.

A big pot of fragrant soup was served to the company at luncheon; and
it amused me to see Jacqueline troop into the tent with the others and
sit down with her bit of bread and her bowl of broth.

She was flushed and excited, and she talked to her instructor, Speed,
all the while, chattering like a linnet between mouthfuls of bread and
broth.

"How is she getting on?" I called across to Speed.

"The child is simply startling," he said, in English. "She is not
afraid of anything. She and Miss Crystal have been doing that
hair-raising 'flying swing' _without rehearsal!_"

Jacqueline, hearing us talking in English, turned and stared at me,
then smiled and looked up sweetly at Speed.

"You seem to be popular with your pupil," I said, laughing.

"She's a fine girl--a fine, fearless, straight-up-and-down girl," he
said, with enthusiasm.

Everybody appeared to like her, though how much that liking might be
modified if prosperity returned I was unable to judge.

Now all our fortunes depended on her. She was not a ballon d'essai;
she was literally the whole show; and if she duplicated the
sensational success of poor little Miss Claridge, we had nothing to
fear. But her troubles would then begin. At present, however, we were
waiting for her to pull us out of the hole before we fell upon her and
rent her professionally. And I use that "we" not only professionally,
but with an attempt at chivalry.

Byram's buoyancy had returned in a measure. He sat in his
shirt-sleeves at the head of the table, vigorously sopping his tartine
in his soup, and, mouth full, leaned forward, chewing and listening to
the conversation around him.

Everybody knew it was life or death now, that each one must drop petty
jealousies and work for the common salvation. An artificial and almost
feverish animation reigned, which I adroitly fed with alarming
allusions to the rigor of the French law toward foreigners and other
malefactors who ran into debt to French subjects on the sacred soil of
France. And, having lived so long in France and in the French
possessions, I was regarded as an oracle of authority by these
ambulant professional people who were already deadly homesick, and
who, in eighteen months of Europe, had amassed scarcely a dozen French
phrases among them all.

"I'll say one thing," observed Byram, with dignity; "if ever I git
out of this darn continong with my circus, I'll recooperate in the
undulatin' medders an' j'yful vales of