Toby Tyler: or, Ten Weeks with a Circus

The old monkey, instead of obeying, stepped back to Toby's side, and screamed to the others in such a manner that they all entered the cage, leaving him on the outside with the boy.

Toby motioned him to get in too, but he clung to his hand, and scolded so furiously, that it was apparent he had no idea of leaving his boy companion. One of the men stepped up, and was about to force him into the wagon, when the proprietor ordered him to stop.

"What boy is that?" he asked.

"Job Lord's new boy," said some one in the crowd.

The man asked Toby how it was that he had succeeded in capturing all the runaways; and he answered, gravely,

"Mr. Stubbs an' I are good friends, an' when he saw the others runnin' away he just stopped 'em, an' brought 'em back to me. I wish you'd let Mr. Stubbs ride with me; we like each other a good deal."

"You can do just what you please with Mr. Stubbs, as you call him. I expected to lose half the monkeys in that cage, and you have brought back every one. That monkey shall be yours, and you may put him in the cage whenever you want to, or take him with you, just as you choose, for he belongs entirely to you."

Toby's joy knew no bounds; he put his arm around the monkey's neck, and the monkey clung firmly to him, until even Job Lord was touched at the evidence of affection between the two.

While the wagon was being repaired Toby and the monkey stood hand-in-hand watching the work go on, while those in the cage scolded and raved because they had been induced to return to captivity. After a while the old monkey seated himself on Toby's arm and cuddled close up to him, uttering now and then a contented sort of a little squeak as the boy talked to him.

That night Mr. Stubbs slept in Toby's arms, in the band wagon, and both boy and monkey appeared very well contented with their lot, which a short time previous had seemed so hard.

When Toby awakened to his second day's work with the circus his monkey friend was seated by his side, gravely exploring his pockets, and all the boy's treasures were being spread out on the floor of the wagon by his side. Toby remonstrated with him on this breach of confidence, but Mr. Stubbs was more in the mood for sport than for grave conversation, and the more Toby talked the more mischievous did he become, until at length the boy gathered up his little store of treasures, took the monkey by the paw, and walked him toward the cage from which he had escaped on the previous night.

"Now, Mr. Stubbs," said Toby, speaking in an injured tone, "you must go in here and stay till I have got more time to fool with you."

He opened the door of the cage, but the monkey struggled as well as he was able, and Toby was obliged to exert all his strength to put him in.

When once the door was fastened upon him Toby tried to impress upon his monkey friend's mind the importance of being more sedate, and he was convinced that the words had sunk deep into Mr. Stubbs's heart, for, by the time he had concluded, the old monkey was seated in the corner of the cage, looking up from under his shaggy eyebrows in the most reproachful manner possible.

Toby felt sorry that he had spoken so harshly, and was about to make amends for his severity, when Mr. Lord's gruff voice recalled him to the fact that his time was not his own, and he therefore commenced his day's work, but with a lighter heart than he had had since he stole away from Uncle Daniel and Guilford.

This day was not very much different from the preceding one so far as the manner of Mr. Lord and his partner toward the boy was concerned; they seemed to have an idea that he was doing only about half as much work as he ought to, and both united in swearing at and abusing him as much as possible.

So far as his relations with other members of the company were concerned, Toby now stood in a much better position than before. Those who had witnessed the scene told the others how Toby had led in the monkeys on the night previous, and nearly every member of the company had a kind word for the little fellow whose head could hardly be seen above the counter of Messrs. Lord and Jacobs's booth.

Chapter IX.

THE DINNER-PARTY

At noon Toby was thoroughly tired out, for whenever any one spoke kindly to him Mr. Lord seemed to take a malicious pleasure in giving him extra tasks to do, until Toby began to hope that no one else would pay any attention to him. On this day he was permitted to go to dinner first, and after he returned he was left in charge of the booth. Trade being dull – as it usually was during the dinner hour – he had very little work to do after he had cleaned the glasses and set things to rights generally.

When, therefore, he saw the gaunt form of the skeleton emerge from his tent and come toward him he was particularly pleased, for he had begun to think very kindly of the thin man and his fleshy wife.

"Well, Toby," said the skeleton, as he came up to the booth, carefully dusted Mr. Lord's private chair, and sat down very cautiously in it, as if he expected that it would break down under his weight, "I hear you've been making quite a hero of yourself by capturing the monkeys last night."

