Polly of the Circus

Chapter V

THE church bells were ringing their first warning for the morning service when Mandy peeped into the spare bedroom for the second time, and glanced cautiously at the wisp of hair that bespoke a feminine head somewhere between the covers and the little white pillow on the four-poster bed. There was no sound from the sleeper, so Mandy ventured across the room on tiptoe and raised the shades. The drooping boughs of Autumn foliage lay shimmering against the window panes, and through them might be seen the grey outline of the church. Mandy glanced again toward the bed to make sure that the burst of sunlight had not wakened the invalid, then crossed to a small, rickety chair, laden with the discarded finery of the little circus rider.

“Lawdy sakes!” she cried, holding up a spangled dress, admiringly. “Ain't dat beautiful!” She drew near the mirror, attempting to see the reflection of the tinsel and chiffon against her very ample background of gingham and avoirdupois. “You'd sure be a swell nigger wid dat on, Honey,” she chuckled to herself. “Wouldn't dem deacons holler if dey done see dat?”

The picture of the deacons' astonishment at such a spectacle so grew upon Mandy, that she was obliged to cover her generous mouth to shut in her convulsive laughter, lest it awaken the little girl in the bed. She crossed to the old-fashioned bureau which for many months had stood unused against the wall. The drawer creaked as she opened it to lay away the gay, spangled gown.

“It'll be a mighty long time afore she puts on dem tings agin,” she said, with a doubtful shake of her large, round head.

Then she went back to the chair and picked up Polly's sandals, and examined the bead-work with a great deal of interest. “Lawdy, lawdy!” she cried, as she compared the size of the sandals to that of her own rough, worn shoes. She was again upon the point of exploding with laughter, as the church bell added a few, final and more emphatic clangs to its warning.

She turned with a start, motioning a vain warning out of the window for the bell to be silent, but the little sleeper was already stirring uneasily on her pillow. One soft arm was thrown languidly over her head. The large, blue eyes opened and closed dreamily as she murmured the words of the clown song that Jim and Toby had taught her years ago:

     “Ting ling,
     That's what the bells sing——”
 

Mandy reached the side of the bed as the girl's eyes opened a second time and met hers with a blank stare of astonishment. A tiny frown came into the small, white forehead.

“What's the matter?” she asked faintly, trying to find something familiar in the black face before her.

“Hush, child, hush,” Mandy whispered; “jes' you lie puffickly still. Dat's only de furs' bell a-ringin'.”

“First bell?” the girl repeated, as her eyes travelled quickly about the strange walls and the unfamiliar fittings of the room. “This ain't the show!” she cried, suddenly.

“Lor' bless you, no; dis ain't no show,” Mandy answered; and she laughed reassuringly.

“Then where am I?” Polly asked, half breathless with bewilderment.

“Nebber you mind 'bout dat,” was Mandy's unsatisfactory reply.

“But I DO mind,” protested Polly, trying to raise herself to a sitting position. “Where's the bunch?”

“De wat?” asked Mandy in surprise.

“The bunch—Jim and Toby and the rest of the push!”

“Lor' bless you!” Mandy exclaimed. “Dey's done gone 'long wid de circus, hours ago.”

“Gone! Show gone!” Polly cried in amazement. “Then what am I doing here?”

“Hole on dar, honey! hole on!” Mandy cautioned. “Don't you 'cite yo'se'f.”

“Let me alone!” Polly put aside the arm that was trying to place a shawl around her. “I got to get out a-here.”

“You'se got plenty o' time for dat,” Mandy answered, “yes' yo' wait awhile.”

“I can't wait, and I won't!” Polly shrieked, almost beside herself with anxiety. “I got to get to the next burg—Wakefield, ain't it? What time is it? Let me alone! Let me go!” she cried, struggling desperately.

The door opened softly and the young pastor stood looking down at the picture of the frail, white-faced child, and her black, determined captor.

“Here, here! What's all this about?” he asked, in a firm tone, though evidently amused.

“Who are you?” returned the girl, as she shoved herself quickly back against the pillows and drew the covers close under her chin, looking at him oddly over their top.

“She done been cuttin' up somefin' awful,” Mandy explained, as she tried to regain enough breath for a new encounter.

