y'd like you."

"They're all jealous," he said; "that's the trouble. They're all down on
parade work, even Ma. They couldn't stand for me making a hit with that
chain. Last week, up in Albany, I started to growl just as Shorty started
selling his photographs. The louder he piped away with that silly little
squeaky voice of his, the more I roared. When it comes to roaring, I've
got even the lions jealous. Fact is I'm not liked; they are all jealous,
even the animals. And I feel it, too; any honest hard working
_what-is-it_ would. Especially if he's human. The little two-headed boy
we had was about the best of the lot, only he was double faced. He's with
Barnum's now-fifty a week and overtime."

"I don't see why you want to be a _what-is-it,_" I told him; "especially
if they don't treat you right."

He just went on smoking, awful funny, kind of. Jiminy, I couldn't make him
out at all.

He said, "Now you take Teddy Roosevelt, the elephant. He's what you'd call
a big attraction-very big. Do you suppose he'd refuse to pal with me just
because I'm a poor, neglected _what-is-it?_ Only this morning we had a bag
of peanuts together; he and I and little Ruth. He's just as plain and
democratic as he can be. But you see my position isn't easy. I'm human and
yet I'm not. I don't know where I fit in. The animals are kind of leery;
you can't blame them. And the freaks are as stuck up as poor old Marshal
Foch was. Sometimes I wish I was back in the jungle."

Jingoes, I didn't know how to take him at all, and I could see Dorry was
just staring at him as if he "didn't know whether he was jollying us or
not.

"Anyway, we have to be sorry for you," I said. He just kept puffing on his
cigarette and he said, "Well, it's good to sit back here when the freaks
have turned in and have a quiet smoke. Pretty strenuous work jerking and
pulling on that chain. It's a hard life being a question mark." "You said
something," I told him; "cracky, I wouldn't want to be a _what-is-it._"

He just said, "No, when you grow up, make up your mind whether you're
going to be human or not. Don't try to be two things. Don't be a question
mark. Why away down in my savage, primeval heart, I wouldn't hurt a
kitten. Yet here I am growling and roaring and wrenching at my cage bars
and straining at that old chain, and the children and old ladies back up
on the street when they see me, frightened out of their lives. I'm not
loved by anyone. It's mighty hard. Either