A BACKYARD CIRCUS
They said afterward that the wreck of the snow castle was heard clear to
the outskirts of the town. The _Morning Post_ said that it was
disgraceful that the school authorities had allowed it to be built.
Parents and guardians were inclined to rail against what they had
previously praised the boys for doing.
The fact remained, and the calmer people of the community admitted it,
that as soon as there was any danger the boys had warned everybody out.
That one headstrong girl--and she, only--was caught in the wreckage, did
not change the fact that the boys had been very careful.
At the moment the roof of the snow castle crashed in, the only thought
of those in sight of the catastrophe was of Trix Severn.
"Oh! save her! save her!" Ruth Kenway cried.
"She's killed! I _know_ she is!" wept Agnes, wringing her hands.
Joe Eldred and Wib Ketchell were as pale as they could be. None of the
little group at the entrance moved for a full minute. Then Neale O'Neil
brought them all to life with:
"_She wasn't under that fall!_ Quick! 'round to the rear! We can save
her."
"I tell you she's dead!" avowed Wilbur, hoarsely.
"Come on!" shouted Neale, and seized a shovel that stood leaning against
the snow wall. "Come on, Joe! The roof's only fallen in the middle. Trix
is back of that, I tell you!"
"Neale is right! Neale is right!" screamed Agnes. "Let's dig her out."
She and Ruth started after Neale O'Neil and Joe. Wilbur ran away in
terror and did much to spread the senseless alarm throughout the
neighborhood that half the school children in town were buried beneath
the wreckage of the snow castle!
But it was bad enough--at first. The Corner House girls and their boy
friends were not altogether sure that Trix was only barred from escape
by the falling rubbish.
Neale and Joe attacked the rear wall of the structure with vigor, but
the edge of their shovels was almost turned by the icy mass. Axes and
crowbars would scarcely have made an impression on the hard-packed snow.
It was Ruth who pointed the right way. She picked up a hard lump of snow
and sent it crashing through the rear ice-window!
"Trix!" she shouted.
"Oh! get me out! get me out!" the voice of the missing girl replied.
Another huge section of the roof, with the side battlements, caved
inward; but it was a forward section.
The boys knocked out the rest of the broken ice around the window-hole
and Neale leaped upon the sill which was more than three feet across.
The walls of the castle were toppling, and falling, and the lights had
gone out. But there was a moon and the boy could see what he was about.
The spectators at a distance were helpless during the few minutes which
had elapsed since the first alarm. Nobody came to the assistance of the
Corner House girls and the two boys.
But Trix was able to help herself. Neale saw her hands extended, and he
leaned over and seized her wrists, while Joe held him by the feet.
Then with a heave, and wriggle, "that circus boy," as Trix had nicknamed
him, performed the feat of getting her out of the falling castle, and
the Corner House girls received her with open arms.
The peril was over, but rumor fed the excitement for an hour and brought
out as big a crowd as though there had been a fire in the business
section of the town.
Trix clung to Ruth and Agnes Kenway in an abandonment of terror and
thanksgiving, at first. The peril she had suffered quite broke down her
haughtiness, and the rancor she had felt toward the Corner House girls
was dissipated.
"There, there! Don't you cry any more, Trix," urged good-natured Agnes.
"I'm _so_ glad you got out of that horrid place safely. And we didn't
help you, you know. It was Neale O'Neil."
"That circus boy" had slunk away as though he had done something
criminal; but Joe was blowing a horn of praise for Neale in the crowd,
as the Corner House girls led Trix away.
Ruth and Agnes went home with Trix Severn, but they would not go into
the house that evening as Trix desired. The very next morning Trix was
around before schooltime, to walk to school with Agnes. And within a
week (as Neale laughingly declared to Ruth) Agnes and Trix were "as
thick as thieves!"
"Can you beat Aggie?" scoffed Neale. "That Trix girl has been treating
her as mean as she knows how for months, and now you couldn't pry Aggie
away from her with a crowbar."
"I am glad," said Ruth, "that Agnes so soon gets over being mad."
"Huh! Trix is soft just now. But wait till she gets mad again," he
prophesied.
However, this intimacy of Agnes with her former enemy continued so long
that winter passed, and spring tiptoed through the woods and fields,
flinging her bounties with lavish hand, while still Agnes and Trix
remained the best of friends.
As spring advanced, the usual restless spirit of the season pervaded the
old Corner House. Especially did the little girls find it infectious.
Tess and Dot neglected the nursery and the dolls for the sake of being
out-of-doors.
Old Billy Bumps, who had lived almost the life of a hermit for part of
the winter, was now allowed the freedom of the premises for a part of
each day. They kept the gates shut; but the goat had too good a home,
and led too much a life of ease here at the Corner House, to wish to
wander far.
The girls ran out to the rescue of any stranger who came to the Willow
Street gate. It was not everybody that Billy Bumps "took to," but many
he "took after."
When he took it into his hard old head to bump one, he certainly bumped
hard--as witness Mr. Con Murphy's pig that he had butted through the
fence on the second day of his arrival at the old Corner House.
That particular pig had been killed, but there was another young porker
now in the cobbler's sty. Neale O'Neil continued to lodge with Mr. Con
Murphy. He was of considerable help to the cobbler, and the little
Irishman was undoubtedly fond of the strange boy.