“Cutting up? You surprise me, Miss Polly,” he said, with mock seriousness.

“How do you know I'm Polly?” the little rebel asked, her eyes gleaming large and desperate above the friendly covers.

“If you will be VERY good and keep very quiet, I will try to tell you,” he said, as he crossed to the bed.

“I won't be quiet, not for nobody,” Polly objected, with a bold disregard of double negatives. “I got to get a move. If you ain't goin' to help me, you needn't butt in.”

“I am afraid I can't help you to go just yet,” Douglas replied. He was beginning to perceive that there were tasks before him other than the shaping of Polly's character.

“What are you trying to do to me, anyhow?” she asked, as she shot a glance of suspicion from the pastor to Mandy. “What am I up against?”

“Don't yuh be scared, honey,” Mandy reassured her. “You's jes' as safe here as you done been in de circus.”

“Safer, we hope,” Douglas added, with a smile.

“Are you two bug?” Polly questioned, as she turned her head from one side to the other and studied them with a new idea. “Well, you can't get none the best of me. I can get away all right, and I will, too.”

She made a desperate effort to put one foot to the floor, but fell back with a cry of pain.

“Dar, dar,” Mandy murmured, putting the pillow under the poor, cramped neck, and smoothing the tangled hair from Polly's forehead. “Yuh done hurt yo'sef for suah dis time.”

The pastor had taken a step toward the bed. His look of amusement had changed to one of pity.

“You see, Miss Polly, you have had a very bad fall, and you can't get away just yet, nor see your friends until you are better.”

“It's only a scratch,” Polly whimpered. “I can do my work; I got to.” One more feeble effort and she succumbed, with a faint “Jimminy Crickets!”

“Uncle Toby told me that you were a very good little girl,” Douglas said, as he drew up a chair and sat down by her side, confident by the expression on her face that at last he was master of the situation. “Do you think he would like you to behave like this?”

“I sure am on the blink,” she sighed, as she settled back wearily upon the pillow.

“You'll be all right soon,” Douglas answered, cheerily. “Mandy and I will help the time to go.”

“I recollect now,” Polly faltered, without hearing him. “It was the last hoop. Jim seemed to have a hunch I was goin' to be in for trouble when I went into the ring. Bingo must a felt it, too. He kept a-pullin' and a-jerkin' from the start. I got myself together to make the last jump an'—I can't remember no more.” Her head drooped and her eyes closed.

“I wouldn't try just now if I were you,” Douglas answered tenderly.

“It's my WHEEL, ain't it?” Polly questioned, after a pause.

“Yoah what, chile?” Mandy exclaimed, as she turned from the table, where she had been rolling up the unused bandages left from the doctor's call the night before.

“I say it's my creeper, my paddle,” Polly explained, trying to locate a few of her many pains. “Gee, but that hurts!” She tried to bend her ankle. “Is it punctured?”

“Only sprained,” Douglas answered, striving to control his amusement at the expression on Mandy's puzzled face. “Better not talk any more about it.”

“Ain't anything the matter with my tongue, is there?” she asked, turning her head to one side and studying him quizzically.

“I don't think there is,” he replied good-naturedly.

“How did I come to fall in here, anyhow?” she asked, as she studied the walls of the unfamiliar room.

“We brought you here.”

“It's a swell place,” she conceded grudgingly.

“We are comfortable,” he admitted, as a tell-tale smile again hovered about his lips. He was thinking of the changes that he must presently make in Miss Polly's vocabulary.

“Is this the 'big top?' she asked.

“The—what?” he stammered.

“The main tent,” she explained.

“Well, no; not exactly. It's going to be your room now, Miss Polly.”

“My room! Gee! Think a' that!” she gasped, as the possibility of her actually having a room all of her own took hold of her mind. “Much obliged,” she said with a nod, feeling that something was expected of her. She knew no other phrase of gratitude than the one “Muvver” Jim and Toby had taught her to say to the manager when she received from him the first stick of red and white striped candy.

“You're very welcome,” Douglas answered with a ring of genuine feeling in his voice.

“Awful quiet, ain't it?” she ventured, after a pause. “Guess that's what woke me up.”

Douglas laughed good-naturedly at the thought of quiet as a disturber, and added that he feared it might at first be rather dull for her, but that Jim and Toby would send her news of the circus, and that she could write to them as soon as she was better.