Toby's freckled face reddened with pleasure as he heard these words, and he stammered out, with considerable difficulty, "I didn't do anything; it was Mr. Stubbs that brought 'em back."

"Mr. Stubbs!" And the skeleton laughed so heartily that Toby was afraid he would dislocate some of his thinly-covered joints. "When you was tellin' about Mr. Stubbs yesterday I thought you meant some one belonging to the company. You ought to have seen my wife Lilly shake with laughing when I told her who Mr. Stubbs was!"

"Yes," said Toby, at a loss to know just what to say, "I should think she would shake when she laughs."

"She does," replied the skeleton. "If you could see her when something funny strikes her you'd think she was one of those big plates of jelly that they have in the bake-shop windows." And Mr. Treat looked proudly at the gaudy picture which represented his wife in all her monstrosity of flesh. "She's a great woman, Toby, an' she's got a great head."

Toby nodded his head in assent. He would have liked to have said something nice regarding Mrs. Treat, but he really did not know what to say, so he simply contented himself and the fond husband by nodding.

"She thinks a good deal of you, Toby," continued the skeleton, as he moved his chair to a position more favorable for him to elevate his feet on the edge of the counter, and placed his handkerchief under him as a cushion; "she's talking of you all the time, and if you wasn't such a little fellow I should begin to be jealous of you – I should, upon my word."

"You're – both – very – good," stammered Toby, so weighted down by a sense of the honor heaped upon him as to be at a loss for words.

"An' she wants to see more of you. She made me come out here now, when she knew Mr. Lord would be away, to tell you that we're goin' to have a little kind of a friendly dinner in our tent to-morrow – she's cooked it all herself, or she's going to – and we want you to come in an' have some with us."

Toby's eyes glistened at the thought of the unexpected pleasure, and then his face grew sad as he replied, "I'd like to come first-rate, Mr. Treat, but I don't s'pose Mr. Lord would let me stay away from the shop long enough."

"Why, you won't have any work to do to-morrow, Toby – it's Sunday."

"So it is!" said the boy, with a pleased smile, as he thought of the day of rest which was so near. And then he added, quickly, "An' this is Saturday afternoon. What fun the boys at home are havin'! You see there hain't any school Saturday afternoon, an' all the fellers go out in the woods."

"And you wish you were there to go with them, don't you?" asked the skeleton, sympathetically.

"Indeed I do!" exclaimed Toby, quickly. "It's twice as good as any circus that ever was."

"But you didn't think so before you came with us, did you?"

"I didn't know so much about circuses then as I do now," replied the boy, sadly.

Mr. Treat saw that he was touching on a sore subject, and one which was arousing sad thoughts in his little companion's mind, and he hastened to change it at once.

"Then I can tell Lilly that you'll come, can I?"

"Oh yes, I'll be sure to be there; an' I want you to know just how good I think you both are to me."

"That's all right, Toby," said Mr. Treat, with a pleased expression on his face; "an' you may bring Mr. Stubbs with you, if you want to."

"Thank you," said Toby; "I'm sure Mr. Stubbs will be just as glad to come as I shall. But where will we be to-morrow?"

"Right here. We always stay over Sunday at the place where we show Saturday. But I must be going, or Lilly will worry her life out of her for fear I'm somewhere getting cold. She's awful careful of me, that woman is. You'll be on hand to-morrow at one o'clock, won't you?"

"Indeed I will," said Toby, emphatically, "an' I'll bring Mr. Stubbs with me too."

With a friendly nod of the head, the skeleton hurried away to reassure his wife that he was safe and well; and before he had hardly disappeared within the tent Toby had another caller, who was none other than his friend Old Ben, the driver.

"Well, my boy," shouted Ben, in his cheery, hearty tones, "I haven't seen you since you left the wagon so sudden last night. Did you get shook up much?"

"Oh no," replied Toby: "you see I hain't very big; an' then I struck in the mud; so I got off pretty easy."

"That's a fact; an' you can thank your lucky stars for it, too, for I've seen grown-up men get pitched off a wagon in that way an' break their necks doin' it. But has Job told you where you was going to sleep to-night? You know we stay over here till to-morrow."

"I didn't think anything about that; but I s'pose I'll sleep in the wagon, won't I?"

"You can sleep at the hotel, if you want to; but the beds will likely be dirty; an' if you take my advice you'll crawl into some of the wagons in the tent."