CHAPTER VIII AN AFTERNOON AT THE CIRCUS

Long before one o’clock every Elm Street boy was at the circus grounds with a definite program: First, to see the “cloud-piercing” aeroplane flight by “Master Willie Bonner”; then to visit the gloriously pictured side show; and, finally, to attend the circus performance. The flying machine was apparently in order, and just after one o’clock it was wheeled to a far corner of the grounds. “Master Willie” did not seem very much of a child. He was picked out by the fact that he wore a cheap leather coat, an aviator’s helmet, turned down Scotch stockings and long gloves, much soiled. He looked to be about Arthur Trevor’s age.

“You can bet he’s got nerve,” remarked Lew Ashwood admiringly.

“An’ you bet he gets a big salary,” commented Duke Easton.

“I’ll bet he gets ten dollars a day,” ventured Sandy Sheldon. “An’ he don’t have to work hardly at all.”

“An’, like as not, gets in the circus free when he wants to,” added Colly Craighead. “I’d like a job like that.”

Art had plenty of time to see that there were no seats anywhere. The “superintendent of aviation” was not even present, being, as a matter of fact, fast asleep at that moment beneath a big canvas wagon. Blushing again over the knowledge of how easy he had been, Art led the way to the best place to see, and the boys prepared to drink in every detail. Master Willie Bonner seemed to be the real superintendent.

“They ain’t no golden, silken wings there to flash in the sun. It’s all dirty and greasy,” commented Art. “An’ the engine don’t look any too good neither.”

“The kid looks all right, though,” put in Connie. “He’s the only decent looking fellow I’ve seen in the whole outfit.”

The engine had been started and the propellers tested. The boys were so close that the wind from these beat on their faces, whirling dead grass and dust about them in a choking cloud.

“Chase yourselves, you kids,” called the young aviator in a not unpleasant voice.

“You bet he knows how to run things,” exclaimed Sammy Addington, who was once more in the gang’s fold.

While thousands of spectators shouted and shoved and the Elm Street boys fought to stick together and keep in front, the man who had ridden at the front of the morning parade and who continually warned all to look out for their horses, as the elephants were coming, sprang onto the aeroplane wagon and swept his big black hat from his head.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he exclaimed in a deep, far-reaching voice, “I desire to introduce to you the youngest and most skilled aviator in the world, Master Willie Bonner.” At these words young Bonner leaped on the hub of a wagon wheel and doffed his cap without a smile or the least concern for the mob of spectators. “I desire to add,” went on the deep voice, “that, as a special mark of respect for your beautiful little city, Master Bonner has decided to alter his program somewhat, to-day. Theahfore, instead of making a long flight at this time he desiahs me to announce that he will now simply give you an exhibition in the lowah atmospheres.” As murmurs of disapproval and disgust were heard, the man hastened to add: “He is doing this, because, sharp at five o’clock this afternoon, he has determined to make an attempt to lowah the world’s record for altitude flight.” Cheers sounded, which the speaker stilled with uplifted hand. “Master Bonner’s aeroplane carries enough gasoline for a two hours’ flight. With his tanks charged to their full capacity this world-famous young aviator will at five o’clock head his aeroplane cloudward. He will soar heavenward until his fuel is exhausted; then he will shut down his engine and execute a daring volplane to the earth. Remembah, at five o’clock! Master Bonner will now give you an exhibition of rising, banking, fast flying, spirals and lighting; being careful to keep at all times within full view so that all may have an opportunity to observe these death-defying feats. Watch him closely!”

Alex Conyers snorted openly and disgustedly.

“They’re stringin’ us, kids,” he whispered hoarsely. “They ain’t a-goin’ to be anything more doin’ at five o’clock than they is now. These circuses don’t do half the bills say.”

“They’re a pack o’ swindlers and robbers,” added Art with peculiar emphasis. “I’ll bet that old aeroplane can’t fly at all.”

But, in this, he was wrong. Alex was right about the five o’clock promise, however. At that hour Master Bonner did not fly at all nor for many days to come. The reason grew out of the biggest sensation Scottsville ever had and, incidently, what came from this sensation had a lot to do with the summer plans of the newly organized Boy Scouts. This will be narrated in order, however.

About twenty minutes after one o’clock Master Willie suddenly climbed aboard his small and soiled aeroplane. He seemed to take time only to adjust his cap and tighten his gloves when the engine started, the roar of the propellers broke out and the skeleton craft began wobbling along the ground. Then accompanied by gulps in the throats of thousands, it jumped up and stayed in the air. For the first time a real aeroplane had flown in Scottsville.

Out toward the town limits the young aviator drove his car with half of the spectators in wild pursuit. Then he turned, rose to the height of perhaps five hundred feet, and heading again toward the circus lot, landed in less than ten minutes from the time he started. The “spirals” and “banking” were over and thirteen half disappointed, half delighted boys hurried away to visit the side show—the “World’s Congress of Wonders.”