“I'll have to be a heap better 'an I ever was 'fore I can write much,” Polly drawled, with a whimsical little smile.

“I will write for you,” the pastor volunteered, understanding her plight.

“You will?” For the first time he saw a show of real pleasure in her eyes.

“Every day,” Douglas promised solemnly.

“And you will show me how?”

“Indeed I will.”

“How long am I in for?” she asked.

“The doctor can tell better about that when he comes.”

“The doctor! So—it's as bad as that, eh?”

“Oh, that need not frighten you,” Douglas answered consolingly.

“I ain't frightened,” she bridled quickly; “I ain't never scared of nothin.' It's only 'cause they need me in the show that I'm a-kickin'.”

“Oh, they will get along all right,” he said reassuringly.

“Get along?” Polly flashed with sudden resentment. “Get along WITHOUT MY ACT!” It was apparent from her look of astonishment that Douglas had completely lost whatever ground he had heretofore gained in her respect. “Say, have you seen that show?” She waited for his answer with pity and contempt.

“No,” admitted John, weakly.

“Well I should say you ain't, or you wouldn't make no crack like that. I'm the whole thing in that push,” she said with an air of self-complacency; “and with me down and out, that show will be on the bum for fair.”

“I beg your pardon,” was all Douglas could say, confused by the sudden volley of unfamiliar words.

“You're kiddin' me,” she said, turning her head to one side as was her wont when assailed by suspicion; “you MUST a seen me ride?”

“No, Miss Polly, I have never seen a circus,” Douglas told her half-regretfully, a sense of his deep privation stealing upon him.

“What!” cried Polly, incredulously.

“Lordy no, chile; he ain't nebber seed none ob dem tings,” Mandy interrupted, as she tried to arrange a few short-stemmed posies in a variegated bouquet.

“Well, what do you think of that!” Polly gasped. “You're the first rube I ever saw that hadn't.” She was looking at him as though he were a curiosity.

“So I'm a rube!” Douglas shook his head with a sad, little smile and good-naturedly agreed that he had sometimes feared as much.

“That's what we always calls a guy like you,” she explained ingenuously, and added hopefully: “Well, you MUST a' seen our parade—all the pikers see that—IT don't cost nothin'.”

“I'm afraid I must also plead guilty to the charge of being a piker,” Douglas admitted half-sheepishly, “for I did see the parade.”

“Well, I was the one on the white horse right behind the lion cage,” she began excitedly. “You remember?”

“It's a little confused in my mind—” he caught her look of amazement, “just AT PRESENT,” he stammered, feeling her wrath again about to descend upon him.

“Well, I'm the twenty-four sheet stand,” she explained.

“Sheet!” Mandy shrieked from her corner.

“Yes—the billboards—the pictures,” Polly said, growing impatient at their persistent stupidity.

“She sure am a funny talkin' thing!” mumbled Mandy to herself, as she clipped the withered leaves from a plant near the window.

“You are dead sure they know I ain't comin' on?” Polly asked with a lingering suspicion in her voice.

“Dead sure”; and Douglas smiled to himself as he lapsed into her vernacular.

There was a moment's pause. Polly realised for the first time that she must actually readjust herself to a new order of things. Her eyes again roved about the room. It was a cheerful place in which to be imprisoned—even Polly could not deny that. The broad window at the back with its white and pink chintz curtains on the inside, and its frame of ivy on the outside, spoke of singing birds and sunshine all day long. Everything from the white ceiling to the sweet-smelling matting that covered the floor was spotlessly clean; the cane-bottomed rocker near the curved window-seat with its pretty pillows told of days when a convalescent might look in comfort at the garden beneath; the counterpane, with its old-fashioned rose pattern, the little white tidies on the back of each chair, and Mandy crooning beside the window, all helped to make a homelike picture.

She wondered what Jim and Toby would say if they could see her now, sitting like a queen in the midst of her soft coverlets, with no need to raise even a finger to wait upon herself.

“Ain't it the limit?” she sighed, and with that Jim and Toby seemed to drift farther away. She began to see their life apart from hers. She could picture Jim with his head in his hands. She could hear his sharp orders to the men. He was always short with the others when anything went wrong with her.

