Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/120

 breathless, when the man in the black derby called sharply after him.

"Here you, Redhead, fetch them things round to the cook-tent!"

Lonely obeyed meekly and promptly,—though in the ordinary affairs of life he allowed no such expletives to pass unchallenged,—feeling for the moment that he was a part of that vast and stupendous machinery of amusement.

He followed his guardian in under one of the smaller tents, where his intoxicated young nostrils caught their first whiff of canvas and sawdust,—a smell like unto which there is and can be no other. Later, mingled with this strange odor, he detected the smell of coffee and cooking meat. This brought him to a standstill, causing him to scratch his russet little head absently, and wonder just how long it was since he had breakfasted and just how it was meat and coffee could smell so good.

Then, coming to his senses and getting more accustomed to his surroundings, he beheld two long tables, at which more or less grimy and hungry and tired-looking men and women sat, bolting down a hurried breakfast.