omebody that looks after that."

"It's the magician," Jim Leonard whispered to Pony, and they walked away.

IX

HOW PONY DID NOT QUITE GET OFF
WITH THE CIRCUS

A crowd of the fellows had been waiting to know what the boys had been
talking about to the circus man; but Jim Leonard said: "Don't you tell,
Pony Baker!" and he started to run, and that made Pony run, too, and they
both ran till they got away from the fellows.

"You have got to keep it a secret; for if a lot of fellows find it out the
constable'll get to know it, and he'll be watching out around the corner
of your house, and when the procession comes along and he sees you're
really going he'll take you up, and keep you in jail till your father
comes and bails you out. Now, you mind!"

Pony said, "Oh, I won't tell anybody," and when Jim Leonard said that if
a circus man was to feel _him_ over, that way, and act so kind of pleasant
and friendly, he would be too proud to speak to anybody, Pony confessed
that he knew it was a great thing all the time.

"The way'll be," said Jim Leonard, "to keep in with him, and he'll keep
the others from picking on you; they'll be afraid to, on account of his
dog. You'll see, he'll be the one to come for you to-night; and if the
constable is there the dog won't let him touch you. I never thought of
that."

Perhaps on account of thinking of it now Jim Leonard felt free to tell the
other fellows how Pony was going to run off, for when a crowd of them came
along he told them. They said it was splendid, and they said that if they
could make their mothers let them, or if they could get out of the house
without their mothers knowing it, they were going to sit up with Pony and
watch out for the procession, and bid him good-bye.

At dinner-time he found out that his father was going to take him and all
his sisters to the circus, and his father and mother were so nice to him,
asking him about the procession and everything, that his heart ached at
the thought of running away from home and leaving them. But now he had to
do it; the circus man was coming for him, and he could not back out; he
did not know what would happen if he did. It seemed to him as if his
mother had done everything she could to make it harder for him. She had
stewed chicken for dinner, with plenty of gravy, and hot biscuits to sop
in, and peach preserves afterwards; and she kept helping him to more,
because she said boys that followed the circus around