IN THE DRESSING-TENT
When he regained consciousness, he was lying on a thick, dusty
mattress, his head pillowed on a bundle of cloth that smelled of cotton
and dyestuffs. Faces emerged from the gloom around him. Some one was
holding a torch over his strange couch. That odd face in bismuth and
lampblack was bending over him.
"He's come 'round, Mrs. Braddock," he heard this creature say, in a
far-off voice. "Only a faint, nothing more. Poor lad, he looks ill and
hungry."
Then other figures, all gaudy and bright and glittering, crowded into
his vision. He tried to raise himself to his elbow, a fierce wave of
embarrassment rushing over him. Some one supported him from behind. As
he came to a sitting position, he turned his head to thank this person.
It was with difficulty that he repressed a cry of alarm. The being who
braced him with friendly arms was a glittering, shiny thing of green,
with a human face that leered upon him.
Observing the youth's bewilderment and uncertainty, Grinaldi laughed.
"He's not a boa-constrictor, lad. He's the boneless wonder. He's as
gentle as a spring lamb, and not hardly as tough. Signer Anaconda, the
Human Snake, that's what he's called on the bills. Ed Casey is his real
name."
"Aw, cheese it, Joey," growled the amiable Signer. "Say, young feller,
what's ailing you? Where'd you come from?"
The stranger in this curious world managed to turn his body so that his
legs hung over the side of the vaulter's mattress; he faced his
audience, a sudden wariness in his eyes. Before venturing a word of
explanation, he allowed his gaze to sweep the entire group. They
mistook his deliberateness for stupefaction.
He saw perhaps a dozen people in the group before him. The colors of
the rainbow were represented in the staring, curious company. There
were men in tights and women in tights--in pink and red and green and
blue--some of them still panting and breathless after their perilous
work in the ring. He took them all in at a glance, but his eyes rested
at last on the one figure that seemed out-of-place in this motley
crowd: the tall, graceful figure of the woman in street clothes. He
looked long at the sweet, gentle, unpainted face of this woman, and
drew his first deep breath of relief and hope when she smiled. She
moved quickly through the crowd of acrobats and riders, followed close
behind by the slim, wide-eyed girl in the long red cloak. An instant
later she was sitting beside him on the mattress, smiling with friendly
encouragement as she laid her hand upon his arm. The girl stood at her
knee. For the first time the fugitive noticed the face of this slender
girl--no, it was the eyes alone that he saw, for the face was grossly
covered with pigments.
"What has happened?" asked the tall woman gently. "Have you--have you
run away from home, my boy?"
"How long have I been here?" There was a suggestion of alarm in the
abrupt question.
His voice, querulous through excitement, was quite strong and musical.
The tone and his manner of addressing the questioner proved beyond
contradiction that he was no ordinary tramp, or show-follower, such as
they were in the habit of seeing in their travels. A dozen fine old
Virginia gentlemen, perhaps, one after another, had lived and died
before him; down that precious line of blood had come the strain that
makes for the finished thoroughbred--the real Virginia aristocrat. Six
words, spoken with the mild drawl of the cultured Southerner, were
sufficient to prove his title. No amount of mud or tatters or physical
distress could take away the inborn charm of blood. No haggardness or
pain could detract from the fine, clean movement of the lips, or sully
the deep intelligence of the eyes.
His audience at once found a new interest in him. He was not what they
had expected him to be; this boy was no scatter-brained country lout,
with the dream of the circus at the back of his folly.
He, of course, could not have known that during the ten minutes in
which he lay unconscious on the huge pad a score of these curious,
sympathetic strollers, partially or wholly dressed, had come out to
gaze upon him, each delivering a characteristic opinion as to his
purpose, but all of them roughly compassionate. Without exception, they
looked upon him as one of the show-sick youths who, in those days, as
now, succumb too readily to the lure of sawdust and spangles. More than
one scoffing jest was uttered over his unconscious head.
Now they realized that he was not what they had thought him to be. A
deeper tragedy than this seemed to be stamped in his wan face.
"You fainted ten minutes ago. Are you feeling better now? Give him some
brandy, one of you. We will put you on your feet again in a few
minutes, and then you may get on to the hotel. How wet you are! You
must have come far."
He watched her face all the time she was speaking. No sign of trust or
confidence came into his own as the result of her kindliness. Instead,
the wariness grew.
"Only across the mountain," he said succinctly. A half smile, quizzical
and almost grotesque by reason of the mud on his chin, came to his
lips. "I've been out in the rain, ma'am," he vouchsafed. "I should say
you had," said the contortionist. "You're soppin' wet. By gum, I'll bet
the green runs in these tights of mine, too." The wet body had drenched
them thoroughly.
