAPTER I
“I am not dreaming. I have gone around the world in twenty-eight hours. I have no desire to repeat the trip which I have just ended, and which was not a voluntary journey on my part. Not true?
Yes, it is true, though I scarcely expect anyone to believe the story.
Crazy! No, I am not crazy, though I have gone through enough in the last two days to qualify any man for a lunatic asylum. There is only one satisfaction in the whole business—a Chicago drummer is ahead as usual. Tell you all about it? Well, if I can, I will.”
And the speaker lay back on his reclining chair, as if to collect his thoughts. There was a haggard, scared expression on his face, a wild look in his eye which justified the suspicion that he was partially insane.
“Here, then, is the story,” he said, after a little. “I have been in Michigan, and what I have to tell began in Kalamazoo. I had a good trade till I entered Brunton’s place. I could sell him nothing. I could not fix his attention on my goods, and I could not understand things, for hitherto he had been one of my best customers.
My pride was stirred, and when be suddenly said to Me “I think you know something about electricity and mechanics,” I answered, promptly: “There isn’t much worth knowing about either that Jim Gerar hasn’t climbed on to,” though what, in the name of the respected Sam Hill, an ordinary mechanic had to do with electricity I could not for the life of me rarefy.
You will presently see that I had now caught Brunton’s drift, but I was bound to sell him goods, and I would have known all about Uriah and David or the tax systems of Turkey and Mongolia had Brunton asked me about them.
“‘Well, come down with me to my house. There is something there I want to show you.’
“There was no getting out of it. I might lose my sale if I refused to go, and I could not leave Kalamazoo without an order from Brunton. I wish to Heaven I hadn’t gone; but I have had an experience that has fallen to the lot of no other man, and if I get one or two points out of the old fellow, I have the biggest thing for the Chicago world’s fair that has been dreamed of. The Eiffel tower! Pshaw! I’ll give them daily trips around the earth, and for a consideration stop to enable a fellow drummer to sell a bill of goods on the way. Only he must hail from Chicago.
“Well, I went down to Brunton’s house with him. It is a goodish looking place, for the old man is comfortably fixed.
“Where are the mechanics?” I asked, as we passed round to the rear of the building.
“He gave me an odd sort of look, but led the way to a high structure in the middle of the back yard. I concluded the men must be at work in it. We entered, and then my wonder and my troubles began.
“‘Here are the mechanics,” he said, pointing to an object with the graceful outlines of a pigeon. “I saw you misunderstood my meaning, but you now see before you the greatest invention of the age. It is a combined flying and swimming machine, whose motive power is electricity. As you look at it now its arrangement is such that it can rise and move through the air at lightning speed. Now,’ and Mr. Brunton touched a button, ‘you see it is a fish.’
“True as gospel, Tom, the wings of the bird closed, its feet were drawn up under it almost a moment, and right before my eyes was a perfect facsimile of a fish, probably twenty-six feet in length.
“I forgot soap, sugar and starch. Was I in the presence of Aladdin, or Sinbad, or would I wake up at home from an attack of nightmare?
“‘The change can be made in an instant, you see,’ continued Sinbad, as he pressed another button which uncoiled the fish covering and gave us back the bird.
“The quarters inside are rather cramped,’ said this modern wizard, ‘owing to the machinery, which had to be light as well as strong. I used rubber chiefly. Let us go in.’
“Another button was touched, and a sort of door admitted us to the interior. The door shut behind us and there was darkness for a moment. Then a dim light revealed the mysterious mechanism within.
“‘You see I have windows below the wings. When the machine becomes a fish I have to depend on electricity, of which I have stored a sufficient supply to afford light and motive power for twenty-eight hours. Following the curve of the earth in this latitude and going east or west, I have calculated that the storage would bring me back to this starting point.
“Here are the springs which cause the machine to descend. It is also in the interior arrangement and produces the fish form. By this button the depth of its immersion in the water is regulated. A like arrangement on this side gives the bird form when desired, and regulates the elevation. This button develops the electric force.’