For Neale _did_ remain a stranger, even to his cobbler friend, as Mr.
Murphy told Ruth and Agnes, when they called on him on one occasion.
"An oyster is a garrulous bir-r-rd beside that same Neale O'Neil. I know
as much about his past now as I did whin he kem to me--which same is
jist nawthin' at all, at all!"
"I don't believe he _has_ a past!" cried Agnes, eager to defend her
hero.
"Sure, d'ye think the bye is a miracle?" demanded Con Murphy. "That he
has no beginning and no ending? Never fear! He has enough to tell us if
he would, and some day the dam of his speech will go busted, and we'll
hear it all."
"Is he afraid to tell us who he really is?" asked Ruth, doubtfully.
"I think so, Miss," said the cobbler. "He is fearin' something--that I
know. But phat that same is, I dunno!"
Neale O'Neil had made good at school. He had gained the respect of Mr.
Marks and of course Miss Georgiana liked him. With the boys and girls of
grade six, grammar, he was very popular, and he seemed destined to
graduate into high school in June with flying colors.
June was still a long way off when, one day, Tess and Dot begged Neale
to harness Billy Bumps to the wagon for them. Uncle Rufus had fashioned
a strong harness and the wagon to which the old goat was attached had
two seats. He was a sturdy animal and had been well broken; so, if he
wished to do so, he could trot all around the big yard with Tess and Dot
in the cart.
Sometimes Billy Bumps did not care to play pony; then it was quite
impossible to do anything with him. But he was never rough with, or
offered to butt, Tess and Dot. They could manage his goatship when
nobody else could.
Sometimes Billy Bumps' old master, Sammy Pinkney, came over to see his
former pet, but the bulldog, Jock, remained outside the gate. Billy
Bumps did not like Jock, and he was never slow to show his antagonism
toward the dog.
On this occasion that Neale harnessed the goat to the wagon, there was
no trouble at first. Billy Bumps was feeling well and not too lazy. Tess
and Dot got aboard, and the mistress of the goat seized the reins and
clucked to him.
Billy Bumps drove just like a pony--and was quite as well trained. The
little girls guided him all around the garden, and then around the
house, following the bricked path down to the front gate.
They never went outside with Billy unless either Neale, or Uncle Rufus,
was with them, for there was still a well developed doubt in the minds
of the older folk as to what Billy Bumps might do if he took it into his
head to have a "tantrum."
"As though our dear old Billy Bumps would do anything naughty!" Dot
said. "But, as you say, Tess, we can't go out on Main Street with him
unless we ask."
"And Uncle Rufus is busy," said Tess, turning the goat around.
They drove placidly around the house again to the rear, following the
path along the Willow Street side.
"There's Sammy Pinkney," said Dot.
"Well, I hope he doesn't come in," said Tess, busy with the reins. "He
is too rough with Billy Bumps."
But Sammy came in whistling, with his cap very far back on his closely
cropped head, and the usual mischievous grin on his face. Jock was at
his heels and Billy Bumps immediately stopped and shook his head.
"Now, you send that dog right back, Sammy," commanded Tess. "You know
Billy Bumps doesn't like him."
"Aw, I didn't know Jock was following me," explained Sammy, and he drove
the bulldog out of the yard. But he failed to latch the gate, and Jock
was too faithful to go far away.
Billy Bumps was still stamping his feet and shaking his head. Sam came
up and began to rub his ears--an attention for which the goat did not
care.
"Don't tease him, Sammy," begged Dot.
"Aw, I'm not," declared Sammy.
"He doesn't like that--you know he doesn't," admonished Tess.
"He ought to have gotten used to it by this time," Sammy declared.
"Jinks! what's that?"
Unnoticed by the children, Sandyface, the old mother cat, had gravely
walked down the path to the street gate. She was quite oblivious of the
presence, just outside, of Jock, who crouched with the very tip of his
red tongue poked out and looking just as amiable as it is ever possible
for a bulldog to look.
Suddenly Jock spied Sandyface. The dog was instantly all
attention--quivering muzzle, twitching ears, sides heaving, even his
abbreviated tail vibrating with delighted anticipation. Jock considered
cats his rightful prey, and Sammy was not the master to teach him
better.
The dog sprang for the gate, and it swung open. Sandyface saw her enemy
while he was in midair.
She flew across the backyard to the big pear-tree. Jock was right behind
her, his tongue lolling out and the joy of the chase strongly exhibited
in his speaking countenance.
In his usual foolish fashion, the bulldog tried to climb the tree after
the cat. Jock could never seem to learn that he was not fitted by nature
for such exploits, and wherever the game led, he tried to follow.
His interest being so completely centered in Sandyface and his attempt
to get her, peril in the rear never crossed Jock's doggish mind.
Old Billy Bumps uttered a challenging "blat" almost upon the tail of
Sammy's shout; then he started headlong for his ancient enemy. He gave
his lady passengers no time to disembark, but charged across the yard,
head down, and aimed directly at the leaping bulldog.
The latter, quite unconscious of impending peril, continued to try to
catch Sandyface, who looked down upon his foolish gyrations from a
branch near the top of the tree. Perhaps she divined what was about to
happen to the naughty Jock, for she did not even meow!