"Are you sure, Joe?"
"Yes, sure."
"Of course he is," broke in a new voice, and Joe and the ring-master turned to see Helen Morton standing beside them. She had finished her act some time before.
"I heard that something had happened to Benny," she said, "and I came in to see if I could do anything. I heard what you and Joe were saying, Jim, and I couldn't help speaking as I did. I know Joe can stay under water more than three minutes."
"How?" asked the ring-master. He seemed dazed by the way things were happening. "How do you know, Helen?"
"I timed him—I held the watch on him, as you call it."
"That's what she did," confirmed Joe.
He then told, Helen adding her share to the story, how one hot day, being warm from exercises in the circus tent, he had put on a bathing suit, and gone into Benny's glass water-filled tank to cool off. While there Joe, who was an adept in the water, as are many boys who live in the country near a river, decided to test himself for under-water endurance. He filled his lungs with air and went under.
"And he stayed more than three minutes," testified Helen.
"Well, if you can do that, maybe we can pull off the act yet," agreed the ring-master, with a sigh of relief.