CHAPTER V
WHEN THE BANDS PLAYED
Phil started for the Widow Cahill's on the run after havingprocured his tickets. "Here's a ticket for the circus, Mrs.Cahill," he shouted, bursting into the room, with excited,flushed face.
"What's this you say--the circus? Land sakes, I haven't seen onesince I was--well, since I was a girl. I don't know."
"You'll go, won't you?" urged Phil.
"Of course, I'll go," she made haste to reply, noting thedisappointment in his face over her hesitation. "And thank youvery much."
"Shall I come and get you, Mrs. Cahill, or can you get over tothe circus grounds alone?"
"Don't worry about me, my boy. I'll take care of myself."
"Your seat will be right next to mine, and we can talk while weare watching the performers."
"Yes; you run along now. Here's a quarter for spending money.Never mind thanking me. Just take it and have a good time.Where's your friend?"
"Teddy?"
"Yes."
"Over on the lot."
"He going in with you, too?"
"Oh, no. Teddy is too proud to go in that way. He crawls inunder the tent," laughed Phil, running down the steps and settingoff for the circus grounds with all speed.
When he arrived there he saw at once that something was going on.The tents were all in place, the little white city erected withas much care and attention to detail as if the show expected toremain in Edmeston all summer. The lad could scarcely makehimself believe that, only a few hours before, this very lot hadbeen occupied by the birds alone. It was a marvel to him, evenin after years, when he had become as thoroughly conversant withthe details of a great show as any man in America.
Just now there was unusual activity about the grounds. Men ingaudy uniforms, clowns in full makeup, and women with longglistening trains, glittering with spangles from head to feet,were moving about, while men were decorating the horses withbright blankets and fancy headdress.
"What are they going to do?" asked Phil of a showman.
"Going to parade."
"Oh, yes, that's so; I had forgotten about that."
"Hello, boy--I've forgotten your name--"
"Forrest," explained Phil, turning. The speaker was Mr.Sparling's assistant, whom the lad had seen just after saving thelion cage from turning over.
"Can you blow a horn as well as you can stop a wagon?"
"Depends upon what kind of a horn. I think I can make as muchnoise on a fish horn as anyone else."
"That'll do as well as anything else. Want to go in the parade?"
"I'd love to!" The color leaped to the cheeks of Phil Forrestand a sparkle to his eyes. This was going beyond his fondestdreams.
The assistant motioned to a clown.
"Fix this boy up in some sort of a rig. I'm going to put him inthe Kazoo Band. Bring him back here when he is ready. Bequick."
A long, yellow robe was thrown about the boy, a peaked cap thruston his head, after which a handful of powder was slapped on hisface and rubbed down with the flat of the clown's hand. The finedust got into the lad's nostrils and throat, causing him tosneeze until the tears rolled down his cheeks, streaking hismakeup like a freshet through a plowed field.
"Good," laughed the clown. "That's what your face needs. You'dmake a good understudy for Chief Rain-In-The-Face. Now hustlealong."
Phil picked up the long skirts and ran full speed to the placewhere the assistant had been standing. There he waited until theassistant returned from a journey to some other part of the lot.
"That's right; you know how to obey orders," he nodded. "That'sa good clown makeup. Did Mr. Miaco put those streaks on yourface?"
"No, I sneezed them there," answered Phil, with a sheepish grin.
The assistant laughed heartily. Somehow, he had taken a suddenliking to this boy.
"Do you live at home, Forrest?"
"No; I have no home now."
"Here's a fish horn. Now get up in the band wagon--no, not thebig one, I mean the clowns' band wagon with the hayrack on it.When the parade starts blow your confounded head off if you wantto. Make all the noise you can. You'll have plenty of company.When the parade breaks up, just take off your makeup and turn itover to Mr. Miaco."
"You mean these clothes?"
"Yes. They're a part of the makeup. You'll have to wash themakeup off your face. I don't expect you to return the powder tous," grinned the assistant humorously.
The clowns were climbing to the hayrack. A bugle had blown as asignal that the parade was ready to move. Phil had not seenTeddy Tucker since returning to the lot. He did not know wherethe boy was, but he was quite sure that Teddy was not missing anyof the fun. Tucker had been around circuses before, and knew howto make the most of his opportunities. And he was doing so now.
"Ta ra, ta ra, ta ra!" sang the bugle.
Crash! answered the cymbals and the bass drums. The snare drumsbuzzed a long, thrilling roll; then came the blare of the brassas the whole band launched into a lively tune such as only circusbands know how to play.
The parade had begun to move.
It was a thrilling moment--the moment of all moments of PhilForrest's life.
The clowns' wagon had been placed well back in the line, so asnot to interfere with the music of the band itself. But Phil didnot care where he was placed. He only knew that he was in acircus parade, doing his part with the others, and that, so faras anyone knew, he was as much a circus man as any of them.
As the cavalcade drew out into the main street and straightenedaway, Phil was amazed to see what a long parade it was. Itlooked as if it might reach the whole length of the village.
The spring sun was shining brightly, lighting up the line,transforming it into a moving, flashing, brilliant ribbon oflight and color.
"Splendid!" breathed the boy, removing the fish horn from hislips for a brief instant, then blowing with all his might again.
As the wagons moved along he saw many people whom he knew. As amatter of fact, Phil knew everyone in the village, but there werehundreds of people who had driven in from the farms whom he didnot know. Nor did anyone appear to recognize him.
