“Now, then, lazybones,” was Mr. Lord's warning cry as Toby came out of
the tent, “if you've fooled away enough of your time, you can come here
an' tend shop for me while I go to supper. You crammed yourself this
noon, an' it 'll teach you a good lesson to make you go without anything
to eat tonight; it 'll make you move round more lively in future.”
Instead of becoming accustomed to such treatment as he was receiving
from his employers, Toby's heart grew more tender with each brutal word,
and this last punishment--that of losing his supper--caused the poor
boy more sorrow than blows would. Mr. Lord started for the hotel as
he concluded his cruel speech; and poor little Toby, going behind the
counter, leaned his head upon the rough boards and cried as if his heart
would break.
All the fancied brightness and pleasure of a circus life had vanished,
and in its place was the bitterness of remorse that he had repaid Uncle
Daniel's kindness by the ingratitude of running away. Toby thought that
if he could only nestle his little red head on the pillows of his little
bed in that rough room at Uncle Daniel's, he would be the happiest and
best boy, in the future, in all the great wide world.
While he was still sobbing away at a most furious rate he heard a voice
close at his elbow, and, looking up, saw the thinnest man he had
ever seen in all his life. The man had flesh colored tights on, and a
spangled red velvet garment--that was neither pants, because there were
no legs to it, nor a coat, because it did not come above his waist--made
up the remainder of his costume.
Because he was so wonderfully thin, because of the costume which he
wore, and because of a highly colored painting which was hanging in
front of one of the small tents, Toby knew that the Living Skeleton was
before him, and his big brown eyes opened all the wider as he gazed at
him.
“What is the matter, little fellow?” asked the man, in a kindly tone.
“What makes you cry so? Has Job been up to his old tricks again?”
“I don't know what his old tricks are--” and Toby sobbed, the tears
coming again because of the sympathy which this man's voice expressed
for him--“but I know that he's a mean, ugly thing--that's what I know;
an' if I could only get back to Uncle Dan'l, there hain't elephants
enough in all the circuses in the world to pull me away again.”
“Oh, you run away from home, did you?”
“Yes, I did,” sobbed Toby, “an' there hain't any boy in any Sunday
School book that ever I read that was half so sorry he'd been bad as
I am. It's awful; an' now I can't have any supper, 'cause I stopped to
talk with Mr. Stubbs.”
“Is Mr. Stubbs one of your friends?” asked the skeleton, as he seated
himself in Mr. Lord's own private chair.
“Yes, he is, an' he's the only one in this whole circus who 'pears to
be sorry for me. You'd better not let Mr. Lord see you sittin' in that
chair or he'll raise a row.”
“Job won't raise any row with me,” said the skeleton. “But who is this
Mr. Stubbs? I don't seem to know anybody by that name.”
“I don't think that is his name. I only call him so, 'cause he looks so
much like a feller I know who is named Stubbs.”
This satisfied the skeleton that this Mr. Stubbs must be someone
attached to the show, and he asked:
“Has Job been whipping you?”
“No; Ben, the driver on the wagon where I ride, told him not to do that
again; but he hain't going to let me have any supper, 'cause I was so
slow about my work--though I wasn't slow; I only talked to Mr. Stubbs
when there wasn't anybody round his cage.”
“Sam! Sam! Sam-u-el!”
This name, which was shouted twice in a quick, loud voice, and the third
time in a slow manner, ending almost in a screech, did not come from
either Toby or the skeleton, but from an enormously large woman, dressed
in a gaudy red and black dress, cut very short, and with low neck and
an apology for sleeves, who had just come out from the tent whereon the
picture of the Living Skeleton hung.
“Samuel,” she screamed again, “come inside this minute, or you'll
catch your death o' cold, an' I shall have you wheezin' around with the
phthisic all night. Come in, Sam-u-el.”
“That's her,” said the skeleton to Toby, as he pointed his thumb in the
direction of the fat woman, but paying no attention to the outcry she
was making--“that's my wife Lilly, an' she's the Fat Woman of the show.
She's always yellin' after me that way the minute I get out for a little
fresh air, an' she's always sayin' just the same thing. Bless you, I
never have the phthisic, but she does awful; an' I s'pose 'cause she's
so large she can't feel all over her, an' thinks it's me that has it.”
“Is--is all that--is that your wife?” stammered Toby, in astonishment,
as he looked at the enormously fat woman who stood in the tent door, and
then at the wonderfully thin man who sat beside him.