“I'll bet 'Muvver Jim's' in the dumps,” she murmured, as a cloud stole across the flower-like face; then the tired muscles relaxed, and she ceased to rebel.

“Muvver Jim”? Douglas repeated, feeling that he must recall her to a knowledge of his presence.

“That's what I calls him,” Polly explained, “but the fellows calls him 'Big Jim.' You might not think Jim could be a good mother just to look at him, but he is; only, sometimes, you can't tell him things you could a real mother,” she added, half sadly.

“And your real mother went away when you were very young?”

“No, she didn't go AWAY——”

“No?” There was a puzzled note in the pastor's voice.

“She went out,” Polly corrected.

“Out!” he echoed blankly.

“Yes—finished—Lights out.”

“Oh, an accident.” Douglas understood at last.

“I don't like to talk about it.” Polly raised herself on her elbow and looked at him solemnly, as though about to impart a bit of forbidden family history. It was this look in the round eyes that had made Jim so often declare that the kid knew everything.

“Why mother'd a been ashamed if she'd a knowed how she wound up. She was the best rider of her time, everybody says so, but she cashed in by fallin' off a skate what didn't have no more ginger 'an a kitten. If you can beat that?” She gazed at him with her lips pressed tightly together, evidently expecting some startling expression of wonder.

“And your father?” Douglas asked rather lamely, being at a loss for any adequate comment upon a tragedy which the child before him was too desolate even to understand.

“Oh, DAD'S finish was all right. He got his'n in a lion's cage where he worked. There was nothing slow about his end.” She looked up for his approval.

“For de Lord's sake!” Mandy groaned as the wonder of the child's conversation grew upon her.

“And now I'm down and out,” Polly concluded with a sigh.

“But THIS is nothing serious,” said the pastor, trying to cheer her.

“It's serious ENOUGH, with a whole show a'-dependin' on you. Maybe you don't know how it feels to have to knock off work.”

“Oh, yes, I do,” Douglas answered quickly. “I was ill a while ago myself. I had to be in bed day after day, thinking of dozens of things that I ought to be doing.”

“Was you ever floored?” Polly asked with a touch of unbelief as she studied the fine, healthy physique at the side of her bed.

“'Deed he was, chile,” Mandy cried, feeling that her opportunity had now arrived; “an' I had the wors' time a-keepin' him in bed. He act jes' like you did.”

“Did he?” Polly was delighted to find that the pastor had “nothin' on her,” as she would have put it.

“You ought to have heard him,” continued Mandy, made eloquent by Polly's show of interest. “'What will dose poor folks do?' he kept a-sayin'. 'yes' yo' lie where yo' is,' I tole him. 'Dem poor folks will be better off dan dey would be a-comin' to yoah funeral.'”

“Poor folks?” Polly questioned. “Do you give money to folks? We are always itchin' to get it AWAY from 'em.”

Before Douglas could think of words with which to defend his disapproved methods, Mandy had continued eagerly:

“An' den on Sunday, when he can't go to church and preach—” She got no further. A sharp exclamation brought both Mandy and Douglas to attention.

“Preach!” Polly almost shouted. She looked at him with genuine alarm this time.

“That will do, Mandy,” Douglas commanded, feeling an unwelcome drama gathering about his head.

“Great Barnum and Bailey!” Polly exclaimed, looking at him as though he were the very last thing in the world she had ever expected to see. “Are you a skypilot?”

“That's what he am, chile.” Mandy slipped the words in slyly, for she knew that they were against the pastor's wishes, but she was unable to restrain her mischievous impulse to sow the seeds of curiosity that would soon bear fruit in the inquisitive mind of the little invalid.

“Will you get onto me a-landin' into a mix-up like this?” She continued to study the uncomfortable man at her side. “I never thought I'd be a-talkin' to one of you guys. What's your name?”

“Douglas.” He spoke shortly.

“Ain't you got no handle to it?”

“If you mean my Christian name, it's John.”

“Well, that sounds like a skypilot, all right. But you don't look like I s'posed they did.”

“Why not?”

“I always s'posed skypilots was old and grouchy-like. You're a'most as good lookin' as our strong man.”

