NEKA’S PRESENCE OF MIND.

To those standing below in the otherwise empty theatre, it looked as if Nina Tonetti, the “Human Fly,” would be dashed to death on the seats below her.

“Gracious!” burst from Bindley’s lips. “What shall we do?”

“Catch her if she comes!” ejaculated Longfellow Wadsworth, but even as he spoke he felt this was well-nigh impossible, for the distance was all of thirty-five feet.

“Keep quiet, don’t stir an inch!” cried Neka. “Try to catch her if she falls,” he added to his companions.

With three leaps he had cleared the orchestra stalls and was on the stage. Near to hand were several large ropes, used to haul unnecessary scenery out of the way.

Selecting the longest of these ropes, Neka cut it away from the blocks which held it. Then he made a slip noose in one end of the rope.

Standing well down to the footlights, he curled the impromptu lasso around his head and measured the distance carefully with his eye.

Whizz! Away flew the end of the rope, and the noose caught over the bottom of the heavy brass gas fixture in the center of the theatre ceiling.

Neka pulled the loop up, so that the end of the rope was fast. As he did so, there came another cracking of a board.

“I am falling!” shrieked Nina Tonetti.

“Catch the rope!” yelled Neka. “Here it comes!”

As he called, he threw the loose end of the rope upward. She did not see it coming, but as it hit her shoulder, she clutched it in one hand.

Crack! crash! Down came the board from overhead, bringing with it a lot of plaster and dirt and a cloud of dust. For the moment, those below could see nothing; then they beheld Nina Tonetti swinging safely in midair.

Bindley and Longfellow Wadsworth felt almost inclined to cheer. As for Neka, a great load was lifted from the boy’s heart. To him it would have been horrible to have one of their performers killed.

Down the rope, hand below hand, came the Human Fly, until within ten feet of the floor. Then her nerve forsook her, and she fell, a limp, unconscious mass, into Bindley’s arms.

She was carried into the dressing-room and a doctor was sent for. The physician said her nervous system had been shocked, but she would soon get over this. Yet it was not until a week later that Nina Tonetti again made her appearance on the boards.

Despite the accident to one of its main drawing cards, the Neka-Wadsworth Specialty Company met with tremendous success in Philadelphia. On the opening night the audience was cold and apathetic.

“We’ll have to warm ’em up,” said Bindley. “Give it to ’em hot like.”

And they did. Longfellow Wadsworth outdid himself in his droll monologue, and for an encore came out as William Penn, to argue with the present day citizens, and this “caught on” immediately.

For Philadelphia Neka had arranged a new fire act, which he called the Arbor of Flames.

This new act was the last thing produced previous to the usual farce wind-up. When the curtain went up on the scene, there was revealed a Chinese tea garden. Into this garden stalked Neka, attired as the Emperor of China.

He clapped his hands, and Jennie Windom came dancing in, carrying a lighted taper. As she handed it to Neka, it went out. She appeared frightened, but he only smiled and pointed to a bush standing nearby. She touched the taper to the bush and immediately the taper burst into flames again.

Then Neka took the taper and tasted of the fire on it. It seemed to please him, and he put the taper in his mouth. From between his partly closed teeth could be seen the fire still glowing within.

“By Jove! He must have a fire-proof mouth!” cried one spectator, and several echoed this opinion.

The taper gone, Neka waved his hand for another and also for a cup of tea. When the tea came, he put the taper in it, but instead of the latter going out, the tea burst into flames. While the cup was thus full of fire, the Fire King quaffed it with apparent satisfaction.

Suddenly he clapped his hands, and a strange green light shone all over the stage. Then Neka passed his hands over Jennie Windom’s eyes and put her in a trance. He made her walk around and point to several flowers and bushes standing about.

Whatever she pointed out immediately took fire, until two flowers and two bushes were blazing away. These stood in a small square, and from each there slowly arose a pillar of fire, which, when it was eight feet high, curved forward and joined the others in a cross overhead.

As soon as the pillars of fire were several feet high, burning vines began to appear around them, and, when they were joined, they formed a little arbor. Neka again clapped his hands and inside the arbor a table appeared, with two seats. He seated Jennie on one seat and took the other himself.

On the table was a covered bowl. When it was opened, fiery snakes sprang out. But as fast as they appeared, Neka seized and devoured them.

Finally one of the snakes got away. Still in her apparent trance, Jennie Windom caught it in her hand. She gave a cry, there was an explosion, and then, like a cloud, the arbor of fire disappeared, and Neka stood down by the footlights bowing and smiling, and holding pretty Jennie by the hand.

“Wonderful!”

“I never saw anything half so good!”

So the comments went on, and from that instant the success of the engagement in Philadelphia was assured.

Yet Neka and Longfellow Wadsworth were not to be without trouble while in the Quaker City. On their third day there was a very much intoxicated variety actor came to the elocutionist for a position.

“We are all filled up,” said Longfellow Wadsworth. He knew the fellow, and did not care to say any more.

The drunkard was very persistent, however, and soon after accosted Neka, and the result was that the boy Fire King gave the man a piece of his mind.

The drunkard went off, vowing vengeance. But as he was intoxicated, Neka paid no attention to his threats.

But an hour later, a row below the stage was heard, and on going down, Neka saw Bindley in the act of kicking the drunkard out of a rear door.

“Found him in your dressing-room,” he said to the boy. “I tell you we’ll have to watch out for these chaps. Lots of them are not above stealing, especially when they are down on their luck.”

No more was said about the matter. Bindley went out and came back to report the fellow out of sight.

“And he’s too drunk to find his way back,” he laughed.

Neka lost no time in going over his effects to see that nothing had been stolen. Especially was he solicitous about his tricks, for the drunkard claimed to be something of a fire king himself.

“I reckon he wouldn’t be above stealing my best tricks if he got the chance,” he thought.

That evening Neka reached the theatre rather late, and when it was time for him to go on, he hurried into his costume with all possible speed.

“Five minutes, Mr. Neka!” came in the voice of the call boy, and this meant Neka had just that length of time in which to complete his preparations.

The time passed, and Neka went on the stage. He had just made his bow, and was starting on some of his simpler tricks when, on glancing into the right wing, he saw Joe Windom beckoning to him frantically.

Fearing something was wrong about his attire or preparations, Neka artfully allowed himself to drift close to the wing. At once Joe Windom thrust a written slip of paper in his hand.

While devouring a burning strip of cotton, Neka read the slip. It was a mere scrawl, but it startled him greatly.

Beware of your life. That drunkard tampered with some of your apparatus! He said he would blow you sky-high.