He looked surprised, but also relieved that there would be no further delay, and presently I found myself upon a huge stage, the curtain down in front, and no one there but myself and my conductor. What was I expected to do? I was sufficiently expert at gymnastics to make some sort of show upon the trapeze without more than a reasonable chance of breaking my neck. But there was no sign of any such apparatus. Was I, then, a strong man? I had always had a grave suspicion that those huge cannon-balls and dumb-bells were really hollow, and, in any case, I could at least roll them about. But there were neither cannonballs nor dumb-bells. No, there was nothing but a high and narrow box of glass.
“It is all right, you will find,” said my conductor, coming up to this.
I also approached it and gave a gasp.
The box was filled with water—water about six feet deep!
“I shouldn't care to dive into it myself,” he said, jocularly. “But I suppose it is all a matter of practice.”
“Do I dive in—from the roof?” I asked, a little weakly, I fear.
“Did you mean to?” he replied, evidently perturbed lest their arrangements had been insufficient.
“Not to-night,” I said, with a sigh of relief. “But to-morrow night—ah, yes; you will see me then!”
He regarded me with undisguised admiration.
“You are all ready?” he asked.