The Rose in the Ring Part 3

The lad had risen. A look of abject misery and dread leaped in his eyes.

"Let me go!" he said, almost in a whisper, fiercely intense. "I'll get out. I haven't done any harm to you. Don't keep me here a minute--"

"Then you _are_ the Jenison boy!" in open-mouthed wonder. "Well, I'll be jiggered! Here! Don't bolt like that!"

"Let go of me!" cried the boy, striking at the hand that clutched his arm. "I won't let them catch me! Let me go!"

"Keep your shirt on, my son," said the clown coolly. "n.o.body's going to 'urt you 'ere. Just you remember that. I am not going to give you up--leastwise, not just yet. So you murdered your grandfather, did you?

Well, I wouldn't 'ave took you to be that kind--"

"I didn't do it! I didn't do it!" There was piteous appeal in his wide eyes. "I swear I didn't. They're trying to put it on me to save some one else. Oh, please, don't keep me here. They--they are--they must be here by this time, looking for me. Oh, if you knew how I've tried to dodge them. They had bloodhounds last Sat.u.r.day. Oh!" He covered his face with his hands and shuddered as with a mighty chill.

Grinaldi eyed him speculatively.

"You say they're 'ere now? So close as that?" he demanded in a low voice.

"I pa.s.sed them on the mountain. I tried to make the railroad ahead of them. There was a bridge down back there. There were two of them, officers from the county seat. They won't have any mercy if they find me. They'll take me back and I'll be hung. I can't prove anything--I can't escape." He had dropped helplessly to the edge of the mattress, and was staring hard at the sidewall beyond as if expecting his pursuers to burst in upon him at any moment.

"And you didn't do it?" the clown asked, something like awe in his voice.

"Before G.o.d, I did not. I--I loved my grandfather. I _couldn't_ have done it. Why, he was the only father I had--the only mother. He was everything to me. It was--" He caught himself up quickly in his wild declaration. "I know the man who did it. I heard them talking it over before it happened, but I didn't know what they were talking about."

His eyes grew almost gla.s.sy with the horror that surged up from behind them.

"Then why don't you tell your story?" demanded the clown. "Let the other chap clear 'imself."

"They've got the evidence against me. Oh, you don't know! You can't know how it looked to the world. There's a man who says he saw me with a gun at my grandfather's window. He did see me there and I had a gun, but not to kill poor old granddaddy. No, no! I heard some one walking on the gallery--a thief, I thought. I crawled out of my window with my shotgun. I--but I oughtn't to tell you this. You must let me go. I'll never tell on you, I swear--"

"Wait a minute," interrupted the clown, laying his arm over the boy's shoulder. "We'll talk it over with Mrs. Braddock. She can tell by lookin' in your eyes whether you're good or bad. As far as I'm concerned, I don't believe you did it. Yes, yes, that's all right!

Don't hug me, sonny. Here she is. She's the wife of the man wot owns the show."

Mrs. Braddock crossed over to them, smiling. It was not until she opened her lips to speak of the compliment his appet.i.te had paid to the cook tent that she perceived the look in his eyes. Then she glanced at the serious face of the clown.

"This 'ere chap, ma'am," said Grinaldi, in low, level tones, "is David Jenison, the boy wanted for that murder near Richmond last week. You've seen the reward bills. His grandfather, you remember--"

She drew back; her eyes dilated, her lips stiff. "You are the Jenison boy?" she said slowly, even unbelievingly. "The one who killed his grandfa--" "But I didn't do it!" he almost wailed. "You--_you_ must believe me, ma'am. I didn't do it!" He stood before her, looking straight into her eyes.

"No, Mrs. Braddock," said Grinaldi, "he didn't do it." "How do you know, Grinaldi? How can you--" "Because he says another person did it,"

said Grinaldi calmly.

The woman turned to the boy once more. She seemed to be searching his soul with her intense gaze.

"No," she murmured, after a moment, breathing deeply, "I am sure you did _not_ commit murder. You poor, poor boy!"

He would have dropped to his knees before her, had not the clown checked him by means of a warning hiss.

"Brace up!" he said sharply. Then to Mrs. Bradock: "We've got to find a way to 'ide 'im. The officers are right on his 'eels."

She hesitated for a moment. Swift glances pa.s.sed between her and the clown.

"You must keep very quiet and do what we tell you to do," she said to the boy, who nodded his head eagerly. "You will be safe here. A circus is the safest harbor in all the world for the thief and the lawbreaker.

Why should it not be so for one who is innocent?"

"Let me tell you all about it, madam," began David Jenison, the hunted.

She stopped him.

"Not now. There is no time for that. We will take you on faith and we will help you. My boy, I knew in the beginning that you were of gentle birth--I saw it in your face, in the way you held yourself. But that you should be one of the Jenisons of Virginia--why, Grinaldi, the Jenisons are the bluest--But, there, we'll talk of that another time, too. Sam!" She called to a ring attendant who stood near the entrance.

