Bikey the Skicycle and Other Tales of Jimmieboy

"Come in," he said, as he disappeared through the door. "I have to keep the pantry locked."

Jimmieboy and Bikey entered as they were bid, and the landlord closed the door after them. The place was dimly lighted, but on the shelves, that rose one above another from floor to ceiling, all sorts of curious looking bottles and cakes and pies and biscuits could be seen, and Jimmieboy's mouth watered at the sight.

"What'll you have?" asked the landlord. "An air cake or a piece of fresh pneumatic mince pie?"

"A little of both," said Jimmieboy.

"Or a bite of my gutta percha gum?" suggested the landlord.

"Well, it's hard to say," said Jimmieboy. "Indeed, I don't know what an air cake or a pneumatic mince pie is, nor did I ever hear of gutta percha gum."

"I know that mighty well," laughed the landlord. "Nobody ever heard of these patent dainties of mine, but they're the best things for the digestion you ever saw, and they last forever. If people could only train themselves to eat my food they'd be able to save money in two ways – bakers' bills and doctors' bills."

"I don't quite understand," said Jimmieboy.

"One of my pneumatic mince pies will show you in a jiffy," returned the landlord. "One pie if properly cared for will last a lifetime" —

"Not with a real live boy in the house it won't," said Jimmieboy, positively.

"That may be all very true," said the landlord, "but if the real live boy ate one of those pies he would cease to be a real live boy. You see this pie is made of rubber, and all you've got to do is to blow it up with an air pump and serve it."

"But you called it mince pie," said Jimmieboy, very much disgusted.

"Well, it's my pie," said the landlord. "I guess I've got a right to call it what I please."

"But you said it saved doctors' bills," put in Bikey, who was no better pleased with this absurd invention than was Jimmieboy.

"And I said right," said the landlord, with a self-satisfied smile. "It's just this way: – If you eat mince pie it gives you indigestion and you have to send for the doctor, and then you get a bill for several dollars. Now, with my pie it's different. You can't eat it, and therefore you can't get indigestion, and you don't have to send for a doctor. Wherefore, as I said, it saves doctors' bills. This is the latest make – I make a new kind every year, just as the bicycle makers make new wheels every year. A 1902 safety pneumatic mince pie costs $2; a 1901 pie I sell for $1.50."

"And what is the difference?" asked Jimmieboy, beginning to be amused.

"The air in this year's pie is fresher, that's all," said the landlord.

"I suppose your air biscuits are of the same kind?" asked Bikey.

"Yes," said the landlord, "except that I flavor 'em. If you're fond of vanilla, or strawberry, or any other flavor, I perfume the air that is pumped into them. They're very nice."

"What are those things on the top shelf?" asked Jimmieboy. "They look like sausages."

"They are sausages. I make 'em out of old tires, and they are very good and solid. Then, over there in the icebox, I have rubber steaks and chickens – in fact, all kinds of pneumatic food. You have no idea how well they last, and how good they are for the digestion – if you could only get used to them. That's the greatest trouble I have, getting people used to them."

"Don't you have any real good food here?" asked Bikey.

"Real? Why, my dear fellow," ejaculated the landlord, "what could you ask more real than those rubber viands? You could drop a railway engine on one of those rubber sausages and it would be just as solid as ever."

"But you can't live on air!" protested Jimmieboy.

"No more can you live without it," said the landlord, unlocking the door and opening it, some disappointment manifested in his countenance. "If you will come up to the hospital now, sir," he added, addressing Bikey, "I'll see what can be done to repair your wounds. I am sorry you do not seem to appreciate the good things in my larder."

"We'd appreciate 'em if we could see the good of 'em," said Jimmieboy. "What on earth can you do with a rubber mince pie besides not eat it?"

"Oh! as for that, you might use it for a football," retorted the landlord sadly, as he locked the door behind them and started down the corridor to the hospital room.

"I call it the hospital room," said he, "although I am aware that doesn't describe it. We don't take care of horses there, but as yet nobody has invented a word like bikepital, and so I do not use it. I have applied for a patent on that word, however, and as soon as I get it we'll change the name."