“Yes, that's her,” said the skeleton. “She weighs pretty nigh four
hundred, though of course the show cards says it's over six hundred, an'
she earns almost as much money as I do. Of course she can't get so much,
for skeletons is much scarcer than fat folks; but we make a pretty good
thing travelin' together.”
“Sam-u-el!” again came the cry from the fat woman, “are you never coming
in?”
“Not yet, my angel,” said the skeleton, placidly, as he crossed one thin
leg over the other and looked calmly at her. “Come here an' see Job's
new boy.”
“Your imprudence is wearin' me away so that I sha'n't be worth five
dollars a week to any circus,” she said, impatiently, at the same time
coming toward the candy stand quite as rapidly as her very great size
would admit.
“This is my wife Lilly--Mrs. Treat,” said the skeleton, with a proud
wave of his hand, as he rose from his seat and gazed admiringly at her.
“This is my flower--my queen, Mr. -- Mr. --”
“Tyler,” said Toby, supplying the name which the skeleton--or Mr. Treat,
as Toby now learned his name was--did not know; “Tyler is my name--Toby
Tyler.”
“Why, what a little chap you are!” said Mrs. Treat, paying no attention
to the awkward little bend of the head which Toby intended for a bow.
“How small he is, Samuel!”
“Yes,” said the skeleton, reflectively, as he looked Toby over from head
to foot, as if he were mentally trying to calculate exactly how many
inches high he was, “he is small; but he's got all the world before
him to grow in, an' if he only eats enough--There, that reminds me. Job
isn't going to give him any supper, because he didn't work hard enough.”
“He won't, won't he?” exclaimed the large lady, savagely. “Oh, he's a
precious one, he is! An' some day I shall just give him a good shakin'
up, that's what I'll do. I get all out of patience with that man's
ugliness.”
“An' she'll do just what she says,” said the skeleton to Toby, with an
admiring shake of the head. “That woman hain't afraid of anybody, an' I
wouldn't be a bit surprised if she did give Job a pretty rough time.”
Toby thought, as he looked at her, that she was large enough to give
'most anyone a pretty rough time, but he did not venture to say so.
While he was looking first at her, and then at her very thin husband,
the skeleton told his wife the little that he had learned regarding the
boy's history; and when he had concluded she waddled away toward her
tent.
“Great woman that,” said the skeleton, as he saw her disappear within
the tent.
“Yes,” said Toby, “she's the greatest I ever saw.”
“I mean that she's got a great head. Now you'll see about how much she
cares for what Job says.”
“If I was as big as her,” said Toby, with just a shade of envy in his
voice, “I wouldn't be afraid of anybody.”
“It hain't so much the size,” said the skeleton, sagely--“it hain't so
much the size, my boy; for I can scare that woman almost to death when I
feel like it.”
Toby looked for a moment at Mr. Treat's thin legs and arms, and then he
said, warningly, “I wouldn't feel like it very often if I was you, Mr.
Treat, 'cause she might break some of your bones if you didn't happen to
scare her enough.”
“Don't fear for me, my boy--don't fear for me; you'll see how I manage
her if you stay with the circus long enough. Now I often--”
If Mr. Treat was about to confide a family secret to Toby, it was fated
that he should not hear it then, for Mrs. Treat had just come out of
her tent, carrying in her hands a large tin plate piled high with a
miscellaneous assortment of pie, cake, bread, and meat.
She placed this in front of Toby, and as she did so she handed him two
pictures.
“There, little Toby Tyler,” she said--“there's something for you to eat,
if Mr. Job Lord and his precious partner Jacobs did say you shouldn't
have any supper; an' I've brought you a picture of Samuel an' me.
We sell 'em for ten cents apiece, but I'm going to give them to you,
because I like the looks of you.”
Toby was quite overcome with the presents, and seemed at a loss how to
thank her for them. He attempted to speak, but could not get the words
out at first; and then he said, as he put the two photographs in the
same pocket with his money: “You're awful good to me, an' when I get to
be a man I'll give you lots of things. I wasn't so very hungry, if I am
such a big eater, but I did want something.”
“Bless your dear little heart, and you shall have something to eat,”
said the Fat Woman, as she seized Toby, squeezed him close up to her,
and kissed his freckled face as kindly as if it had been as fair and
white as possible. “You shall eat all you want to; an' if you get the
stomachache, as Samuel does sometimes when he's been eatin' too much,
I'll give you some catnip tea out of the same dipper that I give
him his. He's a great eater, Samuel is,” she added, in a burst
of confidence, “an' it's a wonder to me what he does with it all
sometimes.”