The sensation that interfered with everything occurred just as the circus performance came to an end, a little after four o’clock. The Elm Streeters had all provided themselves with tickets for the concert. They bought these at the first opportunity and, about halfway through the performance, when the deep-voiced announcer made another speech, they could only grip their precious tickets with new delight.

Jumping upon one of the stools used by pink-legged performers to hold up the banners when the bareback riding was in progress, the man exclaimed:

“Ladies and gentlemen, in making my announcement a few moments ago concerning the grand concert and minstrel show that takes place immediately upon the conclusion of this performance, which is not yet half ovah, I neglected to state that each and every curiosity of the side museum will also be introduced into the arena. Agents will now pass among you once more. The price of admission is ten cents, one dime.”

The concert was not held. While those who had neglected to purchase tickets were crowding through the sawdust strewn passageway between the “big top” or circus and the long odorous menagerie tent, there was a sudden commotion. The crowd jammed forward and back at the same time. For a moment no sound indicated the cause of the excitement and then a roar of “Look out! Look out!” swept through the tents. At the same time a white-faced canvasman with a pitchfork in his hand sprang under the side of the circus tent and yelled to the “concert people”:

“Come on! Old Growls is out again! Come on—git a fork or suthin’!”

“Keep your seats,” yelled the loud-voiced announcer, “the tiger’s escaped but you’re safest in here. Keep your seats!”

In another instant he was deep in the panic-stricken mob, yelling for the people to “come back” and “nobody’s goin’ to be hurt; come this way.”

The terrified Elm Streeters held onto each other for a few moments, rising to their feet. Then as the white-faced mob began to swell toward them Connie shouted:

“Come on. We can get out through the dressing room.”

Others had started that way, but led by Connie and Art the boys plowed their way across the sawdust-covered ring to the dressing room entrance. Then, through the open horse entrance, they rushed out among wagons and horse tents. A cry of warning greeted them. One look along the side of the big tents showed a dozen men armed with stakes, pitchforks and sledges.

“Get back there, you kids. The tiger’s here!”

Before the trembling lads could retreat, a long form shot from beneath a low wagon, bounded forward and then paused. It was a gaunt and mangy tiger, its lips drawn back in a snarl and its almost hairless tail beating the ground.

“Run! Run!” yelled some one.

There had been no time to move. But the cry of warning aroused the tiger. A suppressed snarl broke from the beast and its dimly striped, sinuous length lunged forward again. But it was not toward the boys. With three bounds, arising each time like a rubber ball, the beast disappeared within a horse tent. The fear-stricken lads waited no longer. As if aroused from a spell they turned and fled around the dressing tent.

The boys heard the neighing cries of the haltered horses and at last, their tongues loosened, they told of what they had seen and escaped. Then came new crashes beyond the tents, the shouts of attendants, one piercing snarl of the tiger, and then the cries of those in chase grew fainter. The animal aroused by the taste of blood, for it had crushed the neck of a horse, was in renewed flight. Between wagons it had slunk away and had headed toward the edge of town. A thousand persons, young and old, were in a panic flight in the other direction, toward the residence part of town.

It seemed but a few minutes until the warning had spread throughout Scottsville. Children were hastily summoned and taken within doors; stores were closed; armed men appeared; women stood, door knobs in hand, pale-faced and trembling; parents whose children had attended the performance rushed about excitedly calling to all concerning their offsprings’ whereabouts. Mr. Trevor was not missing among these. Many Elm Street mothers paced their lawns as if awaiting some messenger of death. And the Elm Street boys themselves? Their first panic over, they naturally set out in the direction the beast had taken.

“He’s over in Jackson’s Woods,” came a message from somewhere. Jackson’s Woods marked the end of the town, a half-cleared bit of forest. Cautiously and following other pursuers the boys hurried in that direction. When they came to its edge, fifty or more men were seen in a crowd. Well beyond them, on the edge of the old “frog pond” and low on the ground, Old Growls was lapping water in apparent content.

While the pursuers took council, the beast arose, looked lazily at the crowd and then walked slowly toward a clump of half-dead trees. Here, the pursuers again advancing slowly, the tiger paused, hunched himself and then, as lightly as a kitten, sprang into the lower limbs of a tree, broken off about halfway up.

One or two men rushed ahead but the tiger gave them no heed. Slowly it made its way up the tree trunk until it reached an open place above the last dead branches. Then curling its body about the trunk and on the limbs the animal seemed to settle itself in the warm sun for its first taste of freedom.

The first man that the boys recognized was Marshal Walter, who had just arrived in a buggy, a rifle clenched in his trembling hands.

“Where is he?” panted the veteran official.

“In the top o’ that tree,” yelled a dozen spectators. “An’ he’d ought to be shot,” added one.

“I’ll soon put him out o’ business,” announced the marshal. “Stan’ back there, you ’at ain’t armed.”

“What d’you mean?” cried the deep-voiced “announcer,” who now turned out to be one of the owners of the Great Western Show. “Don’t you put no bullet in that animal. He’s worth two thousand dollars of any man’s money. Don’t you do him no damage or you’ll pay for it. He ain’t done no harm and ain’t a-goin’ to. We’ll take care o’ him. He’s been loose before. Drop that gun,” he concluded in a tone that alarmed the marshal.

