her face that at last he was master of the situation. "Do
you think he would like you to behave like this?"

"I sure am on the blink," she sighed, as she settled back wearily upon
the pillow.

"You'll be all right soon," Douglas answered, cheerily. "Mandy and I
will help the time to go."

"I recollect now," Polly faltered, without hearing him. "It was the last
hoop. Jim seemed to have a hunch I was goin' to be in for trouble when
I went into the ring. Bingo must a felt it, too. He kept a-pullin' and
a-jerkin' from the start. I got myself together to make the last jump
an'--I can't remember no more." Her head drooped and her eyes closed.

"I wouldn't try just now if I were you," Douglas answered tenderly.

"It's my WHEEL, ain't it?" Polly questioned, after a pause.

"Yoah what, chile?" Mandy exclaimed, as she turned from the table, where
she had been rolling up the unused bandages left from the doctor's call
the night before.

"I say it's my creeper, my paddle," Polly explained, trying to locate
a few of her many pains. "Gee, but that hurts!" She tried to bend her
ankle. "Is it punctured?"

"Only sprained," Douglas answered, striving to control his amusement at
the expression on Mandy's puzzled face. "Better not talk any more about
it."

"Ain't anything the matter with my tongue, is there?" she asked, turning
her head to one side and studying him quizzically.

"I don't think there is," he replied good-naturedly.

"How did I come to fall in here, anyhow?" she asked, as she studied the
walls of the unfamiliar room.

"We brought you here."

"It's a swell place," she conceded grudgingly.

"We are comfortable," he admitted, as a tell-tale smile again hovered
about his lips. He was thinking of the changes that he must presently
make in Miss Polly's vocabulary.

"Is this the 'big top?' she asked.

"The--what?" he stammered.

"The main tent," she explained.

"Well, no; not exactly. It's going to be your room now, Miss Polly."

"My room! Gee! Think a' that!" she gasped, as the possibility of her
actually having a room all of her own took hold of her mind. "Much
obliged," she said with a nod, feeling that something was expected of
her. She knew no other phrase of gratitude than the one "Muvver" Jim and
Toby had taught her to say to the manager when she received from him the
first stick of red and white striped candy.

"You're very welcome," Douglas answered with a ring of genuine feeling
in his voice.