Taking a running start he sprang up, making a clean dive through the window head-first.
The lad had intended to land on his hands, do a cartwheel and come up easily on his feet. But the best-laid plans sometimes go wrong.
The bass drummer was pounding his drum right in line with the window. Teddy did not see the drum until too late to change his course. His head hit the drum with a bang. He went clear through it, his head protruding from the other side. And there he stuck!
"Oh, wow!" howled the Circus Boy.
The other members of the band, discovering that the drum was no longer marking time for them, got out of tune and came to a discordant stop.
The leader, whose side had been toward the drummer at the time, did not know what had happened. He was furious. He was about to upbraid them when he discovered the head of Teddy Tucker protruding from the head of the drum.
"Wha—wha—what—"
The bass drummer paid no attention to him. Instead he grabbed the offending boy by the feet, bracing his own feet against the rim of the instrument, and began to pull. The drummer was red in the face, perspiring and angry.
Teddy popped out like a pea from a pod. The Circus Boy was not yet out of his trouble. With unlooked-for strength the irate drummer threw the lad over his knees, face down, and raised the drumstick aloft.
This drumstick, as our readers well know, is made of heavy leather—that is the beating end is—and is hard. To add to the distress of the victim, Teddy was in his pink pajamas and they were thin.