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Read Ebook: The Circus Boys on the Plains; Or The Young Advance Agents Ahead of the Show by Darlington Edgar B P
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Ebook has 2289 lines and 47847 words, and 46 pages
The English Fat Girl gets mired on the lot. Teddy Tucker threatens to thrash the "Strongest Man on Earth." The hazards of a circus life. Teddy would put the whole show out of business. Phil and his chum assigned to Advance Car Number Three.
"Boss Sparling seems in an awful hurry to get rid of us." Circus Boys meet a cold reception. Phil is made a "barn climber." Teddy threatens to wring the car manager's neck. "Soak him, Phil!" yells the boy on the pile of railroad ties.
Phil gets into action. "I've had enough!" groans the car manager. A telegram to the owner complains of the Circus Boys. "Either you get off this car or I do." The advance car is a bedlam. More trouble for the Circus Boys is in sight.
Circus Boys meet "Rosie the Pig" and other notables. The porter tells how Phil worsted Mr. Snowden. What a "contract hotel" is. Teddy decides to take bean soup. "Why didn't the contracting agent sign us up with a livery stable?"
How an advance car is operated. The "banner man" and his little magnetic hammer. "You're a bird on the trapeze." The boys exchange confidences on snoring. Circus Boys go to sleep on beds of paper. Aroused by a great uproar.
"He's fallen into the paste can headfirst!" Teddy Tucker has a narrow escape from death. The manager gives Phil a ducking. "Rain-in-the-Face" sees a great light. An irate car manager. How Teddy took his revenge on Mr. Snowden.
"He pulled me out of bed!" Great excitement on Car Three. Snowden hopes Phil will fall off and break his neck. Young Forrest pastes a poster on himself. "Young man, you have a cast-iron nerve!" The Circus Boy "squares" a hard-shell farmer.
Phil gets a silo, and a hog pen for good measure. Farmers witness a circus stunt not down on the bills. A narrow escape. Taking a desperate chance. Phil "the champeen of them all." Circus sheets that stood out like a fire on the landscape.
Blue jeans replace pink tights. When it rained paste. "I didn't know you had your nose stuck in the paste pot when I turned on the steam." Teddy sets himself the task of reforming a "crazy man." The trouble maker is named "Spotted Horse." "You're discharged!"
Billy Conley is up to tricks. Mr. Sparling takes a hand. The car manager gets his deserts. "You will hear great things of Phil Forrest one of these days." "I'm going to thrash a man within an inch of his life!" Phil hears an amazing thing.
Phil Forrest, Car Manager. Dazed by an unexpected promotion. Teddy graduates from the paste pot. How circus money is spent. The Circus Boys win new laurels. Teddy becomes a press agent. Phil makes a speech and is welcomed as "The Boss."
"Bad habit to go to bed on an empty stomach." Teddy Tucker discovers a rival on a side track. "Here's trouble right from the start!" The new car manager gets into rapid-fire action. "We must beat the 'opposition.' Now, boys, it's up to you!" The mine is laid.
"That fellow is playing a sharp trick." Phil breakfasts with his rival and extracts information from him. "You ain't half as big a fool as you look, are you?" Bob Tripp gets a great shock. Farmers guard Phil Forrest's posters with shot guns.
Circus Boys steal a second march on the "opposition." Teddy Tucker whoops for joy. The new press agent begins work. "Spotted Horse" has too many fingers for typing. A suggestion for billposters. Circus Boys strike hard blows.
All surrounded in Kansas. Three "opposition" cars discovered in the same yard with Phil Forrest. A race for the country. Paste cans dance a jig. Rivals turned over into a ditch. A case of give and take.
When money made a big noise. The canary car manager gets an awful jolt. "Be on your way, my little man," urges Phil sweetly. "Turn out every man in town! Run as if the Rhino of the Sparling Circus were after you!"
