PLANS FOR THE SOCIETY CIRCUS
“Ralph and Hugh! I am so delighted to see you!” cried Mollie Thurston, a few days later. She was alone in their sitting room writing a letter, when the two friends arrived. “We girls have been dreadfully afraid you would not arrive in time for our Society Circus. You know the games take place to-morrow.”
“Oh, it is a ‘Society Circus’ we have come to! So that is the name Lenox has given to its latest form of social entertainment?” laughed Hugh. “Sorry we couldn’t get here sooner, Mollie; but you knew you could depend on our turning up at the appointed time. Where are the other girls and Aunt Sallie?”
“They are over at the Fair Grounds, watching Bab ride,” Mollie explained. “Ralph, I am awfully worried about Bab. One of the amusements of the circus is to be a riding contest. Of course, Bab rides very well, but I don’t think mother would approve of her undertaking such dangerous riding as jumping over hurdles. Ambassador Morton has told Aunt Sallie that there will be no danger. He is used to English girls riding across the country; and I know, at the riding schools in New York, they give these same contests; but we have never had any riding lessons. I can’t help being nervous.”
“I wouldn’t worry, Mollie,” Ralph replied kindly. “I am sure Bab is equal to any kind of horseback exercise. Remember the first time we saw her, Hugh? She was riding down the road in the rain, astride an old bareback horse. We nicknamed her ‘Miss Paul Revere’ then and there. There isn’t any use trying to keep Bab off a horse, Mollie, when she has the faintest chance to get on one.”
“Come on, then,” laughed Mollie, smiling at the picture Ralph’s remark had brought to her mind. “We will walk over to the Fair Grounds. You will find nearly everybody we know in Lenox over there. You remember that you boys gave Ruth and Bab liberty to put your names down for any of the games; come and find out what trouble they have gotten you into. You never dreamed of such absurd amusements as we are to have.”
“Oh, we are game for anything,” Hugh declared. “Lenox sports are the jolliest I have yet run across. Don’t think any other place can produce anything just like them. Certainly the amusements are a bit unconventional, but they are all the more fun. ‘Society Circus’ is a good name for the entertainment. Anything goes in a ‘Society Circus.’”
“What curious amusements people do have for the benefit of charities!” reflected Mollie. “But I expect the Lenox Hospital will receive a great deal of money from the sports this year. You see, they are in charge of the English Ambassador. That alone would make the entertainment popular.”
“Is Mollie growing worldly wise, Hugh?” asked Ralph, with mock horror.
“Looks like it, Ralph,” was the reply.
The boys and Mollie found Barbara in the midst of a gay circle of young people. Grace and Ruth were nowhere to be seen.
Aunt Sallie sat with Mrs. Morton in the grandstand. The Ambassador and Mr. Winthrop Latham wandered about near them. Many preparations were necessary for the next day’s frolic.
In front of the grandstand stretched a wide, green field, enclosed with a low fence. A little distance off stood the club house.
Bab came forward with both hands extended to greet her friends. She gave one hand to Ralph, the other to Hugh.
“I am so glad to see you!” she declared. “I can’t wait to shake your hands in the right way. We girls were so afraid you had turned ‘quitters’! Come, this minute, and see Aunt Sallie. You must be introduced, too, to Ambassador and Mrs. Morton.”
“But where are Ruth and Grace?” inquired Ralph.
“Over yonder,” laughed Bab, pointing to the green inclosure in front of them.
The boys spied Ruth and Grace some distance off. The two girls were deep in conversation with a farm boy. Strutting around near them were a fat turkey gobbler and a Plymouth Rock rooster.
Just at this moment Ruth was giving her instructions. “Be sure you bring the turkey and the rooster over to the Fair Grounds by ten o’clock to-morrow morning.”
The boy grinned. “I’ll have ’em here sure, Miss.”
