"I'll do just as well as I can," said Toby, in reply to his little companion, "an' if we earn the dollars, I'll have a hole bored in mine, an' you shall wear it around your neck to remember me by."
"I'll remember you without that," she whispered, "and I'll give you mine, so that you shall have so much the more when you go to your home."
There was no time for further conversation, for Mr. Castle entered just then to tell them that they must go in in another moment. The horses were all ready—a black one for Toby, and a white one for Ella—and they stood champing their bits and pawing the earth in their impatience, until the silver bells with which they were decorated rang out quick, nervous little chimes that accorded very well with Toby's feelings.
Ella squeezed Toby's hand as they stood waiting for the curtain to be raised that they might enter, and he had just time to return it when the signal was given, and almost before he was aware of it they were standing in the ring, kissing their hands to the crowds that packed the enormous tent to its utmost capacity.
Thanks to the false announcement about the separation of the children in Europe and their reunion in this particular town, the applause was long and loud, and before it had died away, Toby had had time to recover a little from the queer feeling which this sea of heads gave him.
He had never seen such a crowd before, except as he had seen them as he walked around at the foot of the seats, and then they had simply looked like so many human beings; but as he saw them now from the ring, they appeared like strange rows of heads without bodies, and he had hard work to keep from running back behind the curtain from whence he had come.
Mr. Castle acted as the ring-master this time, and after he had introduced them, very much after the fashion of the posters, and the clown had repeated some funny joke, the horses were led in, and they were assisted to mount.
"Don't mind the people at all," said Mr. Castle, in a low voice, "but ride just as if you were alone here with me."
MADEMOISELLE JEANNETTE AND MONSIEUR AJAX.