"If they only knew, wouldn't they be surprised?" chuckled thelad. "Hello, there's Mrs. Cahill."
The widow was standing on her front door step with a dishtowel inone hand.
In the excess of his excitement, Phil stood up, waving his hornand yelling.
She heard him--as everybody else within a radius of a quarter ofa mile might have--and she recognized the voice. Mrs. Cahillbrandished the dishtowel excitedly.
"He's a fine boy," she glowed. "And he's having the first goodtime he's had in five years."
The Widow Cahill was right. For the first time in all theseyears, since the death of his parents, Phil Forrest was carefreeand perfectly happy.
The clowns on the wagon with him were uproariously funny. Whenthe wagon stopped now and then, one whom Phil recognized as thehead clown, Mr. Miaco, would spring to the edge of the rack andmake a stump speech in pantomime, accompanied by all the gesturesincluded in the pouring and drinking of a glass of water. Sohumorous were the clown's antics that the spectators screamedwith laughter.
Suddenly the lad espied that which caused his own laughter to dieaway, and for the moment he forgot to toot the fish horn. Theparade was passing his former home, and there, standing hunchedforward, leaning on his stick and glaring at the procession frombeneath bushy eyebrows, stood Phil's uncle, Abner Adams.
Phil's heart leaped into his throat; at least that was thesensation that he experienced.
"I--I hope he doesn't know me," muttered the lad, shrinking backa little. "But I'm a man now. I don't care. He's driven me outand he has no right to say a thing."
The lad lost some of his courage, however, when the processionhalted, and he found that his wagon was directly in front of Mr.Adams' dooryard, with his decrepit uncle not more than twentyfeet away from him. The surly, angry eyes of Abne
r Adams seemedto be burning through Phil's makeup, and the lad instinctivelyshrank back ever so little.
However, at that instant the boy's attention was attracted toanother part of the wagon. The head clown stepped from the wagonand, with dignified tread, approached Abner Adams. He graspedthe old man by the hand, which he shook with great warmth, makinga courtly bow.
At first Abner Adams was too surprised to protest. Then,uttering an angry snarl, he threw the clown off, making a viciouspass at him with his heavy stick.
The clown dodged the blow, and made a run for the wagon, whichwas now on the move again.
Phil breathed a sigh of relief. The people had roared at thefunny sight of the clown shaking hands with the crabbed old man;but to Phil Forrest there had been nothing of humor in it. Thesight of his uncle brought back too many unhappy memories.
The lad soon forgot his depression, however, in the rapid changesthat followed each other in quick succession as on a moving-picture film.
Reaching the end of the village street the procession was obligedto turn and retrace its steps over the same ground until itreached the business part of the town, where it would turn offand pass through some of the side streets.
Now there were two lines, moving in opposite directions. Thiswas of interest to Phil, enabling him, as it did, to get a goodlook at the other members of the troupe. Mr. Sparling was ridingahead in a carriage drawn by four splendid white horses, drivenby a coachman resplendent in livery and gold lace, while thebobbing plumes on the heads of the horses added to theimpressiveness of the picture.
"I'd give anything in the world to be able to ride in a carriagelike that," decided Phil. "Maybe someday I shall. We'll see."
Now came the elephants, lumbering along on velvet feet. On thesecond one there crouched a figure that somehow seemed strangelyfamiliar to Phil Forrest. The figure was made up to represent ahuge frog.
A peculiar gesture of one of the frog's legs revealed theidentity of the figure beneath the mask.
"Teddy!" howled Phil.
"Have a frog's leg," retorted Teddy, shaking one of themvigorously at the motley collection of clowns.
"Not eating frogs legs today," jeered a clown, as Teddy wentswinging past them, a strange, grotesque figure on the back ofthe huge, hulking beast.
The clowns' wagon was just on the point of turning when the menheard a loud uproar far down the line. At first they thought itwas a part of the show, but it soon became apparent thatsomething was wrong.
Phil instinctively let the horn fall away from his lips. Hepeered curiously over the swaying line to learn what, ifanything, had gone wrong.
He made out the cause of the trouble almost at once. A pony witha woman on its back had broken from the line, and was plungingtoward them at a terrific pace. She appeared to have lost allcontrol of the animal, and the pony, which proved to be an uglybroncho, was bucking and squealing as it plunged madly down thestreet.
The others failed to see what Phil had observed almost from thefirst. The bit had broken in the mouth of the broncho and thereins hung loosely in the woman's helpless hands.
They were almost up with the clowns' wagon when the woman wasseen to sway dizzily in her saddle, as the leather slippedbeneath her. Then she plunged headlong to the ground.
Instead of falling in a heap, the circus woman, with headdragging, bumping along the ground, was still fast to the pony.
"Her foot is caught in the stirrup!" yelled half a dozen men atonce, but not a man of them made an effort to rescue her. Perhapsthis was because none of the real horsemen of the show were nearenough to do so.
Mr. Sparling, however, at the first alarm, had leaped from hiscarriage, and, thrusting a rider from his mount, sprang into thesaddle and came tearing down the line in a cloud of dust. He wasbearing down on the scene at express train speed.
"The woman will be killed!"
"Stop him! Stop him!"
"Stop him yourself!"
But not a man made an effort to do anything.
It had all occurred in a few seconds, but rapidly as the eventssucceeded each other, Phil Forrest seemed to be the one amongthem who retained his presence of mind.
He fairly launched himself into the air as the ugly broncho shotalongside the clowns' wagon.