d buy a ticket."

But to William's satisfaction he was given free admission as a friend of
Kit. Not only that, but he was invited to take dinner and supper at the
circus table. In fact, he was treated with distinguished consideration.

"Kit," he said, "I was in luck to meet you."

"And it was lucky for me that I met you. I shouldn't like to have met
Aaron Bickford single handed."

"I wish old Bickford would come to the circus to-night. Wouldn't he be
surprised to see you performing in tights?"

"I think it would rather take him by surprise," said Kit, smiling.

Kit and William occupied seats at the afternoon performance as
spectators, it having been arranged that Kit's _debut_ should be made in
the evening. Our hero regarded the different acts with unusual interest,
and his heart beat a little quicker when he heard the applause elicited
by the performances of the Vincenti brothers, for he had already begun
to consider himself one of them.

When the performance was over, and the audience was dispersing, Kit felt
a hand laid upon his shoulder.

He turned and his glance rested upon a man of about forty, with a grave,
serious expression. He was puzzled, for it was not a face that he
remembered to have ever seen before.

"You don't know me?" said the stranger.

"No, sir."

"And yet you have done me a very great service."

"I didn't know it, sir."

"The greatest service that any one person can do to another--you have
saved my life."

Then a light dawned upon Kit's mind, and he remembered what Achilles
Henderson had said to him in the morning.

"Is your name Dupont?" he asked.

"Yes; I am Joe Dupont, the clown, whom you saved from a horrible death.
I tell you, when Nero stood there in the ring with his paw on my breast
I gave myself up for lost. I expected to be torn to pieces. It was an
awful moment!" and the clown shuddered at the picture which his
imagination conjured up. "Yes, sir; I wouldn't see such another moment
for all the money Barlow is worth. I wonder my hair didn't turn white."

"Excuse me, Mr. Dupont, but I find it hard to think you are Joe Dupont,
the clown," said Kit.

"Why?"

"Because you look so grave and sedate."

Joe Dupont smiled.

"I only make a fool of myself in the ring," he said. "Outside you might
take me for a merchant or minister. Indeed, I am a minister's son."

"You a minister's son!" ejaculated Kit.

"Yes; you wouldn't think it, would you? I was rather a wild lad, as