The battle is on in earnest. Trouble is on the air. "Paste them, fellows!" howls Teddy. "Look out! The police are coming!" "I arrest you for disturbing the peace!" Phil faces the officers of the law boldly and wins for his show.
Congratulations from the show's owner. Four rival advance cars go out on one train. Teddy sends the enemy's cars adrift. Sleeping a sleep of innocence. Phil is puzzled over the mystery of the missing cars. Teddy's expression arouses the suspicion of his chum.
Teddy Tucker admits his guilt. Forrest reads "Spotted Horse" a severe lecture. "Is the sermon over?" A lesson that bore fruit for a day or so. Pat "smells a rat." "She's moving! We're off!" The Circus Boys adrift on a runaway car.
A dizzy ride through the storm. "Don't bother me, I'm making the next town!" A thrilling moment. Phil faces death with a smile on his face. "Hold fast, we're going to sideswipe them!" The agent at Salina gets a surprise.
Teddy throws out his chest and seeks publicity. "Spotted Horse" has a daring plan. The Circus Boy a hundred feet in the air. Teddy takes a desperate chance to earn Phil Forrest's fifty. Overtaken by disaster as the Sparling banner floats to the breeze.
"Help! I'm hung up!" Teddy is suspended, head downward, between earth and sky. Phil hurries to the rescue. "I'm all tied up in a knot!" wails the unhappy Tucker. Teddy takes a long drop, landing on Billy's neck, and bowls over a policeman.
A new trouble-plan in the making. Teddy is so happy that he can't go to bed. The "opposition" is lost again. Phil makes his chum tell how he tricked the rival car managers. How Phil Forrest proved that he was a real manager.
The manager of "The Greatest Show on Earth" wants Phil. Setting out to "drive the other fellows off the map." "No more meals at the Sign of the Tin Spoon." Circus Boys have a happy windup to an exciting show season.
THE CIRCUS BOYS ON THE PLAINS
ON THE OWNER'S PRIVATE CAR
"Bates!"
The voice of James Sparling rose above even the roar of the storm.
A uniformed attendant stepped into the little office tent occupied by the owner of the Great Sparling Combined Shows. Shaking the water from his dripping cap, he brought a hand to his forehead in precise military salute.
"How's the storm coming, Bates?" demanded the showman, with an amused twinkle in his eyes as he noted the bedraggled condition of his messenger.
"She's coming wet, sir," was the comprehensive reply.
And indeed "she" was. The gale was roaring over the circus lot, momentarily threatening to wrench the billowing circus tents from their fastenings, lift them high in the air preparatory to distributing them over the surrounding country. Guy ropes were straining at their anchorages, center and quarter poles were beating a nervous tattoo on the sodden turf. The rain was driving over the circus lot in blinding sheets.
The night was not ideal for a circus performance. However, the showmen uttered no protest, going about their business as methodically as if the air were warm and balmy, the moon and stars shining down over the scene complacently.
Now and again, as the wind shifted for a moment toward the showman's swaying office tent, the blare of the band off under the big top told him the show was moving merrily on.
"Bates, you are almost human at times. I had already observed that the storm was coming wet," replied the showman.
"Yes, sir."
"I have reason to be aware of the fact that 'she is coming wet,' as you so admirably put it. My feet are at this moment in a puddle of water that is now three inches above my ankles. Why shouldn't I know?"
"Yes, sir," agreed the patient attendant.
"What I want to know is how are the tents standing the blow?"
"Very well, sir."
"As long as there is a stitch of canvas over your head you take it for granted that the tops are all right, eh?"
"Yes, sir."
"The emergency gang is on duty, of course?"
"They're out in the wet, sir."
"Of course; that is where they belong on a night like this. But what were you doing out there? You have no business that calls you outside."
"I was helping a lady, sir."
"Helping a lady?"
"Yes, sir."
"What lady?"
"The English Fat Girl got mired on the lot, sir, and I was helping to get her out," answered the attendant solemnly.
"Pshaw!"
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