Dick Hamilton's Fortune Part 14

"Say," suddenly whispered the manager to the ticket seller. "Is the marshall out there? He is? All right. Call him here." Then in soothing tones he spoke to d.i.c.k. "That's all right," he said. "Never mind the check. We'll come to Hamilton Corners, anyhow. Now don't get excited.

Here, take a drink of water and you'll feel better. The sun is very hot to-day. In fact, it makes my head buzz. Just put that red book away. Red is very heating, you know."

He paused, and looked rather helplessly about him. Then in a whisper he again asked the ticket seller:

"Is the marshall there? Tell him to come in before he gets violent."

The side door opened, and a town marshall, with a big nickel-plated star on his coat, entered the wagon.

"What's the matter?" asked d.i.c.k, somewhat surprised at the sudden turn of events.

"There! there!" spoke the manager, soothingly. "It's all right. Don't get excited. You're with friends."

"Don't you want this check?" asked d.i.c.k. "I'm in earnest. I want your circus to come to Hamilton Corners."

"Yes, yes, of course, my dear boy. We'll come. I'll let you ride on one of the elephants. You can feed the monkeys, and tickle the hippopotamus, if you like. Poor boy," in lower tones, "so young, too."

"Say," demanded d.i.c.k, standing up, "do you think I'm crazy?"

"There! there!" repeated the manager, in that soothing tone he had suddenly adopted. "Please don't get excited. It's the worst thing in the world for you."

d.i.c.k glanced up at the man in uniform. Then a smile came over his face that had a.s.sumed a rather angry look.

"Why, Marshall Hinckly!" he exclaimed. "How did you come to be here?"

"d.i.c.k Hamilton!" exclaimed the officer in surprise, "I didn't know you at first. You see the authorities in Parkertown, being a little short-handed, asked me to help out on circus day, and so I came over from Hamilton Corners. But what in the name of green turtles is the trouble here?"

"I don't know," replied the millionaire's son. "I merely offered to guarantee this manager a thousand dollars if he would bring his circus to Hamilton Corners, and he acts as though he thought I was crazy."

"And isn't he?" burst out the manager, less frightened, now that an officer of the law was present. "Isn't he, Mr. Policeman? The idea of a boy like him offering to make out a check for a thousand dollars to have a circus come to town! In the first place, I don't believe he has the money; and in the second, what does he want to hire a circus for?

Say, honest, hasn't he got away from some asylum?"

"d.i.c.k Hamilton broke out of an asylum!" exclaimed the marshall. "Well, I rather guess not! As for him not having the money, you're wrong there.

Why, that's Mortimer Hamilton's son," and he showed his pride at being acquainted with d.i.c.k.

"Mortimer Hamilton, president of the Hamilton National Bank?" asked the manager, incredulously.

"That's him," replied the marshall.

"Say!" exclaimed the manager rather faintly, sitting limply down in a chair. "Give me a gla.s.s of water, will you, please. Mortimer Hamilton, the multi-millionaire! And I thought his son didn't have a thousand dollars! Excuse me, Mr. Hamilton," he said, heartily, as he held out his hand to d.i.c.k. "I beg your pardon."

"That's all right," replied d.i.c.k, with a smile. "Whom shall I make the check out to?"

"Me," replied the manager. "Wellington Dappleton. But say," he added, "would you mind telling me what you want of the circus?"

"I'll tell you," answered d.i.c.k, with something of a serious air. "When I was out walking this morning I saw a procession from the orphan asylum.

I heard about the circus being over here, and I knew those poor youngsters couldn't go. I made up my mind that if I could, I'd have the circus come to town and I'd take those kids free. It's the only chance they'll ever get, maybe, and I--well, I've got plenty of money. I can just as well spend some of it this way as in having a good time myself.

When can you come?"

