Page:Once a Week Jul - Dec 1859.pdf/70

Rh the grey’ll be so lame to-morrow she won’t stir a peg. It’s no use, Bill, you must go.”

“I can’t, Whips; it’ll be no use if I do.”

“O, yes, you will; you must go, or I’ll have to throw up the agreement, and you know you’ve overdrawed your money this last two weeks.”

“Well, I know it,” said the man, evidently irresolute now at this threat.

“Well, then, go in if it’s only five minutes. Here, take a drink of this, it will give you heart.”

The man took the proffered flask, and drank deeply.

“Well,” said Whips, “you’ll go, Bill, won’t you?”

“O, yes, I’ll go,” said the man, “go on.”

They left the waggon, and the repeated rounds of applause showed that the public was satisfied. The clown was never more witty, never more agile. Somersault after somersault, leap after leap was taken with a recklessness that nothing could equal; again and again the encores of the élite, and the bravos of the vulgar, spurred his exertions. At last it ended, and the quadrille came on. The clown left the ring, with the plaudits ringing in his ears, and came to the waggon to find—Alas! What?

At the conclusion of the quadrille those in the waggon heard a cry.

“What is it?” said the man, now in his old position, close to the body, with her hand locked in his, and his eyes fixed on her face. “What’s that?”

“They’re calling for her,” said Jenny, pointing to the form in the bed.

There was a lull, and then a long thunder of clapping hands and stamping feet, rose and died away.

“What’s that last?” asked the woman, holding the child, of a person entering.

“O! they called for the queen, and old Whips made a speech, and said she was rather unwell, and could not appear, but would most likely be better to-morrow, when she would again perform her celebrated feat of leaping through the hoop to the ground.”

“Well, my dears,” said the doctor, at the supper-table to his children, “How did you like it?”

“O! we didn’t see the queen, father.”

“No?”

“No, not at all; the man in the ring said she was not well, but would be there tomorrow, and the clown was so good, father, in the scene with the savage.”

“Was he, my dear. Do you know why you didn’t see the queen?”

“No.”

“Well, then, I’ll tell you. Because she was dead. That clown was her husband, I left him kissing her dead lips, and I daresay he is there now. It’s a strange world this! Such a sight as that I never saw before, and hope never to see again.” A. S. H.