der to the platform and applied the stuff.

"But who did it?" asked Jim Tracy, when Joe had told him of the
discovery of the acid-eaten cable.

"Some enemy. Perhaps the same one who was responsible for our loss in
tickets this afternoon," answered the young magician.

"Carfax?" asked the ringmaster.

"It might be, and yet he isn't the only man who's been discharged or who
has a grudge against me. There was Gianni with whom I had a fight."

"You mean the Italian? Yes, he was an ugly customer. But I haven't heard
of him for years. I don't believe he's even in this part of the
country."

"And we haven't any reason to suppose that Carfax is, either, after his
fiasco in trying to expose my Box of Mystery trick. But we've got to be
on our guard."

"I should say so!" exclaimed the ringmaster. "And now about your
trapeze act, Joe! Are you going to put it on again to-night?"

"Of course. It's billed."

"Then you'll have to hustle to rig up a new rope."

"I'm not going to put on a new rope," declared Joe. "The act went so
well when I seemed about to fall, that I'm going to keep that feature
in. I'll rig up a catch on the severed cable. At the proper time I'll
snap it loose, seem to fall, swing by the dangling bar as I did before,
and land on the platform that way. It will be more effective than if I
did it in the regular way."

"But won't it be risky?"

Joe shrugged his shoulders.

"No more so than any trapeze act. Now that I'm ready for the sudden drop
I'll be on my guard. No, I can work it all right. And now about these
extra admissions? What are we going to do about them?"

"Well," said the ringmaster, "maybe we'd better talk to Moyne about
them. If they ring an extra thousand persons in on us again to-night the
thing will be getting serious."

The treasurer was called in consultation with Joe and Tracy and other
circus officials, and it was decided to keep a special watch on the
ticket wagon and the ticket takers that night.

Joe quickly made the change in his trapeze and tested it, finding that
he could work it perfectly. Then he began to think of his new
fire-eating act. He was determined to make that as great a success as
was his now well advertised ten thousand dollar mystery box act.

The evening performance had not long been under way, and Joe had done
his big swing successfully, when he was sought out by Mr. Moyne.

"The same thing has happened again," said the treasurer.

"You mean more people