With these words they entered the hospital, and if the pantry was queer the hospital was a marvel.

V

IN THE HOSPITAL AND HOME AGAIN

"Come right in," said the landlord, stepping into the hospital. "We'll fix Bikey up in a jiffy, and as for young Mr. Jimmieboy, we'll see what can be done to improve his appetite for our gutta percha pies."

Jimmieboy glanced apprehensively at the old gentleman. He did not like the tone in which the remark was made.

"Thank you, Mr. Landlord," he said, after thinking for a moment, "but you needn't bother about me. I can get along very well without liking them. The kind of pies that we have at home are plenty good enough for me, and I don't really care to like yours, thank you." Jimmieboy had tried to be at least polite. The landlord laughed unpleasantly.

"Humph!" he sneered, "that doesn't make any difference to us. Article number seven, paragraph sixty-three, of the hotel laws of Saturn requires that you SHALL like the food we serve at this hotel, whether you want to or not. Therefore, what you want or don't want to like cuts no figure here. You will have to be operated upon, and that portion of your anatomy which does not welcome the best pneumatic pie that ever was made will be removed."

Jimmieboy immediately perceived that he was in trouble, for the landlord spoke with great determination and, what was more, had locked the door behind him, so that the boy was practically a prisoner. Escape seemed impossible, and yet escape he must, for no one could relish the idea of becoming a patient at the Bicycle Hospital. To gain time to think, he observed as civilly as he could: —

"It seems to me, Mr. Landlord, that that is a curious law. Just because a traveller doesn't like the food at your hotel he's got to go to a hospital and stay there until he does like it. Isn't that a trifle queer?"

"Nothing queer about it at all," retorted the landlord savagely. "Nothing queer about it at all. Naturalest law in all the world. I'm not in business for fun, as I've already told you, and if I left any stone unturned to compel people to like my house I should be ruined. My guests have got to like everything, including me – I, myself, see? When I pay a big tax to the government for the privilege of doing business the government has got to do something to help me on in that business, and, fortunately for us, in Saturn we've got a government that is just chock full of justice and common sense.

"When I first started up here nobody liked the food I served, and after coming here once most of them never came again. Ruin was staring me in the face, so I went to the capital and I told the government that they had to do something for me, and they did. They passed an act compelling people to like my food under penalty of $500 a dislike, or six months in my hospital, where I am authorized to regard them as patients. Now you can take your choice. You don't like the pie, you don't like the sausage, you don't like the rubber chops and the bicycle saddle stew you look upon with disfavor. There are four things you don't like.

"Now you can do any one of three things. Eat all four of these dishes, pay a fine of $2,000 or stay here in the hospital and undergo a course of treatment. I don't care which. There's one thing certain. I'm not going to let you out of this place until you like everything about it."

Jimmieboy glanced uneasily at Bikey, who was leaning carelessly against the wall as if he were not at all bothered by the situation.

"But I've got to go to school to-morrow, Mr. Landlord," he put in. "Can't you let me off long enough to finish my term at school, and then when vacation comes maybe I'll come back?"

"No siree!" ejaculated the landlord. "I know what you are up to. You're nothing but a boy, and boys don't like schools any better than you like my pneumatic pies. You stay right here."

"Oh, tell him you like 'em, Jimmieboy," put in Bikey. "Tell him they beat mince all holler and pumpkin isn't in it with 'em. Tell him life would be a barren waste and every heart full of winter if it wasn't for 'em. Pile it on and let's get out. I'm getting nervous."

"Well, so they are in a way," said Jimmieboy. "The fact is, they're the finest pies ever made."

The landlord's face brightened up.

"To eat?" he asked eagerly.

"N-n-o," stammered Jimmieboy. "Not to eat – but to play football with or to use for punching bags."

The landlord froze up immediately.

"That settles your case," he snapped. "I'll put you in the violent ward and to-morrow morning we'll begin a course of treatment that will make you wish you'd liked 'em from the beginning. And now for you, sir," the landlord added severely, turning to Bikey. "How about you and my pneumatic pies?"