The Circus Comes to Town Part 3

"You didn't!" exclaimed Jerry, and joy came unbidden back into his eyes and there was a very different feel to his lips. He knew that it was a real smile this time.

"Not this late in the week," Mr. Barton informed him. "It's too long after pay day for me to have that much money. I've got just thirty-five cents."

He drew some small coins out of his pocket.

"Yes, it's all here. The half-dollar must have been lying on one of the boards that you struck in falling. Let's see it."

He took the money and examined it.

"It was almost covered with dirt," he said. "So was one end of both boards. h.e.l.lo! That's a funny black mark on the other side. Looks as though somebody had smeared it with black paint."

"That doesn't hurt it any, does it?" asked Jerry in trepidation.

"Not a bit! It's good for a ticket to the circus."

"If I hadn't of run into you, I wouldn't get to go," observed Jerry.

"That's so," responded Mr. Barton. "I wouldn't let any one know you found the money. Just sneak off to the circus when it comes and buy your ticket. Danny would find some way to get it away from you if he knew you had it."

"I guess mebbe he would," Jerry responded.

"You just keep it to yourself and enjoy the circus," Mr. Barton advised him and went on to the store.

Jerry trudged slowly back toward Mrs. Mullarkey's, thinking intently.

The gloom that pervaded the house was so deep that Jerry perceived it as soon as he opened the door. Danny sat glowering by the window; Celia Jane was weeping unashamed, while Chris and Nora were trying not to show their disappointment.

So Mother 'Larkey had not yet been able to make both ends meet--those troublesome, refractory ends that made her life a continual round of hard work--and there were no fifty-cent pieces for the children to buy tickets with to see the elephant jump the fence. Jerry hugged himself just to feel the half-dollar in his blouse pocket and a glow of exultation ran over his body at the thought that he was going to get to see the circus.

Mrs. Mullarkey, looking tired and worn, was ripping apart the dress for Mrs. Green that she had just finished at noon. Baby Kathleen sat at her feet, playing with the old rag doll that had once been Nora's and was now claimed by Celia Jane.

Jerry entered the room slowly and took a seat on the chair without a back. He said nothing at all and finally Mother 'Larkey looked up at him.

"Why don't you ask for fifty cents, too?" she inquired. "Don't you want to see the circus?"

"Yes'm," replied Jerry, "but I ain't got no mother."

"What difference does that make?" she asked, in a voice sharper than she was accustomed to use in speaking to Jerry. "Haven't I done everything a mother could--"

"Yes'm," Jerry interrupted hastily, for he didn't want her to think he thought _that_. "But it said to ask your _mother_ for fifty cents and I ain't got none to ask."

"Sure and you haven't, you blessed boy," said Mother 'Larkey. "If I had it to give, you wouldn't need a mother to ask it of. I wish I could send all of you to the circus and go myself."

"We never get to go no place," muttered Danny gloomily.

"It costs money to go to places," his mother explained, "and there's no money in the house. It's all I've been able to do to put enough food in your hungry mouths to keep soul and body together and to get enough clothes to keep you looking decent and respectable. I was counting on some money from Mrs. Green to-day, to buy a little meat for supper and get some more cough medicine for Kathleen, but she wasn't satisfied with the dress and I've got to do part of it over before she will pay me."

"Is Kathleen's cough medicine all gone?" Jerry asked, suddenly feeling hot and uncomfortable.

"Yes, and she ought to have some more right this minute. Summer coughs are bad things for babies."

Jerry went to Kathleen and she welcomed him by raising her arms and gurgling at him. He put his face gently against hers and she patted his head and tugged at his hair.

And all the time Jerry felt guiltier and guiltier and the half-dollar in his pocket seemed to become bigger and heavier. He was relieved when he heard Celia Jane, recovered from her crying, asking:

"Did you ever see a circus, Mother?"

"Yes, once. Dan took me to see one in the city right after we were married. If he was living, he would find a way to take you all and him liking the fun and the noise and the crowd and all."

"Some day I'll be big enough to earn lots of money and take us all to the circus," a.s.serted Danny. "And Jerry, too."

"Sure and you will," his mother said. "And now, if you children will pick me some gooseberries, I'll make you a gooseberry pie for supper."

Jerry did not join the rest in the scamper for cups and a pan nor follow them out into the back yard. He patted Kathleen's head and then went into the kitchen when he had heard the screen door slam and knew the Mullarkey children were all out of the house. He took down a bottle from the shelf by the table and slipped quietly out to the street.

When he was out of sight of the house he looked to see if the half-dollar were still in his pocket. The sight of it made him recall vividly all the joys that he would miss if he didn't get to see the circus. He took the coin out of his pocket and looked at it and the longer he looked the slower grew his pace. Then he thought of Kathleen and the summer cough that Mother 'Larkey said was bad for babies, and his lips suddenly closed in a firm, straight line. He clutched the half-dollar tightly in one hand, the bottle in the other, and set out as fast as his legs would carry him. He did not dare waste a moment for fear the temptation to change his mind would prove too great to be resisted.

Not once did he slacken speed till he reached the corner drug store.

Speechless for lack of breath, he pa.s.sed the bottle over the counter to Mr. Barton.

"Well, Jerry, what is it this time?" asked the clerk.

Jerry panted a moment before he could reply.

"Some more of--that cough medicine--for Kathleen."

"That won't take long," said Mr. Barton. "All I've got to do is to pour it from a big bottle into this little one."

He disappeared behind the prescription case, but was back long before Jerry's pulse had had time to slow down to its customary beat.

"There you are," he said. "Forty-five cents."

Jerry pa.s.sed over the precious half-dollar. The pang of regret at the thought of circus delights, once so nearly his, now beyond his reach, he resolutely forced out of his mind every time he caught himself thinking about it. He tried to whistle to help forget the circus, but to his surprise not a sound issued from his lips. They were too dry to whistle.

Then he suddenly heard the drug clerk exclaim:

"Gee whillikens! This is the identical half-dollar you found this afternoon! I can tell it by the black mark on it."

"Yes, it is," Jerry admitted in a forlorn tone.

"So you told about finding it--"

"No, I didn't," interrupted Jerry, "but Kathleen was all out of cough medicine and Mother 'Larkey didn't have no money."

"I see. Then you told what--"

"No, I just got the bottle and brought it here."

Mr. Barton whistled.