"Fisheye is our meat for this play, but don't sell out too quick."
Leaving the cubs to the further destruction of their cage, the prospective salesmen wended their way through a maze of sidewalls, poles, unplaced wagons, cages. On past the refreshment booth that was setting up in the central area; past a score of elephants, swaying in contentment over the morning hay; past camels, llamas, zebras, and other luminaries, to the far end of the big tent where a group of laborers were aiding two elephants to line up the last of the cages and vans in a proper circle around the enclosure.
It was all confusing enough to the big Westerner, but the little man knew where to go. He pressed forward to where a little, old, dried up "razorback" was regaling two of the workmen with words of experience if not wisdom.
"'En I told Shako," he declared with emphasis, "that he never could win back old Mom's confidence, till he got a big armload of sugarcane en doled hit out to her. En shore enough when we got to Little Rock and Shako got holt of some sugarcane, he win that old elephant's respect instanter. En that ain't all! When we got to Memphis en hit into that big storm, why ole Mom—" But the audience died away to one man as the midget's voice interrupted.
"Say, Fisheye, I want you to meet a friend of mine, Mr. Welborn. Meet Mr. Welborn, Mr. Gleason. Mr. Welborn here dickers a little in native animals and has a couple of the slickest, fattest, neatest bear cubs I've seen in years. He's got too much business to give any time to training them and I told him of your success with animals and he wants to make a deal with you."
"What kind of a deal? And where's yer bars?" Fisheye was alert to the business up to knowing the full import of the deal.
"They are out here in a coop—on a trailer. He brought them down out of the mountains this morning."
"Did ye ketch 'em this mornin'?" queried Fisheye as he followed the two salesmen to the truck.
"Naw, he's had 'em in training for two months. Best of all, he knows how to take care of their hair, how to feed 'em. Look, there they are, alike as two peas and ready to climb a pole or turn a somersault."
Fisheye was peering through the slats. "I wish we had 'em out whar I could see 'em better. Now what's yer deal, Prince? Ye said somethin' about a deal?"