"We'll be there to-morrow and play the afternoon and evening," said the manager. "And I'll tell you what I'll do. You needn't make out that check now. We'll wait until after the last performance, and all I'll ask you to do will be to make good whatever I'm short of a thousand-dollar profit. Maybe we can get enough admissions in the town to make up part of the sum. I'll not see a lad do the only good turn in these parts.

I'll meet you half way, and there's my hand on it," and once more he gripped d.i.c.k's fingers in a hold that made them tingle.

"But the orphans come in free," insisted d.i.c.k.

"The orphans come in free," repeated the manager, "and any other boys or girls you like. We'll only charge the grown folks."

So it was arranged. d.i.c.k and the manager had a long talk, so long that d.i.c.k had time only to see the closing acts in the big tent.

"Well, you missed it," said Frank, as he met d.i.c.k on his way out. "You should have seen that fellow hold all those others. It was great! I'm going to join a circus."

"Better wait," advised d.i.c.k, with a smile. "Have a talk with that acrobat. The show is coming to Hamilton Corners to-morrow, and you can ask him how he likes the life."

"The show coming to Hamilton Corners?"

"Yes," and then d.i.c.k told of the arrangements.

Hamilton Corners hardly knew itself when it awoke the next morning. The town was gay with many colored posters, showing fierce animals wandering together over vast treeless plains, and many-hued lithographs of men risking their lives on the high trapeze. Before the boys had fairly gotten the idea into their heads that the circus was coming the cavalcade of wagons began arriving. d.i.c.k had seen the town authorities and secured the necessary permits. Then Hamilton Corners really woke up as the news became known that d.i.c.k was responsible for the whole affair.

"Say, he spends money like water," observed Simon to Guy. "I wish I had some of what he's throwing away."

"I suppose you'd buy oil stock with it," observed Guy, with a peculiar smile. Simon did not answer.

The orphans at the asylum--hundreds of them--could hardly believe the joyous news when, after d.i.c.k had told those in charge, it was announced to them by the matrons. Some of the poor little tots cried in very happiness. One little boy, who remembered once seeing some of the gay lithographs of a circus, was discovered running around in a circle.

"What are you doing?" asked a matron.

"Playing I'm a circus horse," was the answer. "I'se got to do suffin to make de time pa.s.s. I'm so happy!"

Long before the time set for the performance, crowds of boys and girls were headed for the big tents. d.i.c.k had generously arranged so that no boy or girl need pay, and hundreds of those in Hamilton Corners, as well as those in the surrounding suburbs, besides the orphans, saw the show free.

d.i.c.k wanted to go off with some of his chums and view the performance, but the head matron of the asylum asked him to sit with her in the midst of her little charges.

"They want to see you," she explained. "They think you own the circus, and that you are the most wonderful person in the world."

"Oh, pshaw! It isn't anything at all," declared d.i.c.k, with a blush. "I just happened to think of it when I saw the little children out walking and saw how sad some of 'em looked. Besides, it's time we had a circus in Hamilton Corners."

The antics of the clowns, the "hair-raising, death-defying evolutions in mid-air," as the programme called them, the performing horses and elephants, the pony races, the chariot contests, the trick dogs, pigs, monkeys, and other animals, the glittering pageant, the music and excitement--all this was as a happy dream to the orphans. They sat in ecstasy, now and then some of them looking at d.i.c.k, who sat in their midst, as though, like some good fairy, they feared he might disappear any minute.

"Well," remarked the manager to d.i.c.k in the library of the Hamilton mansion, when the show was over. "You had your circus all right. I guess about four hundred dollars will square us. There were quite a few paid admissions."

"There's your check," answered d.i.c.k, pa.s.sing over a slip of paper, and the manager took his departure.

That night, as the rumble of circus wagons leaving the town came faintly to the ears of d.i.c.k and his father, as they sat in the library, Mr.

Hamilton remarked:

"Well, did you get your money's worth, d.i.c.k?"

"I certainly did, dad. The look on the faces of those orphans was worth twice as much as I spent."