The Greatest Works of B. M. Bower - 51 Titles in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). B. M. Bower
and down and round and about, trying to discover the door upon which Pete had knocked. Doors there were, plenty of them, but though he knocked until his knuckles were sore, none gave any response. He was trying to find his way back to the horses when he met Norm hurrying along the outer corridor where occasional windows let in a gray light. The Kid stopped him and asked his question. Could he build a fire and cook a meal, or how about it? Norm grinned.
"Against the fire ordinance. Some cop come along—good night. Here, I'll show where you can do light housekeeping and it's nobody's business so long as you don't blat it out. If I've got a key that'll fit—yep—here you are, Cowboy. You've got over a week free rent. Make yourself to home, but don't advertise it, or the stuff's off. Keep the key and turn it in to me or Pete when you're through. The gas is on, and water and lights—all you need is grub." He gave the Kid a sudden searching glance. "I've got no right to turn you in here, you know. But I guess you won't—being a friend of Harlan's—oh, that's all right! Glad to do what I can—G'by!"
He was gone, his footsteps echoing down the wide corridor, and the Kid was left standing just within a barnlike room with rows upon rows of white crockery staring from shelves along the wall, two big coffee machines blinking in the light Norm had snapped on overhead, a gas range fit for an ordinary hotel and a long, tin-covered table in the center of the room. The Kid gave a short hiccupy laugh. He and his lone frying pan!
But it was a place to cook, and the Kid was hungry. He wandered around until he found his horses again, gathered an armload of provisions and his frying pan and coffeepot, and made his way back to the kitchen and let himself in. Luckily he had stopped that morning at a grocery and bought bread, eggs, butter and a bottle of milk, and he still had coffee and bacon from farther back along the road. He therefore dined very well and in lonely state at one end of the tin-covered table, and felt so much better for it that it was not necessary to remind himself so often of his blessings. The fact that he was housed from the rain, that his ponies were feeding happily sheltered at their journey's end seeped in now to where the realization brought a glow of content.
At five o'clock the bedlam of hammers ceased down at the end of the arena where the chutes were going up. Hollow footsteps ceased also, and the distant rumble of trucks. A silence of the wilderness settled upon the place. But it was not the wilderness he knew,—this dim cavern of steel and cement; it affected him strangely, made him glad of the presence of the horses. That small group of hay bales was like a tiny isle in an uncharted sea. In the gloom he clung to it, secretly dreading to leave it even to cook his supper in the dismal room over there in the outer corridor. And as soon as he recognized that dread he gave a snort of disdain and started for the place with his flashlight.
No one had thought to show him where to turn on the lights, though he supposed there must be lights in the labyrinth. But with the white beam of his flashlight threading the darkness before him he found the room, unlocked it and went in, closing the door after him to shut out some of the cheerlessness that seemed to follow him. He ate hurriedly, washed plate and cup at the big sink, emptied and rinsed his coffeepot with cold water, turned out the light and made his way with some difficulty back to the horses. It seemed a mile, in the dark like that.
With his blankets spread upon a shelflike niche in the pile of hay bales and the horses dozing in their pen beside him, the Kid tried to sleep. But the very silence of the place disturbed him. He lay there alert, listening for something—though what it could be he did not attempt to define. The small sounds close by—the sigh of a horse, the scrape of a hoof upon the cement floor—seemed only to accentuate the stillness beyond, press it more heavily upon his nerves. He caught himself holding his breath, straining his ears to hear something; which was useless and idiotic of course, since there was nothing to tempt even a rat to scamper down that black arcade.
The muffled hoot of an engine reminded him that the city lay huddled along the lake, but it could not lessen the loneliness of this great pile of masonry. And after the engine had quieted down and the silence returned thick and unbroken another sound—or it may have been that his nerves deceived his ears into imagining it—came whispering out of the blackness. The Kid was not certain, but he thought he heard some one moving along the wall that stretched behind him, curving inward to the wide, sloping passage leading to the great pillared corridor that stretched curving away upon either side in that immense horseshoe which formed the stadium.
It might be the night watchman, though reason told him there would be no watchman on duty until there was something more to safeguard than a load of hay and a few piles of planks. Furthermore, a watchman would carry a light; and although he sat up and strained his eyes, not a glimmer showed in the inky blackness. It couldn't be a watchman, then. Perhaps it was nothing at all—or a drip, perhaps, if the roof leaked somewhere and it still was raining. But it did not sound like the drip of water—he thought of a leaky faucet and discarded the explanation. It sounded—or it felt, since nothing much could be heard—like some one moving stealthily along the wall, away back there.
After a few minutes he relaxed and lay down again. Whatever it was, the thing must have passed. Imagination, probably, the Kid told himself with some disgust, and snuggled under his blankets determined to sleep. The folks at home would have reason for thinking him still a child, if they knew he was afraid of the dark! After awhile he did sleep, for the next he knew the sun, shining directly into the broad passage from the arena, filtered a gray light through the cavernous place where he lay.
The Kid sat up and looked back at the blank wall where he had fancied he heard the sly footsteps last night. All foolishness, of course; there couldn't have been any one there. But he had never owned such things as nerves—at least not consciously—and it was strange they should play that trick on him.
He got up and went out into the arena where the sun was almost standing on tiptoe to look over the fluted colonnade that crowned the opposite side. It was early, a beautiful morning. He would feed the horses, eat his own breakfast and then take them out in the arena for a little exercise before the workmen arrived. For a minute or two he stood gazing around him at the great tiers of seats, row upon row, and tried to picture what it would be like when the big show started. A vast slope flowered with faces—eyes staring down upon him—thousands and thousands of eyes! Would he have stage fright, fail to do his best? The roar of applause—would the waves of it surge toward him in approval of his skill?
He turned back, thrilled at the spectacle which was to be; awed, trembling a little lest he fail somehow, do a little less than his best.
But when he went to cook his breakfast his thoughts jarred back to the present. For his coffeepot, that he had left standing on its nose on the drain-board of the sink, was on the stove a third full of coffee not quite cold. Of his half loaf of bread only the heel was left lying on the table, and when he counted he knew that three eggs had been taken from the carton.
Yet the door had been locked with one of those expensive Yale locks supposed to be burglar proof, or nearly so. Aside from the food nothing had been disturbed, so far as he could see. But some one had been in that room very late in the night and had helped himself to a meal. That furtive sound last night had not been imagination, then. Some one else had shared the stadium with him and had been rather anxious that his presence should not be discovered.
In spite of himself, the Kid felt a queer prickling sensation at the back of his neck.
Chapter VIII. Contestant Number One
The Kid did not take his horses out to exercise them after breakfast. Instead of that, he made a complete and careful exploration of that vast and to him mysterious region beneath the stadium. From the kitchen he started toward the gate where he had entered, and tried every door he saw. Such rooms as were unlocked were empty, but not many could he look into. Much of the way the walls were blank. The outer windows were heavily barred, the great entrances tightly closed with steel doors. At long intervals, iron stairways went up to the seats, and here and there were inclines like tilted tunnels twisting upward. He did not try these yet; he wanted to see what lay on the ground floor.
When