The Circus Boys on the Flying Rings Part 32

"Easily satisfied, aren't you?"

"I don't know about that. I expect to meet with some disagreeable experiences."

"You won't be disappointed. You'll get all that's coming to you.

It'll make a man of you if you stand it."

"And if I don't?" questioned Phil Forrest, with a smile.

Mr. Sparling answered by a shrug of the shoulders.

"We'll have to make some different arrangements for you," he added in a slightly milder tone. "Can't afford to have you get sick and knock your act out. It's too important. I'll fire some lazy, good-for-nothing performer out of a closed wagon and give you his place."

"Oh, I should rather not have you do that, sir."

"Who's running this show?" snapped the owner.

Phil made no reply.

"I am. I'll turn out whom I please and when I please. I've been in the business long enough to know when I've got a good thing.

Where's your rubber coat?" he demanded, changing the subject abruptly.

"I have none, sir. I shall get an outfit later."

"No money, I suppose?"

"Well, no, sir."

"Humph! Why didn't you ask for some?"

"I did not like to."

"You're too modest. If you want a thing go after it. That's my motto. Here's ten dollars. Go downtown and get you a coat, and be lively about it. Wait a minute!" as Phil, uttering profuse thanks, started away to obey his employer's command.

"Yes, sir."

"About that act of yours. Did you think it out all yourself?"

"The idea was mine. Of course the property man and Mr. Kennedy worked it out for me. I should not have been able to do it alone."

"Humph! Little they did. They wouldn't have thought of it in a thousand years. Performers usually are too well satisfied with themselves to think there's anything worthwhile except what they've been doing since they came out of knickerbockers. How'd you get the idea?"

"I don't know--it just came to me."

"Then keep on thinking. That act is worth real money to any show. How much did I say I'd pay you?"

"Ten dollars a week, sir."

"Humph! I made a mistake. I won't give you ten."

Phil looked solemn.

"I'll give you twenty. I'd give you more, but it might spoil you. Get out of here and go buy yourself a coat."

CHAPTER XVI

HIS FIRST SETBACK

"Tha--thank--"

"Out with you!"

Laughing, his face flushed with pride and satisfaction, Phil did move. Not even pausing to note what direction he should go, he hurried on toward the village, perhaps more by instinct than otherwise. He was too full of this wonderful thing that had come to him--success--to take note of his surroundings.

To Phil there was no rain. Though he already was drenched to the skin he did not know it.

All at once he pulled himself up sharply.

"Phil Forrest, you are getting excited," he chided. "Now, don't you try to make yourself believe you are the whole show, for you are only a little corner of it. You are not even a side show.

You are a lucky boy, but you are going to keep your head level and try to earn your money. Twenty dollars a week! Why, it's wealth! I can see Uncle Abner shaking his stick when he hears of it. I must write to Mrs. Cahill and tell her the good news.

She'll be glad, though I'll warrant the boys at home will be jealous when they hear about how I am getting on in the world."

Thus talking to himself, Phil plodded on in the storm until he reached the business part of the town. There he found a store and soon had provided himself with a serviceable rubber coat, a pair of rubber boots and a soft hat. He put on his purchases, doing up his shoes and carrying them back under his arm.

The parade started at noon. It was a dismal affair--that is, so far as the performers were concerned, and the clowns looked much more funny than they felt.

Mr. Miaco enlivened the spirits of those on the hayrack by climbing to the back of one of the horses drawing the clowns'

wagon, where he sat with a doll's parasol over his head and a doll in his arms singing a lullaby.

The people who were ma.s.sed along the sidewalks of the main street did not appear to mind the rain at all. They were too much interested in the free show being given for their benefit.

The show people ate dinner with their feet in the mud that day, the cook tent having been pitched on a barren strip of ground.

"This is where the Armless Wonder has the best of us today,"

nodded Teddy, with his usual keen eye for humor.

"How is that?" questioned Mr. Miaco.

" 'Cause he don't have to put his feet in the mud like the rest of us do. He keeps them on the table. I wish I could put my feet on the table."

Everybody within hearing laughed heartily.

In the tents there was little to remind one of the dismal weather, save for the roar of the falling rain on the canvas overhead. Straw had been piled all about on the ground inside the two large tents, and only here and there were there any muddy spots, though the odor of fresh wet gra.s.s was everywhere.

The afternoon performance went off without a hitch, though the performers were somewhat more slow than usual, owing to the uncertainty of the footing for man and beast. Phil Forrest's exhibition was even more successful than it had been in the last show town. He was obliged to run back to the ring and show himself after having been carried from the tent by Emperor. This time, however, his stage fright had entirely left him, never to return. He was now a seasoned showman, after something less than three days under canvas.

The afternoon show being finished, and supper out of the way, Phil and Teddy returned to the big top to practice on the flying rings, which they had obtained permission to use.