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Read Ebook: Frank Reade and His Steam Horse by Senarens Luis
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Ebook has 2570 lines and 58906 words, and 52 pages
Transcriber's Notes:
Text enclosed by underscores is in italics , and text enclosed by equal signs is in bold .
Additional Transcriber's Notes are at the end.
New York, December 24, 1892. ISSUED WEEKLY.
The subscription price of the FRANK READE LIBRARY by the year is .50: .25 per six months, post-paid. Address FRANK TOUSEY, PUBLISHER, 34 and 36 North Moore Street, New York. Box 2730.
Frank Reade and His Steam Horse.
PUTTING THE "ANIMILE" TOGETHER.
"Musha, my God, an' what do ye call it?"
Frank Reade looked up with a pleasant smile, as a brick-colored head was thrust into the half-open doorway of the wood-shed, where he was hard at work putting the several parts of his invention together.
"Call it!" said the sixteen-year-old genius, with a proud glance at his wonderful idea; "why, I call it a steam horse."
"A harse, is it?"
"It is," said Frank.
"Wid stale an' iron legs, an' a big copper belly on him?"
"You're right."
"An' can he walk?"
"Yes, and run too."
"Worra, worra, did yez iver hear the loikes o' that?" cried the Irishman, throwing up his hands in astonishment. "Would ye have the nateness to allow me to sthep in for a whist, while I obsarve the construction of the conthrivance? I can philosophize, and so forth, but be the smoke o' Kate Kelly's pipe , this bates me philosophy, it do."
"Who are you?" asked Frank.
"Patrick McSpalten's my name. Will yez allow me in?"
"I suppose so," said Frank, and into the wood-shed walked the Irishman.
He was a good-natured looking man of about thirty, pleasant-faced, well-dressed, and full of blarney.
"Arrah, it's a jaynus ye are," he said as he looked at Frank's invention. "An' do ye mane to tell me that you constructed that conthrivance all out of yer own head, me gossoon?"
"Oh, no," grinned Frank. "I use quite a quantity of steel, iron and copper."
"Oh, I didn't mane that," hastily said Patrick McSpalten. "I want to know if ye conthrived the masheen all alone?"
"You bet your bottom dollar I did," said Frank. "I could make a metal casting of any animal and send it traveling with speed. This horse will probably travel at the rate of sixty miles an hour when under high pressure, and could keep going thirty-five or forty miles an hour for ten hours, with occasional ten minute stops to cool a hot joint."
"What?" cried Frank Reade, surprise ringing in his voice. "The Steam Man was my invention."
"Ye mane it?"
"Of course; I invented the old fellow and traveled over the west with him."
"Honor bright now?" said McSpalten.
"Honor bright," said Frank.
"Thin ye are the broth of a gossoon he was telling me about."
"Who?"
"Me cousin."
"What's his name?"
"Barney Shea."
"What!" cried the much-pleased boy, "is Barney Shea your cousin?"
"Oh, hire a stump," broke in Frank. "Never mind the old folks, but tell me about Barney. How is he?"
"Well and harety."
"When did you see him last?"
"A month ago, when he said God speed to me on the quay at Dublin. Ah, he's a great mon in the county now, is me cousin, Barney Shea. Frank Rade is yer name, for mony a toime has he tould me of yer diviltries with the red haythen out in the west."
"Frank Reade is my name," said the young inventor. "Is Barney coming back to this country, do you know?"
"Faith, I heerd him talkin' about the matther, an' saying that he moight take a pleasure trip to this land."
"Do you know his address?"
"Do I, don't I?" cried Pat. "Would yez be afther sinding a letther to the mon?"
"That's the idea," said Frank.
"For what?"
"To get him to come out here and travel with me."
"And with that thing?"
"Yes," said Frank. "He was the darndest cuss to fight that ever I laid my eyes on. He was always spoiling for a first class shake-up or knock-down, and he was the toughest boy in a rough hand-to-hand scrimmage that ever walloped his way through the West. I could depend on him when there was fighting for us to handle, and he was a mighty stanch friend to me. What's his address?"
"Esquire Barney Shea, Clonakilty, County of Cork, Ireland."
"All right," said Frank, jotting it down in a book, "I've got it."
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