"What does it mean?" says Silas Sykes. "What are we all being a party to?"
"I guess it's who are we being a party to, Silas," I says, mild.
They all looked at me. And then they looked where I was looking, and I was looking at something hard. Coming out of the main tent was a mass of struggling, wriggling, dancing humanity—little humanity—in short, the boys that had rode in the big wagon. And walking in the midst of them was a man.
At first not even I recognized him. He had his coat off, and his collar was turned in, his hat was on the back of his head, and he was smiling throughout his whole face, which was red.
"Look-at!" says I. "I guess that's who we're the party to—all of us."
"What do you mean?" Silas says again.
"I mean," says I, "that Nick Nordman's had this whole circus come here to the village and give it to us free. And I say, let's us rush down there and drag him up here to eat with us!"
It came to them so sudden that they all moved off like one man, and, as we started together, not caring who stole the whole lunch that we left laying idle under the tree, I turned and took a look at Lucy.
Land, she looked as I haven't seen her look in twenty years! Her head was back, her eyes were bright, her face was bright, and she didn't know one of us was there. She just went down the slope, running.