Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/136

 for the goose was sauce for the gander, he made himself more at his ease, and was interestedly and pointedly watching the half-dressed Queen of the Tight Rope inhaling cigarette smoke, when he was seized by the woman in the dirty apron, and without ceremony or apology thrust from the tent.

He made his way disconsolately about, looking for the wagon-office, in the hope that the manager's possible delight at the grace and ease with which he had filled his part as a page might induce that bluff gentleman yet to change his mind and make serious advances as to Lonely's joining the Circus for all time. He felt vaguely disturbed, for the moment, at the thought that of late he had sadly neglected his muscles, that the angle-worm oil had been applied only scantily and carelessly, and that he had never yet perfected to his own liking his new twister back-somersault.

Yet, after all the excitement and activity of the morning, he soon began to feel an emptiness in the pit of his stomach, where the inexorable clock of nature was warning him the dinner-hour must be well at hand. Just as he was debating on his course of action, a bluff