Part 4 (2/2)
”Where?”
”In the ring. Anybody can ride a horse in a parade, but not everyone can perform on the flying rings and leap over elephants to boot.”
Teddy instinctively threw out his chest.
”You're right, at that. Hark!”
”Yes; they are coming. I can hear Billy English blow the big ba.s.s horn. You could hear him over three counties, I really believe.”
Laughing and chatting, the boys settled themselves on Mrs.
Cahill's hospitable doorstep to await the arrival of the parade which could be heard far off on the other side of the village.
Now and then the high, metallic notes of the calliope rose above all the rest, bringing a glint of pride to the eyes of Teddy Tucker.
”I just love that steam music machine.”
”Well, I must say that I do not admire your taste,” laughed Phil.
”It's the most hideous discord of noises I ever heard. I never did like the steam piano, but a circus wouldn't be a circus without it.”
”Nope,” agreed Teddy with emphasis.
Down the street a gorgeously colored rainbow slowly reached around a bend and began straightening away toward the Cahill home. The parade was approaching.
As the gay procession drew nearer the boys began to evince some of the enthusiasm that they had known before they themselves had become a part of the big show.
”Remember the parade two years ago, Phil?” asked Mrs. Cahill.
”I could not very well forget it. That was a red letter day in my life, the day when I fell into the show business.”
”And that wasn't all you fell in either,” added Teddy.
”What else did I fall in?”
”In a ditch when you stopped the runaway pony.”
Phil did not laugh. He was thinking.
”That was a lucky fall, too.”
”Why?”
”Because it was the means of giving you and me our start in the circus business.”
”Hurrah! Here they come. Now see me make faces at them when they go by,” said Teddy.
The Cahill home was near the outskirts of the village, and as the golden chariot of the band, glistening in the bright morning sunlight, approached, the lads could not repress an exclamation of delight.
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