“I done tole him he was too good-lookin' to be an unmarried parson,” Mandy chuckled, more and more amused at the pastor's discomfort.

“Looks don't play a very important part in my work,” Douglas answered curtly. Mandy's confidential snickers made him doubly anxious to get to a less personal topic.

“Well, they count for a whole lot with us.” She nodded her head decidedly. “How long you been showin' in this town, anyhow?”

“About a year,” Douglas answered, with something of a sigh.

“A year!” she gasped. “In a burg like this? You must have an awful lot of laughs in your act to keep 'em a-comin' that long.” She was wise in the ways of professional success.

“Not many, I'm afraid.” He wondered, for the first time, if this might be the reason for his rather indifferent success.

“Do you give them the same stuff, or have you got a rep?”

“A rep?” he repeated in surprise.

“Sure, repertory—different acts—entries, some calls 'em. Uncle Toby's got twenty-seven entries. It makes a heap of difference in the big towns where you have a run.”

“Oh, I understand,” Douglas answered in a tone of relief. “Well, I try to say something new each Sunday.”

“What kind of spiels do you give 'em?” she inquired with growing interest.

“I try to help my people to get on better terms with themselves and to forget their week-day troubles.” He had never had occasion to define his efforts so minutely.

“Well, that's jes' the same as us,” Polly told him with an air of condescension; “only circuses draws more people 'an churches.”

“YOURS does seem to be a more popular form of entertainment,” Douglas answered drily. He was beginning to feel that there were many tricks in the entertainment trade which he had not mastered. And, after all, what was his preaching but an effort at entertainment? If he failed to hold his congregation by what he was saying, his listeners grew drowsy, and his sermon fell short of its desired effect. It was true that his position and hers had points of similarity. She was apparently successful; as for himself, he could not be sure. He knew he tried very hard and that sometimes a tired mother or a sad-faced child looked up at him with a smile that made the service seem worth while.

Polly mistook the pastor's revery for envy, and her tender heart was quick to find consolation for him.

“You ain't got all the worst of it,” she said. “If we tried to play a dump like this for six months, we'd starve to death. You certainly must give 'em a great show,” she added, surveying him with growing interest.

“It doesn't make much difference about the show—” Douglas began, but he was quickly interrupted.

“That's right, it's jes' the same with a circus. One year ye give 'em the rottenest kind of a thing, and they eat it up; the next year you hand 'em a knock-out, and it's a frost. Is that the way it is with a church show?”

“Much the same,” Douglas admitted half-amusedly, half-regretfully. “Very often when I work the hardest, I seem to do the least good.”

“I guess our troubles is pretty much alike.” Polly nodded with a motherly air of condescension. “Only there ain't so much danger in your act.”

“I'm not so sure about that,” he laughed.

“Well, you take my tip,” she leaned forward as though about to impart a very valuable bit of information. “Don't you never go in for ridin'. There ain't no act on earth so hard as a ridin' act. The rest of the bunch has got it easy alongside of us. Take the fellows on the trapeze. They always get their tackle up in jes' the same place. Take the balancin' acts; there ain't no difference in their layouts. Take any of 'em as depends on regular props; and they ain't got much chance a-goin' wrong. But say, when yer have ter do a ridin' act, there ain't never no two times alike. If your horse is feelin' good, the ground is stumbly; if the ground ain't on the blink the horse is wobbly. Ther's always somethin' wrong somewheres, and yer ain't never knowin' how it's goin' ter end—especially when you got to do a careful act like mine. There's a girl, Eloise, in our bunch, what does a SHOWY act on a horse what Barker calls Barbarian. She goes on in my place sometimes—and say, them rubes applauds her as much as me, an' her stunts is baby tricks alongside o' mine. It's enough to make you sick o' art.” She shook her head dolefully, then sat up with renewed interest.

“You see, mine is careful balancin' an' all that, an' you got ter know your horse an' your ground for that. Now you get wise ter what I'm a-tellin' yer, and don't you NEVER go into ANYTHIN' what depends on ANYTHIN' else.”

“Thank you, Polly, I won't.” Douglas somehow felt that he was very much indebted to her.

“I seen a church show once,” Polly said suddenly.

“You did?” Douglas asked, with new interest.

“Yes,” she answered, closing her lips and venturing no further comment.