Whereupon the newcomer undertook to support himself, not without a word
of thanks to the acrobat. Once more he surveyed the mystic circle of
figures. He had never been so close to men and women in tights before.
Somehow they were not so alluring as when viewed from the blue seats of
the circus tent. The fluffy, abbreviated tarletan skirts of two women
bareback riders who stood not more than two yards away seemed tawdry
and flimsy at close range; the pink fleshings of the world's greatest
somersault artist looked rumpled and fuzzy; the zouave costume of the
lady rope-walker lost its satiny sheen through propinquity; the clown
was dusty and greasy and stuffy. An illusion was being shattered in the
flash of an eye.
"I must be moving along," he said, in quick return to apprehension.
"Thank you for looking out for me. It was very kind of--" He swayed as
he tried to arise. The genial contortionist caught him.
"He's hungry!" cried one of the bareback queens. He made a heroic
effort to pull himself together. The innate modesty of a gentleman
reproved him even as things went hazy: he was conscious that he was
staring at the surprisingly large kneecaps of the speaker. He was
vaguely troubled because they were dirty.
A flask of brandy was pressed to his lips. He gasped, caught his
breath, and, as the tears came to his eyes, smiled apologetically.
"It's pretty strong," he choked out.
"Puts snap and ginger into you," said the clown, standing back to watch
the effect of his ministrations. "It strikes me you're not a common
tramp. Wot were you doing 'angin' round this tent, son? Don't you know
you might 'ave got clubbed to death by one of the canvasmen out there?
They're never 'appy unless they're kickin' some poor rube over the
guy-ropes. You wasn't trying to peep into the dressing-tent, was you?"
A hot flush mounted to the boy's forehead. He arose unsteadily.
"No," he said quickly. "I was trying to find a dry spot. I was tired
out. Let me go now, please. I'm all right." He started toward a flap in
the tent wall.
"Better not go that-a-way," said the clown. "You'll go plump into the
ring. Wait a minute. Are you 'ungry?"
"No," said the boy, but they knew he was not speaking the truth. The
girl in the long red cloak, she of the wonderful eyes, stood before him.
"Please wait, won't you?" she said, half timidly, half imperatively. "I
will get something for you to eat. It's--it's right over there in my
corner. The cook always brings my father's supper here after the show
begins. He won't mind if I give it to you. He can get more. My father
owns the show."
"No, no," he cried. "I can't take his supper. I am not hungry."
But she smiled and flew away, disappearing behind the flap at his left:
a fluttering red fairy she might have been. He never forgot that first
radiant, enveloping smile.
"It is all right, my boy," said the girl's mother, also smiling. "You
_are_ hungry. We know what it is to be hungry--sometimes."
"That we do," said the contortionist, rubbing his narrow abdomen and
drawing a lugubrious mouth.
"You must be quite frozen in those wet clothes," observed Mrs. Braddock
pityingly.
"I can't stay here, ma'am," he said abruptly. The hunted look came back
into his eyes.
"He's no regular bum," said the "strong man," in the background,
addressing the pink-limbed "lady juggler."
"He's got a 'istory, that boy 'as," said the lady addressed, deeply
interested. "Makes me think o' that boy Dickens wrote about. What was
his name?"
"How should I know?" demanded the strong man. "You Britishers are
always workin' off riddles about something somebody wrote."
"What is your name?" asked the gentle-voiced woman at the boy's side.
"Where do you come from?"
He hesitated, still uncertain of his standing among these strange,
apparently friendly people.
"I can't tell you my name," he said in a low voice. "I hoped you
wouldn't ask me. I have no home now--not since--Oh, a long time ago, it
seems. More than a week, I reckon, ma'am."
"You have been wandering about like this for a week?" she asked in
surprise. He gulped.
"Yes, ma'am. Since the eleventh of May." He wanted to tell her that he
had been hunted from county to county for over a week, but something
held his tongue. He felt that she would understand and sympathize, but
he was not so sure of the others.
Perhaps she suspected what was going on in that troubled brain, for she
laid her hand gently upon his arm and said: "Never mind, then. When you
are stronger, you may go. I am sure you are a good boy."
He thanked her with a look of mute gratitude. The girl with the long
red cloak came tripping back with a tray. She placed it on his knees;
then she whisked away the napkin which covered it. All he knew was that
he smiled up into her eyes through his tears, and that the smell of
warm food assailed his nostrils. As she straightened up, the neglected
cloak slipped from her shoulders. She caught it on her arm, but did not
attempt to replace it. He lowered his eyes, singularly abashed. A trim,
clean figure in red tights stood before him, absolutely without fear or
shame or in the least conscious of her attire.