“I’m here to protect life and property,” began the marshal.

“They ain’t a-goin’ to be nobody hurt,” expostulated the circus owner. “I’ll take care of that.”

By the circus man’s side stood a young man who had been studying the treed tiger. At this moment the boy spoke to the circus proprietor, who gave immediate signs of surprise. Then the boy seemed urging something, and while the man stood as if perplexed, the lad turned and hurried away on a run.

“It’s Master Willie Bonner, the Aviator,” exclaimed Art.

“I reckon he’s goin’ back to the show to give his cloud-piercin’ exhibition,” suggested Wart Ware. “It’s nearly five o’clock.”

“Not much,” exclaimed Alex Conyers. “The show people ain’t a-goin’ to bother about free shows while their two thousand dollar tiger’s loose.”

Marshal Walter was still arguing with the showman but the latter seemed to be having his way with the official, for the marshal made no effort to shoot the animal. The crowd grew larger. Everyone wanted to know why the tiger was in the tree? Why he was not somewhere else? Had he killed any one? Why didn’t some one do something!

The Elm Streeters kept together and as far from Marshal Walter as was consistent with keeping in the crowd. At this point Mr. Trevor’s automobile appeared on the edge of the crowd. It was recognized by the boys and all knew what it meant. Much excited, Mr. Trevor sprang out of the machine and Art hastened forward.

“You should have gone home at once, Arthur. Where’s the tiger?”

When he had been shown the beast he rounded up the children of his neighbors and crowded them into the automobile. “We’ll wait a few minutes, boys,” he explained, “to see what happens. I guess we can get away all right if his Royal Bengal Highness takes a notion to come down.”

There was continued debate between the circus proprietor and the excited marshal, during which the still increasing number of spectators edged nearer the tree and the tiger. Finally it moved, got upon its feet and raised the upper part of its body along the tree trunk as if to examine the broken tree top.

“It’ll come down or do something now,” suggested Art.

“I’d think they’d shoot,” added Connie.

A man in the crowd suddenly raised his arm and pointed toward that part of town where the circus stood.

“It’s the aeroplane,” shouted Colly excitedly.

“It’s comin’ in this direction,” yelled Art. “Gee whiz, watch him.”

“I’ll bet it’s that boy a-goin’ to do something to the tiger,” cried Connie jumping on the rear seat and waving his hat. “Mebbe he ain’t flyin’ though!”

As each boy struggled to get in a better position to see, Sammy Addington almost crushed in the jam of thirteen boys, and howling and kicking, the circus aeroplane darted over the automobile.

“I told you so! I told you so!” roared Connie. “Look at his rope!”

All could make that out. In his left hand the youthful aviator held several long loops of light rope. Was he going to lasso the beast? How could he do it with his left hand? And if he did, how could he hold the line and manage the aeroplane? It was not necessary to theorize long. What followed showed that “Master Willie Bonner’s” noonday flight was little indication of what the nervy little aviator could do with his aeroplane.

Sailing low, he passed almost directly over the tree. As he did so, the long line dropped in a dozen loops onto the dead branches. While they were yet in the air the flying machine made a quick and sharp bank to the left. The end of the line was in young Bonner’s hand. The aeroplane dipped downward and then, with an instant’s check, began immediately to bank on an upward dart, the rope paying out behind and circling the tree.

A yell arose from the crowd and in the automobile every boy had a different exclamation.

“He’s windin’ the tiger up,” shouted Ware. And that really expressed it. The loose end of the line lay on a limb some yards below the animal. It did not catch and, apparently, there was no need why it should. The first circling dart of the aeroplane looped the line about the limbs and trunk of the tree. Like a bicycle on a quick turn, the flying machine, still at an angle of at least forty-five degrees, made a second circuit—this time higher. The swaying rope followed.

As the loose line passed the apparently indifferent animal, the beast suddenly struck at it with a paw. The rope slipped under the tiger’s leg and before the now aroused beast could escape it another circle of the airship had placed a coil about the tiger. The gaunt animal now began to attack the line in earnest but with each spiral bank of the aeroplane his entanglement grew worse.

At last, every one cheering and calling out directions, there was not over fifty feet of line left. A dozen turns of rope had entangled themselves about the tree and the wildly resisting beast, when speaking for the first time, the aviator yelled:

“Here she comes. Take up the slack and you’ve got him.”

With this Bonner dropped the end of the line. Dozens of nervy spectators grabbed it and, with a quick pull, drew it taut about the snarling tiger.

“Get an ax,” yelled the circus man.

“Look! The aeroplane!” screamed a boy in the automobile.

There was only time to see that the flying machine was in trouble. In righting itself, it had already banked itself sharply to the right. There were two quick darts and then the planes seemed to buckle. Like a broken kite, the machine dropped straight to the ground in a tangled wreck, the aviator underneath.