erecting the big
round-top. Fortunately they had all of Sunday to prepare for the next
performance; and that would count for considerable, if repairs were
necessary.

Just then, during a temporary lull in the gale, he distinctly heard the
clock in the town hall tower strike three. This told him that the time
fixed for the coming of the circus train had long since passed, and
that they would undoubtedly be caught unprepared by the storm.

"But then they're used to roughing it," Toby thought, without stammering
either, "because circus canvas hands have to rub up against hard things
wherever they go. Haven't I had one boy tell me he never knew when he
was going to get his next meal, and how for a month he didn't have
regular sleep, and then it was on a hard board floor mebbe. Which makes
me feel thankful for such a nice soft bed, though I c'n stand it
sleepin' on the bare ground, when I have to in camp."

Yawning as he told himself this, Toby stood there by the open window for
a minute trying to ascertain whether he could hear a lion roar or an
elephant trumpet, for that would have made his ambitious blood leap
through his veins. But the noise of the storm prevented him from hearing
anything else, as the rain was beating down on a tin roof near by, while
the wind howled through the trees as though pursued by a legion of
demons.

So presently, when Toby found himself beginning to shiver, he crawled
back again between the sheets, and snuggled down, glad that he had such
a comfortable nook in which to lie while things were so unpleasant
without.

Once Toby managed to get to sleep and he minded nothing else that
occurred. Had that furious gale whipped the roof off the house he might
have aroused sufficiently to ask if the danger were very great, and
upon being reassured would have again dropped off on his voyage to
slumberland.

It was daylight when Toby sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes.

"Gee!" he was saying to himself, "that was a corker of a dream, all
right. Why, seemed like I could see everything the animals were adoing
at that same waterhole where that man took his flashlight pictures; and
it was so much like the real thing I could even hear 'em carryin' on
when the flash scared the bunch."

Just then he started, and sat upright, staring hard toward the nearer
window, through which it seemed a queer sound had come.

Toby could not ever remember having heard such a sound in all his life;
it was different from