Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/127

 the busy circle made short shrift of him, and his heart sank to its lowest depth as he found himself once more pushed and jostled ignominiously into the background. It was the old, old trick. Year after year he had helped water the elephants, and had run messages, and had piloted the tent-hands to the best drinking-well in all Cowansburg, and had borrowed matches for the stake-drivers—and year by year he had been fed on only empty and heart-breaking promises!

But in such a place and at such a time even sorrow like unto his could not long remain. He choked back an impotent sniffle or two, and ten minutes later was wandering in among the side-show canvases, hoping to get a gratuitous glimpse of the Fat Woman, trying to find out where the snakes were kept, taking an experimental pound at one of the big drums, speculating as to the contents of many mysterious boxes, and still vaguely asking himself if those star-decked and beautiful visions who rode on the piebald horses and the elephants really ate beefsteak and hot biscuits, the same as the common circus hands; and if, too, those winged, angel women in spotless