He was in her world, that was all. In his, outside that canvas crucible
and between performances, she would have died of mortification if, by
chance, there had been one-tenth of the exposure. Here, she was as
fully dressed and as modestly as she would be an hour later, clothed
from head to foot in the conventional garments of her sex, rigidly
observing the strictest laws of delicacy.
A trim, straight figure she was, just rounding into young womanhood;
turning fifteen, in truth. Lithe and graceful, with the sinuous
development of a perfectly healthy young girl who has gone through the
expanding process without pausing at the awkward stage, due no doubt to
her life and training. Firm, well-rounded hips; a small waist, full
chest and perfect shoulders, straight, exquisitely modeled limbs and
high, arched insteps: perfect in girlhood, with promise of the divine
at the height of full womanhood.
The mother arose at once. She remembered that he was in their world.
"Come," she said to her daughter. They withdrew to the women's half of
the dressing-tent, leaving him to devour his feast alone. Slowly the
others, taking their cue, edged away. When next the clown approached
him, fresh from a merry whirl in the ring, the tray was on the mattress
at his side, every particle of food gone. The boy's face was in his
hands, his elbows on his knees.
"Well, you _was_ 'ungry," said the kindly voice. The boy looked up, his
eyelids heavy.
"I reckon I was almost asleep," he said. "I haven't slept much of late."
Suddenly it dawned on him that the clown was staring intently at his
face. With quick understanding he shrank back, but did not withdraw his
gaze from the eyes of the other.
"By jingo!" muttered the motley one. "You--you are the one they're
'unting for--all over the state. The reward bills! I remember now!"
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. "Nobody'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 Saturday. 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 passed 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 God, 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 glassy 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 appetite 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 passed 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, harassed 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. Nobody 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 bismuth 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'-glass," 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 asserted 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--"
"Say, do you suppose I'm going to get into a muss with these people by
hiding a murderer?" snapped Braddock. "Bring him out here. Come along,
bub."
"You're getting blamed virtuous all of a sudden, Braddock," said the
clown angrily. "'Ow about these dogs you are protectin' all the time?
What's more, this 'ere kid's innocent."
"There's five hundred dollars reward for this fellow," said Braddock,
jamming his hands into his coat pockets. "That doesn't sound like he's
innocent, does it? Besides, the officers are plumb certain he's hanging
around this show some place. I'm not going to be pestered with
constables and detectives from here to Indiana, let me tell you that.
It's bad business, monkeying with stray boys, ever since the Charley
Ross kidnapping job last year. So you lummixes have decided to protect
him, have you? Why, the whole pack of you ought to be in jail for even
thinkin' of it. Come out here, boy!"
Without a word, the boy shook himself free of Grinaldi's protecting
grasp, and stepped forward.
"I'm not willing to see these men get into trouble," he said steadily,
addressing the boss. "Give me time to change my clothes again, and then
you can call in the officers."
"Don't be a fool," exclaimed the clown. A murmur of protest arose from
the others.
"Thomas!" A woman's voice was calling from the other side of the low
canvas partition.
"That's my wife," growled Braddock. "I suppose she'll be beggin' for
you, too. What do you want?" The question was roared through the canvas.
"Come here, please. I must speak with you."
"Change your clothes, boy," he said, after a moment of indecision. "See
that he don't get away, you fellows. If he gives you the slip, I'll
have blood, and don't you forget it."
The man had been drinking. His eyes were bloodshot and unsteady. His
face was bloated from the effects of long and continued use of alcohol.
Once on a time he had been a dashing, boldly handsome fellow; there
could be no doubt of that; the sort of youth that any romantic girl
might have fallen in love with. He was tall and straight and powerful,
despite the evidences of dissipation that his face presented. A
wonderfully vital constitution had protected his body from the ravages
of self-indulgence; the constitution of a great, splendid human animal,
in whom not the faintest sign of a once attractive personality
remained. There was no refinement there, no mark of good breeding; all
of the mirage-like glamour that may have bewildered and deceived _her_,
long years ago, was gone. What she had evidently mistaken for the
nobility of true manhood, in her innocence and folly, was no more than
the arrogance of splendid health. This man had been beautiful in his
day, and frankly pleasing. That was long before the thing that was in
his blood, and in the blood of his fathers, perhaps, had claimed
dominion: the mysterious thing which inevitably registers the curse of
the base-born, so that no man may be deceived. Blood always tells, but
usually it tells too late.
