“I’m glad,” he said, “that there’s something else they want, if the elephant ain’t thirsty.”
He flung me the rod and wished that I might enjoy the circus.
I had it in my sleeve when White appeared in the grass alley before the circus entrance.
I got out of the crowd and followed him. It was now dark. We went around the big tent, through the stables for the horses, then struck out across the meadow in a direction opposite from the town.
I walked beside him with my piece of rod in my sleeve, very much as a child, it now seems to me, might set out on a fairy expedition with an all-abiding confidence in the resources of those conducting him, and with no clear idea of what he might come to, unconcerned and careless of events.
White had very few words during the long walk through the dark in the meadow.
“You are a husky youngster,” he said. “You could shove along a bull wagon or I miss my guess.”
He was correct in that estimate. I was a sturdy youngster, hardened by the out-of-doors. Physically I was developed, but I seemed in my conception of affairs to have been still a child, albeit approaching that stage of youth where, instantly, as by merely awaking in the morning, one becomes a man.
We came finally to the railroad track. There was a short switch with a little red house beside it. It was less a house than a sort of box with a low door. Leaning against this door, when we arrived, was Mooney.
He was smoking a cigarette; the tiny point of light had been visible to us as we approached.