The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men Part 26

He cast one glance at the piles and commenced to work with a will.

Presently a shout was heard and Ralph, the photographer, appeared on his wheel.

"There's a bunch more coming," he said, and he, too, set to work.

"Frost!" said Bob suddenly, as he pointed to a small glistening crystal of h.o.a.r frost on a blade of gra.s.s.

The boys cheered. Their prophecies were justified, and they plugged at the work harder than ever. Bob, who feared neither Jed Tighe's tongue, nor anything else, opened the farmer's stable, harnessed and hitched up a team, and commenced to draw the manure and straw to the edge of the orchard. It was now three o'clock and the frost was beginning to form rapidly.

"We can't save the rest of it," said Ross, as he looked longingly at the far quarter of the orchard; "we've got all we can do to keep going what we've got."

Four o'clock and five o'clock pa.s.sed. The sun rose. Promptly at five-thirty, his regular hour, old Jed Tighe got up and walked to the window to see what kind of a day it was. He rubbed his eyes and looked again, astonished.

There, on his land, using his team of horses, was a group of eight boys, their forms only occasionally seen through the blanket of smoke which drifted sluggishly over and through the trees of his orchard. The ground was white with h.o.a.r frost and the lower branches of the trees in the yard had frost crystals on them. The farmer dressed hurriedly and went out.

A dead silence fell along the boys as the tall spare form of the farmer was seen approaching. Georgie and some of the younger ones shrank back.

Ross stood his ground. Bob lounged forward.

Jed Tighe said never a word. He cast a shrewd glance at the fruit trees in the orchard which had been nearest to the fires and the smudges, and then, still silently, walked down the entire line of the fires until the end of it, and beyond. On the unprotected stretch, the frost lay thick.

He stood thoughtfully a moment and then walked back up the line, more slowly, until he came to where Ross stood, watching him.

"So you did save it, eh?"

"Yes, Mr. Tighe," the boy said, "I did."

"And I suppose you think I told you to?"

"Yes, you did."

"I'm not any fonder of being made to look like a fool than most men are," the farmer said, "but I'm fair." He turned on his heel and started to walk away. Over his shoulder he snapped:

"Twenty-five per cent of the value of the difference between the fruit on the protected and the unprotected parts of my ground goes to the League. And I'll let my boy, Bill, join you."

CHAPTER VII

CLEARING AN INNOCENT MAN

The saving of Jed Tighe's crop did more to establish the reputation of the Mississippi League of the Weather than anything which the boys had done since the League was organized. Although Jed Tighe was stern by nature, he was thoroughly fair. He had no hesitation in placing the credit where it belonged, and the boys soon found that they had no stronger ally than the hard-spoken old farmer.

Even his friends.h.i.+p, however, did not prepare the boys for the farmer's sudden arrival at their club-house, on a Sat.u.r.day afternoon, two weeks later. He drove up in a ramshackle old buggy, driving two of the finest horses in the county. Skinflint though he was, he loved horses. He came into the club-house and eyed the boys standing around the table.

"I'm going to s.h.i.+p some potatoes to Chicago," he said abruptly, without any preface. "I want to know whether they'll be safe from freezing on the way."

There was a moment's dead silence. The boys had not bargained for such a point-blank demand for help, and it took them off their feet. One looked at the other and several shuffled uncomfortably. The Forecaster watched the lads keenly, interested to see how they would face the issue. Ross spoke first.

"Well, Mr. Tighe," he said hesitatingly, "we haven't done any figuring on the weather outside this neighborhood, as yet."

This cautious att.i.tude did not appeal to Fred, who always wanted to plunge in head first.

"Sure we can, Ross!" he declared.

The president of the League looked inquiringly at his mainstay, the silent Bob, and, in answer to his unspoken question, the other nodded.

"We could try it, of course, if you wanted us to," agreed Ross.

"Ain't I asking you to?" said their visitor, sharply.

"But suppose we don't get it just right?" Ross queried.

"That's the chance I'm taking," the farmer replied. "But there's no doubt that you know a lot more about it than I do, and your guess is likely to be nearer than mine. Those potatoes have just got to go to Chicago some time next week, anyway."

"It's a new stunt for the League," said Ross again, hesitating, but the editor-in-chief broke in impatiently.

"We might as well tell what we know," he said. "We do know that there's a cold wave on the way."

"There is? How cold?" the farmer asked, with a sudden quickening of interest.

"Cold enough to freeze potatoes, at any rate," a.s.sured Fred. "I was looking at the Weather Map only about an hour ago. Oh, it's going to be cold, all right."

"How do you know?" Jed Tighe demanded. "If I'm goin' to act on what you boys say, I'd like to know how you find out."

"I've been wondering," put in Anton thoughtfully, "if it wouldn't be a good idea to have Mr. Tighe go over the map with us. He might be interested in figuring it out, and then if we didn't hit it just right, he'd know we'd done our best, anyway."

"Well," rejoined the farmer grimly, "if I've got to hand you over some of my crop this fall, I might as well find out what sort of project I'm supporting. I really would like to see how you find out. You boys certainly made good on that frost business the other night."

From a hook over the compositor's "case," Fred reached down a sheaf of the Daily Weather Reports, and laid those for the last three days on the table in front of Anton. The Forecaster stood by to help the crippled lad and to correct him if he made any mistakes in his explanations.

"All our weather in the United States," the boy began, explanatorily, "comes from the west."

"Why?" snapped back Jed Tighe.

The Forecaster smiled. He realized that the question went to the very root of weather knowledge. The query was a poser to Anton. He stammered.

"I know it does," he said, "but just why, I--I--"

"You'll have to begin at the beginning, Anton," put in the Forecaster quietly. "If Mr. Tighe really wants to know, you can't take anything for granted. Explain to him the circulation of the atmosphere, just the way I taught it to you during the winter."

The crippled lad's face brightened. He knew, now, how to proceed.

"All changes of weather, Mr. Tighe," he said, "happen because of the winds, and all the changes of winds are due to the differences in heat at various parts of the globe, especially at the equator, where it is always hot, and at the poles, where it is cold nearly all the year round."

"You mean to say that the weather at the North Pole and at the equator has anything to do with our weather here?"

"Everything," Anton answered, nodding his head. "The heat of the sun is what causes weather changes, because winds are due to the heating of the air, and the sun is the only thing that heats the air. At the equator, where the sun s.h.i.+nes nearly overhead all the year round, the air gets to be very hot. Hot air expands, and as it gets bigger, it displaces the cold air above it. Gravity pulls down the colder air on both sides of this belt of rising hot air, and the down-flowing cold air on both sides blows in toward the equator under the warm air, where the heat of the sun warms it again, and, in turn, it rises. This is going on all the time and is one of the chief things that starts the winds blowing."