David smiled. "He'll never die, Mr. Noakes. He's more alive now than ever. 'The Rose and the Ring.' Why not 'The Rose in the Ring'?"
"Hi! Hi!" cried Joey approvingly, "Right you are."
During the entire act of Little Starbright and Monsieur Dupont David gazed entranced. He followed Grinaldi, but his eyes were not always leveled against the spotted back of his mentor; they were for the lithe, graceful figure in scarlet riding atop of the sturdy Tom Sacks, sometimes standing upright on his shoulders, again leaning far out from his thigh, or even more daringly dancing on his broad back while he squatted on the pad. First on one foot, then the other, then clear of his back with both of them twinkling in merry time to the quickstep of the band, her dark hair fluttering from beneath the saucy cap, her hands waving and her eyes sparkling. Kisses went wafting to every section of the tent, and with them smiles such as David had never seen before.
He was standing near when she leaped from the horse's back and skipped to the center of the ring to blow her final kisses to the multitude. It occurred to him all at once that he was staring at this wonderfully graceful, fairy-like little creature with the eyes of a delighted spectator and not as a clown. He guiltily looked for a reprimand from Grinaldi. To his surprise and disappointment she passed him by without a sign of recognition, slipping her tiny feet into the ground shoes and shuffling off to the dressing-tent with the stride peculiar to ring performers. For a moment he felt as if she had struck him in the face, so quick was his pride to resent the slight.
"This ain't a parlor, my lad," said Joey, shrewdly analyzing the feelings of his protege. "You mustn't expect the ladies to stop and chat with you in the ring. It ain't reg'lar. She didn't mean nothink—nothink at all, bless 'er 'eart."
When the performance was over, David was whisked into the men's section of the dressing-tent and told to stay there until further orders. He changed his clothes and "washed up," listening meanwhile to the congratulations and the good-natured chaffing of the performers who were there with him. Despite their ribald scoffing, he knew they were his friends: there was something about these careless, inconsequent knights of the sawdust ring, in spangles or out, that warmed the cockles of his sore, despairing heart.
He came before long to laugh with them and to take their jibes as they were meant—good-naturedly. Joey Grinaldi beamed with congratulation. He laid himself out to make the going easy for his "gentleman pardner," appreciating the vast distinction that lay between these men and the kind David had known all of his life. And David saw that he was trying to make it easy for him. His heart swelled with a strange gratitude; he unbent suddenly and met the rough kindnesses more than half way. They were not the kind of men he was used to,—they were not gentlemen; but they stood ready to be his friends, and something told him that they would ring true to the very end if he met them half way.
They had their own undeviating regard for what they called honor: honor meant loyalty and fairness, nothing more. Simple, genial, unpolished braggarts were they, but their word was as good or better than a gentleman's bond. David was soon to fall under the spell of this bland comradeship: he was to see these men in a light so bright that it blinded him to their vulgarities, their quaint blasphemy and their prodigious lack of veracity as applied to personal achievements. He was to find in them a splendid chivalry, almost unbelievable at first: their regard for the women in the troupe was in the nature of a revelation to him, who came from the land of gallantry itself.
"Say, kid," said Signor Anaconda, "the human snake," suddenly adopting a serious mien,—which did not become him,—"you gotta change your name. What'll we call him, fellers? Now, le' 's give him a reg'lar story-book name. Prince Something-or-other. What say to—"
"That's all settled," said old Joey, his eyes full of soap and water and squeezed so tightly together that they looked like wrinkles. "Christine Braddock named 'im this morning. I forgot to tell you, David. Your name is Snipe—Jack Snipe."