The burly, rough-looking young man came up at once, respectful to a degree.

"Go out in front and tell Mr. Braddock to hurry back here as soon as he is through with the tickets!" The man slid out between the flapping walls. "Now, Grinaldi, you must make it your business to tell every one who this boy is, and what must be done for him. Don't be alarmed, David Jenison," she said with a smile. He had opened his lips to protest.

"There isn't a soul in all this company, from feed-boy to proprietor, who will betray you to the officers of the law. We stand together--the innocent and the guilty. If you are vouched for by Joey Grinaldi and--me, or by any other in our little universe, that is the end of it.

Even the basest ruffian in the canvas gang, even the vilest of the hostlers, will stand by you through thick and thin. And there are real murderers among them, too. You must have faith in us."

"I have faith in YOU" he said simply. Then, true Virginian that he was, this tired, hara.s.sed boy bent low and lifted her hand to his gallant lips. "I will give my life up for you any day, madam. It is yours."

"Spoken like a gentleman," said the clown, his eyes twinkling.

A couple of horses came clattering into the tent from the ring. At the entrance they were seized by waiting attendants; one of the mysteries that had always puzzled the boy was solved. He had wondered where the plunging steeds raced to after their whirlwind exit from the ring. A moment later, a swarm of men came rushing in with hoops, balloons and banners and hurdle-poles, followed by the "Greatest Living Bareback Rider of the Globe, the One and Only Mellburg." After him came a tired ringmaster, lanky and not half so proud as he looked to be in his spike-tailed coat.

Some one in the big tent was making an announcement in stentorian tones.

"It's time for me to go in," said the clown. "My song comes now. Just you go along with Casey 'ere, into the dressing-room. He'll get you something dry to wear out of my box. Don't forget one thing: we're all as thick as thieves 'ere, whether we're honest men or not. You'll find every man, woman and child wot appears in the ring to be absolutely square and honest. They've got to be. The bad men are not the performers. You'd find that out if you was with 'em a bit. I don't mind tellin' of it to you, as a consolation, that there is two real murderers among the canvasmen and a dozen or more pussons which are wanted for desp'rit things. n.o.body peaches on 'em, mind you, and that's the way it goes. We've just _got_ to stand together. Hi! Hi!"

He was off with a rush. A few minutes later he was heard singing his lay in the ring, the then popular and familiar ditty, "Whoa, Emma!"

with a crude but vociferous chorus of male voices to "join in the refrain." Casey, without further instructions, and asking no questions, led the youth into the men's section. Here all was confusion. A dozen men were stripping themselves of one set of tights to don another, for in those days the ordinary acrobat did many turns in the process of earning his daily bread.

By the time Grinaldi returned, young Jenison was completely arrayed in an extra costume of the clown's, a creation in red and white stripes, much too baggy in all directions, but dry as toast. The owner of the costume put his hands to his sides and roared with laughter.

"Casey, you serpent," he gasped, "I didn't mean that kind of a suit. I meant my Sunday togs--the ones I go to church in, when I goes. Which I doesn't. 'Ere, boys, step right up and listen to an announcement." The crowd gave attention. "This 'ere chap is wanted. There's a big reward for 'im. You've all seen the posters. He's the Jenison boy. Well, he ain't guilty. Get the notion? We 've got to 'elp 'im out of the country.

Mum's the word, lads. Say!" He stood back to inspect his charge. "If you're going to wear them togs, you've got to 'ave your face done over to match."

Whereupon he began to apply grease and bis.m.u.th to the countenance of the amazed young patrician. The others looked on and laughed good-naturedly. To his surprise, no one seemed to mind the fact that he was a fugitive and an alleged slayer. They had stared at him curiously for a moment; two or three of them exchanged whispers, that was all.

In a twinkling he was transformed into a real scaramouch. A conical hat adorned the knit skullpiece that covered his black hair.

"Don't peep in the lookin'-gla.s.s," said Signor Anaconda, now in the pale blue tights of a "ground and lofty" tumbler. "You'll keel over again, plumb dead."

The flap at the entrance was jerked aside and a tall, black-mustached man peered in upon the group.

"Where's the kid?" he demanded sharply. "My wife said he was with you, Joey. Say, I don't like this business. They're out in front now, looking for him. Two of 'em. Have you let him get away?"

David, peering from behind the real clown, experienced an instantaneous feeling of aversion for Braddock, the proprietor. Even as he quailed beneath the new peril that a.s.serted itself in no vague manner, he found himself wondering how this man could have come to be the husband of his lovely benefactress.

"He's here, Tom," announced Grinaldi, shoving the boy forward.

"What's he doing in that costume?" demanded the owner, dropping the flap and staring hard at the boy.

"His clothes were wet. Besides, if they come botherin' around back 'ere, Tom, they won't be so likely to reckernise him in these--"