But of the Braddocks and their hateful history, more anon. Let us look
at this man as he now is, just as we have looked, perhaps too casually,
at the woman who called him husband.
A heavy black mustache, lightly touched with gray, shaded a coarse,
rather sinister mouth, from the corner of which protruded an unlighted
but thoroughly-chewed cigar. His hair and eyebrows were thick and
black. Thin red lines formed a network in his cheeks, telling of the
habits that had put them there; on his forehead there was a perpetual
scowl, a line slashed between the eyes as if laid there by a knife. The
features were not irregular, but they were of the strength that denotes
cultivated weaknesses. His chin was square and strong, heavily stubbled
with a two days' growth of beard. Eyes that were black and sullen,
stood well out in their sockets; the lids were red and thick, and there
were narrow pouches below them; the whites were bloodshot and
indefinite. He was flashily dressed in the mode of the day, typical of
his calling. A silk hat tilted rakishly over his brow. His waistcoat
was a loud brocade, his necktie a single black band, knotted once.
There was a great paste diamond in his soiled shirt-front. A long
checked coat, with tails and sidepockets, trousers of the same
material, completed his ordinary makeup. Tonight, on account of the
rain, he wore high gum boots outside of the trouser-legs.
You could hardly have mistaken his calling in those days, unless you
might have suspected him of being a gambler. In which you would not
have been wrong.
The line between his eyes seemed to deepen as he turned from the group
to join his wife in the "green room" of the tent. As the flap dropped
behind him, Grinaldi turned to the boy, who had started to unlace the
striped overshirt.
"Wait a minute," he said quickly. "Mebbe we can fix it with 'im. She'll
put in a plea for you and so will Little Starbright,--that's what 'is
daughter is called on the bills--if she gets a chance. Stay right 'ere,
youngster. I've got to go in for my girl's act now. I wish you could
see my girl. She's the queen of the air, and don't you forget it. Ain't
she, boys?"
There was a combined--apparently customary--chorus of approval.
Outside, Braddock was glowering upon his wife, who faced him
resolutely. There never had been a time when she was afraid of this
man; even though he had mistreated her shamefully, he had never found
the courage to exercise his physical supremacy. As so often is the
case--almost invariably, it may be affirmed--with men of his type and
origin, Braddock recognized and respected the qualities that put her so
far above him. Not that he admitted them, even to himself: that would
have been fatal to his own sense of justice. He merely felt them; he
could not evade the conditions for the reason that he was powerless to
analyze the force which produced them. He only knew that somehow he
merited the scorn in which she held him. There were times when he hated
her for the very beauty of her character. Then he cursed her in bleak,
despairing rage, more against himself than against her; but never
without afterward cringing in morbid contemplation of the shudder it
brought to her sensitive face.
If any one had been so bold as to accuse him of not loving her, he
would have been crushed to earth by the brute that was in him. On the
other hand, if he were timorously charged with loving her, it would
have been like him to call the venturesome one a liar--and mean it,
too, in his heart.
"But five hundred is five hundred," he was repeating doggedly in
opposition to her argument in behalf of the boy. "You don't know
whether he's guilty or not, Mary. So what's the use of all this gabble?
It makes me sick. Business is bad. We need every dollar we can scrape
up. I won't be a party to--"
"You harbor pickpockets and thieves and--yes, murderers, I'm told, Tom.
It is a shameful fact that more sneak thieves follow this show and
share with its owner than any other concern in the business. Oh, I know
all about it! Don't try to deny it. They pay a regular tribute to you
for privileges and protection. Artful Dick Cronk gave you half of the
hundred he filched from the old man at Charlottesville last week. I--"
"Here, here!" he said in an angry whisper. "Don't talk so damned loud.
Next thing you'll be telling that sort of stuff to the girl. That'd be
a nice thing for her to think, wouldn't it? Say, don't you ever let me
hear of you breathin' a word of that kind to her. I'd--I'd beat your
brains out. Understand?"
"Oh, I'm not likely to tell her what kind of a man her father is," said
his wife bitterly. "Take care, Tom, that she doesn't find it out for
herself. Be quiet! She is coming."
The girl, cleansed of her paint and powder, her lithe body clad in a
prim, navy blue frock, the skirt of which came below the tops of her
high-laced boots, approached hastily from the women's section. She was
tying the strings of her quaint poke-bonnet under her chin, and her
eyes were gleaming with excitement.