“Is he?” exclaimed Toby, quickly. “How funny that is! for I'm an awful
eater. Why, Uncle Dan'l used to say that I ate twice as much as I ought
to, an' it never made me any bigger. I wonder what's the reason?”
“I declare I don't know,” said the Fat Woman, thoughtfully, “an' I've
wondered at it time an' time again. Some folks is made that way, an'
some folks is made different. Now I don't eat enough to keep a chicken
alive, an' yet I grow fatter an' fatter every day--don't I, Samuel?”
“Indeed you do, my love,” said the skeleton, with a world of pride in
his voice; “but you mustn't feel bad about it, for every pound you gain
makes you worth just so much more to the show.”
“Oh, I wasn't worryin', I was only wonderin'. But we must go, Samuel,
for the poor child won't eat a bit while we are here. After you've eaten
what there is there, bring the plate in to me,” she said to Toby, as
she took her lean husband by the arm and walked him off toward their own
tent.
Toby gazed after them a moment, and then he commenced a vigorous attack
upon the eatables which had been so kindly given him. Of the food which
he had taken from the dinner table he had eaten some while he was in the
tent, and after that he had entirely forgotten that he had any in his
pocket; therefore, at the time that Mrs. Treat had brought him such a
liberal supply he was really very hungry.
He succeeded in eating nearly all the food which had been brought to
him, and the very small quantity which remained he readily found room
for in his pockets. Then he washed the plate nicely; and seeing no one
in sight, he thought he could leave the booth long enough to return the
plate.
He ran with it quickly into the tent occupied by the thin man and
fat woman, and handed it to her, with a profusion of thanks for her
kindness.
“Did you eat it all?” she asked.
“Well,” hesitated Toby, “there was two doughnuts an' a piece of pie left
over, an' I put them in my pocket. If you don't care, I'll eat them some
time tonight.”
“You shall eat it whenever you want to; an' any time that you get hungry
again you come right to me.”
“Thank you, marm. I must go now, for I left the store all alone.”
“Run, then; an' if Job abuses you, just let me know it, an' I'll keep
him from cuttin' up any monkeyshines.”
Toby hardly heard the end of her sentence, so great was his haste to get
back to the booth; and just as he emerged from the tent, on a quick run,
he received a blow on the ear which sent him sprawling in the dust, and
he heard Mr. Job Lord's angry voice as it said,
“So, just the moment my back is turned you leave the stand to take care
of itself, do you, an' run around tryin' to plot some mischief against
me, eh?” And the brute kicked the prostrate boy twice with his heavy
boot.
“Please don't kick me again!” pleaded Toby. “I wasn't gone but a minute,
an' I wasn't doing anything bad.”
“You're lying now, an' you know it, you young cub!” exclaimed the angry
man as he advanced to kick the boy again. “I'll let you know who you've
got to deal with when you get hold of me!”
“And I'll let you know who you've got to deal with when you get hold of
me!” said a woman's voice; and just as Mr. Lord raised his foot to kick
the boy again the fat woman seized him by the collar, jerked him back
over one of the tent ropes, and left him quite as prostrate as he had
left Toby.
“Now, Job Lord,” said the angry woman, as she towered above the
thoroughly enraged but thoroughly frightened man, “I want you to
understand that you can't knock and beat this boy while I'm around. I've
seen enough of your capers, an' I'm going to put a stop to them. That
boy wasn't in this tent more than two minutes, an' he attends to his
work better than anyone you have ever had; so see that you treat him
decent. Get up,” she said to Toby, who had not dared to rise from the
ground; “and if he offers to strike you again, come to me.”
Toby scrambled to his feet, and ran to the booth in time to attend to
one or two customers who had just come up. He could see from out the
corner of his eye that Mr. Lord had arisen to his feet also, and was
engaged in an angry conversation with Mrs. Treat, the result of which he
very much feared would be another and a worse whipping for him.
But in this he was mistaken, for Mr. Lord, after the conversation
was ended, came toward the booth, and began to attend to his business
without speaking one word to Toby. When Mr. Jacobs returned from his
supper, Mr. Lord took him by the arm and walked him out toward the rear
of the tents; and Toby was very positive that he was to be the subject
of their conversation, which made him not a little uneasy.
It was not until nearly time for the performance to begin that Mr. Lord
returned, and he had nothing to say to Toby save to tell him to go into
the tent and begin his work there. The boy was only too glad to escape
so easily, and he went to his work with as much alacrity as if he were
about entering upon some pleasure.
When he met Mr. Jacobs that gentleman spoke to him very sharply about
being late, and seemed to think it no excuse at all that he had just
been relieved from the outside work by Mr. Lord.