“Ruth,” asked Grace, as the two girls started back across the meadow to join their friends, “do you suppose it will be unkind for us to try to drive these poor barnyard fowls across a field before so many people? I presume the poor old birds will be frightened stiff. Whoever heard of anything so utterly absurd as a Gymkana race.”
“Oh, no, you tender-hearted Grace,” Ruth assured her. “I don’t think the kind of pets we are to drive to-morrow will be much affected by our efforts. Indeed they are likely to lead us more of a chase than we shall lead them. And I don’t believe the annoyance of being run across this field by us for a few yards equals the nervous shock of being scared by an automobile or a carriage. That alarm may overtake poor Brother Turkey and Mr. Rooster any day. I think our race is going to be the greatest fun ever! Why! I think I see Ralph Ewing and Hugh over there with the girls. Isn’t that great?”
“Miss Morton!” Hugh was protesting gayly, as Grace and Ruth joined the crowd of their friends. “You don’t mean to say that Barbara and Ruth have put Ralph’s name and mine down for three of your performances? How shall we ever live through such a tremendous strain! Kindly explain to me what is expected of us.”
Dorothy Morton got out her blankbook, where she had written each item of the next day’s programme. “Well, Mr. Post, you and Mr. Ewing are down for three of our best events, ‘The Egg and Spoon Race,’ ‘The Dummy Race’ and ‘The Thread and Needle Race.’”
“All right,” declared Ralph, meekly accepting his fate, “but will you kindly tell me what a Thread and Needle Race is?”
“It is a very easy task, Ralph, compared with what Grace and I have undertaken,” Ruth assured him. “All you do, in the ‘Thread and Needle Race,’ is to ride across this field on horseback carrying a needle. Of course, the real burden is on the woman. It always is. Some fair one is waiting for you at the end of your ride; she must sew a button on your coat. The sooner she can accomplish this, the better; for back you must ride, again, to the starting place, with the button firmly attached to your coat.”
“Will you sew the button on for me, Mollie?” Ralph begged. He saw that Mollie was taking less part in the amusements than the other girls.
“Certainly!” agreed Mollie. “I accept your proffered honor. To tell you the truth, you stand a better chance of winning with my assistance. I am a much better seamstress than Bab.”
“Oh, Bab, will be busy winning the riding prize,” declared Ralph under his breath, smiling at his two friends, Mollie and Barbara.
Maud Warren, the New York girl famous for her skillful riding, was standing near them, talking with Reginald Latham. As she overheard Ralph’s remark, a sarcastic smile flitted across her pale face. She had ignored Bab since their introduction at the Ambassador’s; but the thought of this poor country girl’s really knowing how to ride horseback was too much for her.
Barbara caught Maud Warren’s look of amusement and blushed furiously. Then she turned to Ralph and said aloud, “Oh, I am not a rider when compared with Miss Warren.”
“I don’t believe in comparisons, Miss Thurston,” declared the Ambassador, who had walked up to them. “But I think you are an excellent horsewoman. And I much prefer your riding in the old-fashioned way with a side saddle. I have observed that it is now fashionable, in Lenox, for the young women to ride astride.”
“Girls,” Miss Stuart declared, “it is luncheon time. We must return to the hotel.”
“Now, does everybody understand about to-morrow?” asked Gwendolin Morton, when the last farewells had been said. “Remember, the Gymkana race is first. We started with this spectacle for fear the girls who have promised to take part might back out. Then, immediately after lunch, we shall have our horseback riding and jumping.”
“I don’t believe I have been wise in permitting you to engage in this horseback riding, Barbara,” Miss Stuart declared on their way home. “I am afraid this jumping over fences is a dangerous sport. And I am not sure it is ladylike.”
“But English girls do it all the time, Aunt Sallie. Jumping hurdles is taught in the best riding schools.”
“You have had no lessons, Bab. Are you perfectly sure you do not feel afraid?” queried Miss Stuart.
“Oh, perfectly, dear Aunt Sallie,” Bab assured her.