"Where is that boy?" she asked, looking about in some anxiety. "Father,
you should see him. He is so different from the boys who follow--"
"We were just talking about him," interrupted her father shortly. "He's
wanted by the police, so you see he ain't so different from the rest
after all. He's a--"
"Don't, Tom," cried his wife.
"--a murderer," completed Braddock, rolling his cigar from one side of
his mouth to the other.
The girl stared at him for a moment, dumbly, uncomprehendingly. Her
lips parted and her eyes grew very wide.
"Oh, father," she cried, in low, hushed tones. Then she turned to her
mother, almost imploringly. "Is--is it true, mother?"
"Well, see here," broke in Braddock angrily. "Don't you believe me?
Haven't I said so?"
"He is the Jenison boy we were talking about last night, dearie," said
Mrs. Braddock. "I don't believe he committed that horrid crime. I can't
believe it."
"I am sure he didn't--I am sure he didn't," cried the girl impulsively.
"He is a gentleman, father. He couldn't--"
Braddock took instant offense. He hated to hear any one spoken of as a
gentleman.
"What's that got to do with it?" he demanded. "Gentleman, eh? You two
seem to think that these pretty gentlemen can't do anything wrong. Why,
they're rottener than nine-tenths of the blokes that follow this
show--every mother's son of 'em. I'm sick of having this gentleman
business thrown up to me. That's all you two talk about. I suppose you
think you're better than the company you live with. Let me tell you
this, you're show people and nothin' more. I don't give a damn who your
people are; you're my wife and my daughter, and that's all there is to
it. I won't stand this sort of--"
"Tom, you _must_ keep still," said his wife firmly. He was intoxicated;
she knew better than to argue with him, or to agree with him. "All this
has nothing to do with the boy. We must give him a chance, the same
as--you understand?"
He glared at her warningly.
"I don't protect thieves and murderers," he said quickly.
Then he whirled about and snatched aside the flap, calling to the group
of acrobats.
"Come out here, you! Step lively. I want to ask a few questions. Where
the dev--Say, haven't you got out of that suit yet? Why, you little
scuttle, I'll rip it off your back if you're not out of it in two
minutes. Hold on! Come out here first."
As Jenison walked past him the proprietor gave him a violent cuff on
the side of the head. The boy, weak and faint, reeled away and would
have fallen but for the tent pole which he managed to clutch. His face
was convulsed by sudden rage. Even while his head swam, he pulled
himself together for a leap at the man who had struck the wanton,
unexpected blow.
Braddock was huge enough and strong enough to crush the infuriated lad,
but drink had made him a coward at heart. He stooped over and picked up
an iron-ringed stake from the ground.
With a little cry of terror his daughter, recovering from her sudden
stupefaction, sprang forward and frantically clutched the man's arm.
Her mother was no less active in putting herself in front of the boy,
staying him with resolute hands. The performers who had followed David
from the room leaped in with clenched fists, glaring hatefully at their
employer. Others, in remote parts of the enclosure, hurried up, aroused
from drowsy meditation by the sharp excitement.
"Don't, father!" cried the girl in the agony of dread.
"Damn him, he may have a gun," exclaimed Braddock. "He's used one
before."
"Why did you strike me?" cried David hoarsely, his lips twitching, his
eyes glowing like coals.
"Aw, none o' that, now, none o' that," snarled Braddock, taking a step
forward.
"Why did you strike me?" repeated the boy dully.
"Calm yourself, my boy," Mrs. Braddock kept repeating insistently,
without raising her voice, always low, tense, impelling.
The tears sprang to his eyes--tears of rage and helplessness. With a
sob he turned away and leaned his head against the pole.
"Poor boy," she whispered.
"Don't you call me a brute, Casey," roared Braddock, turning upon the
contortionist in a fury. Casey had not uttered a word, but Braddock
instinctively anticipated the charge. The contortionist was afraid of
him. He drew back with a scared look in his eyes.
Mrs. Braddock was speaking quietly, compassionately to the suffering
boy. "We must be careful," she said, "not to oppose him too strongly.
Those men are out in front. He will turn you over to them if you resort
to violence. Calm yourself, do. There is still the chance that he may
change his mind. He is not really heartless. It is only his way."
"Why did he strike me?" again fell from the lips of the fugitive.
At this moment Grinaldi came hurrying in from the ring. He took in the
situation at a glance. Behind him, peering over his shoulder, was a
black-haired young woman in pink tights and spangled trunks.
David was afterward to know this handsome, black-haired girl as Ruby
Noakes, the daughter of Grinaldi, otherwise Joey Noakes, and known to
the gaping world as Mademoiselle Roxane, the Flying Queen of the Air.