“All this had been said with a simplicity and assurance which turned my head. I must be dreaming. I reached out my hand and touched Mr. Brunton, to assure myself that flesh and blood stood before me. He was surprised, and then, as if understanding my gesture, he said:
“‘Yes, it is all surprising. Even to me, when I first dreamed of it, it all seemed impossible. But I have taken night journeys with my machine which prove its reliability. On one occasion I remember surprising you at eleven o’clock at night by calling at your house to give an order which I had omitted when I saw you at noon. I crossed Lake Michigan that night in just two minutes!”
“He must be mad, and yet I remember the incident he mentioned.
“‘Let me see you turn on the power,’ I said, with absolute incredulity as to its existence.
“‘Certainly, if you wish it,’ he replied. ‘Excuse me just a moment,’ and he stepped into the open air. When outside he touched a spring just as the door shut behind him, and—I tell you, the rest is too horrible to think of.
CHAPTER II
“A sudden blaze of light, an almost imperceptible jerk, where my momentary sensations when the door closed. I waited for Brunton’s return, but a strange, rushing sound forced itself on my ears—a sound which I could not understand. I could liken it only to the roar of a cyclone. Could it be possible that a real cyclone was approaching, and that I was shut up in this trap, and entirely at the storm’s mercy? I looked through one of the opening, expecting to see the wooden structure within which Brunton concealed his secret work.
“God in Heaven! What did it mean? Around the infernal machine in which I was inclosed there were no wooden walls. Only the open sky, and now and then a bank of fog, into which I passed from which I emerged almost as soon as I had entered it. I was dazed; but in a few moments the conviction forced itself upon me that the madman had trapped me to make me the means of testing his insane conception of bird and fish travel.
Yes, below me was the earth—far, far down; and as I looked the depressions and elevations of the surface were becoming more and more indistinct. I was rising as well as speeding along as I had never traveled before. I thought of the button which the lunatic had told me would regulate the ascent of the bird. But ahead of me I saw a glittering surface, which I recognized to be Lake Erie. I was hurrying toward it with fearful rapidity.
Dare I touch the button? Higher and higher was I being carried. The chill of the atmosphere was becoming intolerable. Almost below me was the long, gleaming lake: and, if the button should guide me downward into the lake, there could only be one consequence—death. But every instant I was rising, and the chill was becoming more unbearable. I must die at any rate if I rose much higher. I could only die if I plunged into the lake. I touched the button—very lightly.
The effect was like magic. I began to descend, not so rapidly as I had feared, but I was descending, and now the lake was below me. My finger was resting on the button, and an involuntary movement of my fingers turned it a little to the right. The descending motion ceased, and I seemed now to maintain a fixed height above the water. The end of the lake was near. There was Buffalo, and onward I raced, faster than a cyclone—faster than any thing of which human beings had ever dreamed. Onward over Northern New York, and ahead of me I saw mountains, against which I must be dashed, unless I could again ascend.
“My whole thoughts were now concentrated in trying to control this devil’s ship. But there was an uncontrollable fascination rising within me as I thought that I was the first who had traveled as I was now doing. I pulled the button toward me. I did it rashly, for a peak of the mountains was just ahead. I rushed upward, and I raced over the peak high above it. But again the chill struck me. I pressed on the button, and the downward motion commenced. When I reached a desirable elevation, where I would not come in contact with the peaks, and would also escape the penetrating cold of the higher atmospheric strata, I turned the button again to the right, and found that now I had full control of my strange air-ship. Despite the danger surrounding me an indescribable exhilaration took possession of me. The world below me was asleep. The Kalamazoo madman was not mad after all. But why had he chosen me to take his aerial voyage? Perhaps it had been an accident. Perhaps—
“But what is that? The great Atlantic, as I live. Soon I would be above it. Yes, here it is below me already. At least two thousand miles of water were ahead of me. Would my propelling force carry me beyond it, or would I fall into its depths and never more be heard of? Faith in my Kalamazoo lunatic began to rise within me. I had passed above two ocean steamers, and had seen innumerable crafts near the coast.
