People on the back rows, who were already pushing their way toward the exits, paused. A little girl in the twenty-five-cent seats cheered faintly. Thus encouraged, the clown turned a really marvelous somersault and landed on the tip of the elephant's trunk.
"Will some small boy kindly step forward," begged the clown, glancing hurriedly along the front rows. "For this trick I need a small, active boy. Ah, there he is!"
Urging the elephant to the very edge of the ring, the clown snatched a small, red-headed boy from a group of solemn-eyed orphans, who had been brought to the circus for a special treat. The crowd gasped with surprise, and the orphan tried to wriggle out of his coat, but the clown held on firmly.
"One toss of this boy into the air, and he will disappear; a toss of my cap and he will reappear. Watch!" cried the clown, putting his fingers to his lips.
"What are you trying to do?" demanded the ringmaster in a hoarse whisper. "You can't really make him disappear, you know."
The clown realized this, but he was going to make that crowd laugh—or disappear himself. With a shrill whistle that made even the old elephant prick up his ears, he tossed the orphan to his shoulder and reeled off the first ridiculous rhyme that popped into his head. And this was it:
"Udge! Budge!
Go to Mudge!
Udger budger,
You're a Mudger!"