A stifling evening had succeeded a burning day. Here on the bluff a breeze moved cool and soft as it had been waftings from the dusky cloak night dropped about them; below was heat and crowded life and clamour, rising in the waving reek of the naphtha flares; in shouts of the showmen; in shrill laughter from village girls at fun about the booths, or horseplay with their swains; in ceaseless rifle-cracks from the shooting-galleries—in drum-thumpings, in steam organs, in brazen instruments; occasionally, high above it all, in enormous oo-oo-oomphs from the caged lions in the huge marquee that housed Boss Maddox's Royal Circus and Monster Forest-bred Menagerie—a tremendous sound, as Percival thought when it came booming across the clamour, that was a brute's but that seemed, like some trump of protest against the din, to make brutish the human cries and shouts it governed.
Two crowds, leaving and entering, jostled one another at the entrance to the Royal Circus and Forest-bred Menagerie; stretching on either hand from where they pressed ran the minor shows under Boss Maddox's proprietorship, forming a noisy, flaring street that ended, facing the circus marquee, with "Foxy" Pinsent's Academy of Boxing and School of Arms. Maddox's Royal Circus and Forest Bred Menagerie at one end, Pinsent's fine booth at the other—between them Maddox's Living Pictures, Maddox's Wild-West Shooting Gallery, Maddox's Steam Switch-back and Aerial Railway, Maddox's Original Marionettes, Maddox's Premier Boatswings, Maddox's Monster Panorama, Maddox's Royal Theatre and Concert Divan, Maddox's Elite Refreshment Saloons, Maddox's American Freak Museum, and all Maddox's smaller fry—coker-nut shies, hoop-las, Living Mermaid, Hall of Strength, Cave of Mystery, Magic Mirrors, and the rest of them; owned by Boss Maddox, financed by Boss Maddox, or, if of independent ownership, having the Boss's favour and acknowledging the Boss's ownership.
No booths whose proprietors called Stingo Boss were open: and that was one step in the tricks and chances of the day.
The gaunt figure of Boss Maddox, watchful and urgent this night for the very reason that the Stingo booths were closed, passed now along the further side of lights towards Foxy Pinsent's pitch. Head bent towards his left shoulder; hands clasped behind his back; uncommonly tall; uncommonly spare—that was Boss Maddox anywhere.
A further mark, as he moved through his little kingdom, proclaimed him who he was and what he was. Frequent nods of his head he made in response to hat touchings or greetings in the crowd; frequent stoppings to exchange a few words with some figure that stepped into his path—and broke away from others or pushed others aside to step there: the local tradesmen these, or members of the local Borough Council, anxious to be in with Boss Maddox and so to secure the considerable patronage in victualling and provender he was able to distribute; or anxious to let fellow-townsmen observe on what familiar terms they were with the Boss, and concerned to know that he found his pitch to his liking. A mighty man, the Boss in these days, who bought up his pitches and paid handsomely for them a year in advance, who on a famous occasion had fallen into dispute with a Borough Council, refused their district the honour of his shows, and thereby—by loss of entertainment and loss of revenue—had caused the Borough Councillors to suffer defeat at the next election. Things like that were remembered up and down the west of England; Boss Maddox in the result was reckoned a man to be placated, to be done homage, and to have his interests preserved. Only the old Stingo gang resisted him, and this day he had paid them dear for their want of allegiance.
His parade brought him at length to "Foxy" Pinsent's Academy of Boxing and School of Arms. Foxy Pinsent had risen to be his lieutenant and right-hand man in the management of his business, and Boss Maddox was come to compare notes on how the Stingo crowd were taking their set-back.
Eight pugilists in flannels—two of them negroes—displayed themselves upon the raised platform outside the Academy of Boxing and School of Arms. Pinsent, in a long fawn coat reaching to his shoes, paced before them, crying to the assembled crowds their merits, their prowess, their achievements and their challenges. He swung a great bundle of boxing gloves in his right hand and, amid delighted shouts of the spectators, sent a pair flying to venturesome yokels here and there who pointed to one or other of the eight stalwarts in acceptance of combat.
As Boss Maddox pushed his way to the front the eight turned and filed into the booth. He raised a hand. Foxy Pinsent tossed a last pair of gloves to the crowd, came down the steps from the platform and joined him.
"How are they taking it, Boss?"
"Pretty tough. Move round with me and let 'em see we're watching. In a while I'm to have a word with Stingo and Japhra—you with me, boy."