“Did you like it?” he questioned, after a pause.

“Couldn't make nothin' out of it—I don't care much for readin'.”

“Oh, it isn't ALL reading,” he corrected.

“Well, the guy I saw read all of his'n. He got the whole thing right out of a book.”

“Oh, that was only his text,” laughed Douglas. “Text?”

“Yes. And later he tried to interpret to his congrega——”

“Easy! Easy!” she interrupted; “come again with that, will you?”

“He told them the meaning of what he read.” “Well, I don't know what he told 'em, but it didn't mean anythin' to me. But maybe your show is better'n his was,” she added, trying to pacify him.

Douglas was undecided whether to feel amused or grateful for Polly's ever-increasing sympathy. Before he could trust his twitching lips to answer, she had put another question to him.

“Are you goin' to do a stunt while I am here?”

“I preach every Sunday, if that's what you mean; I preach this morning.”

“Is this Sunday?” she asked, sitting up with renewed energy and looking about the room as though everything had changed colour.

“Yes.”

“And YOU GOT A MATINEE?” she exclaimed, incredulously.

“We have services,” he corrected, gently.

“WE rest up on SUNDAYS,” she said in a tone of deep commiseration.

“Oh, I see,” he answered, feeling it no time to enter upon another discussion as to the comparative advantages of their two professions.

“What are you goin' ter spiel about to-day?”

“About Ruth and Naomi.”

“Ruth and who?”

“Naomi,” he repeated.

“Naomi,” she echoed, tilting her head from side to side, as she listened to the soft cadences of the word. “I never heard that name afore. It 'ud look awful swell on a billboard, wouldn't it?”

“It's a Bible name, honey,” Mandy said, eager to get into the conversation. “Dar's a balful picture 'bout her. I seed it.”

“I LIKE to look at PICTURES,” Polly answered tentatively. Mandy crossed the room to fetch the large Bible with its steel engravings.

“We got a girl named Ruth in our 'Leap of Death' stunt. Some of the folks is kinder down on 'er, but I ain't.”

She might have told Douglas more of her forlorn, little friend, but just then Mandy came to the bed, hugging a large, old-fashioned Bible, and Douglas helped to place the ponderous book before the invalid.

“See, honey, dar dey is,” the old woman said, pointing to the picture of Ruth and Naomi.

“Them's crackerjacks, ain't they?” Polly gasped, and her eyes shone with wonder. “Which one 's Ruth?”

“Dis one,” said Mandy, pointing with her thumb.

“Why, they're dressed just like our chariot drivers. What does it say about 'em?”

“You can read it for yourself,” Douglas answered gently. There was something pathetic in the eagerness of the starved little mind.

“Well, I ain't much on readin'—OUT LOUD,” she faltered, growing suddenly conscious of her deficiencies. “Read it for me, will you?”

“Certainly,” and he drew his chair nearer to the bed. One strong hand supported the other half of the Bible, and his head was very near to hers as his deep, full voice pronounced the solemn words in which Ruth pleaded so many years before.

“'Entreat me not to leave thee,'” he read, “'or to return from following after thee, for whither thou goest I will go, and where thou lodgest I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.'”

He stopped to ponder over the poetry of the lines.

“Kind o' pretty, ain't it?” Polly said softly. She felt awkward and constrained and a little overawed.

“There are far more beautiful things than that,” Douglas assured her enthusiastically, as the echo of many such rang in his ears.

“There are?” And her eyes opened wide with wonder.

“Yes, indeed,” he replied, pitying more and more the starvation of mind and longing to bring to it floods of light and enrichment.

“I guess I'd LIKE to hear YOU spiel,” and she fell to studying him solemnly.

“You would?” he asked eagerly.

“Is there any more to that story?” she asked, ignoring his question.

“Yes, indeed.”

“Would you read me a little more?” She was very humble now.

“Where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried; the Lord do so to me and more also, if ought but death part me and thee.'”

Their eyes met. There was a long pause. Suddenly the sharp, sweet notes of the church bell brought John Douglas to his feet with a start of surprise.

“Have you got to go?” Polly asked regretfully.

“Yes, I must; but I'll read the rest from the church. Open the window, Mandy!” And he passed out of the door and quickly down the stairs.