“Ah! What strange impulse is this? I had read of the wonders of the ‘vasty deep.’ Now I could see them, if the fish were as reliable as the bird. I hesitated, but at last my hand touched the other button. Down like a flash I went, and I soon realized that I was encircled by the waters of the Atlantic. Downward, still downward, and I began to fear that I might reach the bottom or be dashed upon a submarine peak. I turned the button which had transformed my bird into a fish. Its descent was at once checked. Suddenly there was a jar. Instinctively I looked toward a sort of window which had been constructed of sheets of isinglass in the stern. There was a similar window at the bow, defended by rubber points to deaden the effects of a blow, if it should come. Behind I saw a moving monster, whose back the keel of my fish had grazed. I had studied zoology as a matter of course, but the books had never told me of a creature like that of which I got a glimpse. It was in some respects like a huge serpent, but it must have measured two hundred feet in length. I began to think that I ought to rise nearer the surface. I touched the button, and was soon within fifty or sixty feet of the water level. I did not wish to go higher, because in my fearful speed if I should be struck by an ocean steamer I could go to the bottom, and Brunton’s fish would be my coffin.
“What is that? I had read of the octopus. I had imagined all sorts of marine monsters, but any thing like what I saw ahead of me now I never could have conceived. It seemed to be coming toward me, but in this I was deceived. It was resting in the water, holding in its terrible claws a porpoise and two sharks. My brief glance showed me a crab of such dimensions, Tom, that you would not believe me if I tried to describe it to you.
“I was in a quandary. I feared that there were rocks below and crab, and dared not descend. I discovered that I was ignorant of how to turn to the right or left. I was going as straight east as an arrow, and, if I could go entirely around the globe, must again land in Kalamazoo, or pass over it.
“The sight of this horrible-looking animal terrified me. I must get out of its way, somehow, and the only means I saw of doing so was to ascend to the surface, resume my bird-shape, and rise into the air. Here it was that I came near ending my journey. In my excitement, just as I approached the surface of the water, I touched the bird button. I was a moment too soon. The fish covering retreated, and the wings made an effort to clear themselves of the water. There was a moment’s struggle in the singular vehicle. It shook in every—I was about to say—plank, but every part of its rubber incasement is better. At last the wings rose, the water cleared, and ahead of me I saw the shores of Europe. I was just in time.
“I don’t wish to tire you, Tom, with this strange narrative. It is enough to say that I crossed the Eastern continent, took a swim under the Pacific—though I was very careful there—and finally saw the Rocky mountains ahead of me. One strange thing to which I just [sic] refer, was the fact that my days and nights were only about six hours in length, just a little over.
“But I must hurry on. Here we are near Chicago, and I must tell you the end.
“I crossed the Rockies, passed over the great valley and had a brief trip over Lake Michigan. I began to wonder whether the machine was wound up to go on forever—whether, in short, I was started on a car of perpetual motion. I had not long to wonder; as I came to Kalamazoo there was a sudden stoppage of the outward movement. There followed a brief fluttering of the wings, a restful descent, and the wonderful machine alighted within the inclosure with which its inventor had concealed it. Everything had been calculated with an accuracy which would have gratified even Jules Verne.
“The door of the machine opened, and there stood old man Brunton.
“‘I have to apologize to you, Mr. Gerar,’ he said, ‘for omitting to tell you that there are condensed beef and milk in the virvector.’
“‘You old villain, is this a dream, or are you a wizard?’ I asked.
“I was not sure yet whether I was dreaming or awake.
“‘Neither,’ was his quiet reply. ‘You have gone round the world. I wish mine had been such a fortunate lot. You are a lucky man, Mr. Gerar.’
“Tim, am I dreaming still?” said my friend to me.
The train was wheeling into the depot. There was nothing now very suspicious about the appearance of my friend.
“I am going to make money out of this when the world’s fair comes to Chicago, Time,” said my friend, as we parted.
“Brunton is so grateful for my going that he is willing to go snacks with me.”
I haven’t seen Jim Gerar since, and don’t know whether he ws insane that night or not. I know Bruntion, and he is a very peculiar man. But can it be possible that Jim Gerar’s story was true? Or was it insanity? The time of the world’s fair will tell.—Chicago News.
Unionville Republican, Missouri, 14 May, 1890
