This brought up a fund of recollected circus stories, and from then on, until the train stopped on the siding near the grounds, the performers took turns in telling what they had known of wrecks and other accidents to the shows with which they had been connected. Joe listened eagerly.

It was all new to him.

"I only hope my gla.s.s tank isn't cracked," said Benny again. He seemed quite worried about this.

"Well, if it's broken they'll have to get you another," Joe told him.

The tank was carried in one of the cars of the derailed train.

"They might, and they might not," said Benny. "My act hasn't been going any too well of late, and maybe they'd be glad of a chance to drop it from the list. I only hope they don't, though, for I need the money."

Benny spoke wistfully. He seemed greatly changed from the boy Joe had known at first. Benny had grown thinner, and he often put his hand to his head, as though suffering constant pain. Joe and Helen felt sorry for him.

Still there was little they could do, except to cheer him up. Benny had to do his own act--which was a unique one that he had evolved after years of practice. It was not alone the staying under water that made it popular, it was the tricks that the lad did.

"Well, we're here at last," said Joe, as he and his friends alighted from their sleeping car. "Better late than never, I suppose."

Men were busy on the circus grounds, putting up tents, arranging the horses and other animals, putting the wagons in their proper places and doing the hundred and one things that need to be done.

"I wonder what's going on over there," said Helen, as she pointed to a group of men about the place where the canvas for the main tent had been spread out in readiness for erection. "It looks like trouble."

"It does," agreed Joe, as he saw Jim Tracy excitedly talking to the canvasmen. "I'm going to see what it is."

He approached the ring-master, who was also one of the owners of the show.

"Anything wrong?" Joe asked.

"Wrong? I should say so! As if I didn't already have troubles enough here, the tent-men go on a strike for more money. I never saw such luck!"

CHAPTER XVII

IN BEDFORD

Joe Strong looked from the group of sullen, lowering canvasmen to Jim Tracy. On the ring-master's face were signs of anxiety.

"Is it really a strike?" Joe asked.

"That's what they call it," replied the circus owner. "I didn't know they belonged to a union, and I don't believe they do. They just want to make trouble, and they take advantage of me at a time when I'm tied up because we're late with the show."

"What is it they want?" asked Helen.

"More money," Jim Tracy replied. "I wouldn't mind giving it to them if I could afford it, or if they weren't getting the same wages that are paid other canvasmen in other circuses. But they are. As a matter of fact, they get more, and they have better grub. I can't understand such tactics!"

"It looks as if some of them were coming over to speak to you,"

remarked Joe, as he observed one of the strikers detach himself from the group, and approach the ring-master.

"Let him come," snapped Jim. "He'll get no satisfaction from me."

The man seemed a bit embarra.s.sed as he approached, chewing a straw nervously. He ignored several of the circus performers, Joe and Helen among them, who were grouped about Jim Tracy, and, addressing the owner, asked:

"Well, have you made up your mind? Is it to be more money for us or no show for you?"

"It's going to be 'no' to your unreasonable demand, and I want to tell you, here and now, that the show's going on. You can go back to your cowardly crowd, that tries to hit a man when he's down, and tell 'em Jim Tracy said that!" cried the ring-master with vigor. "You'll get no more money from me. I'm paying you wages enough as it is!"

"All right, no money--no show!" said the fellow, impudently. "We gave you half an hour to make up your mind, and if that's your answer you can take the consequences."

He started to walk away, and Tracy called after him:

"If you try to interfere or make trouble, and if you try to stop the show, I'll have you all arrested if I have to send for special detectives."

"Oh, we won't make any trouble except what you make for yourself,"

declared the striker. "We just won't do anything--that'll be the trouble. There's your 'main top,' and there she'll stay. We won't pull a rope or drive a peg!"

He pointed to the pile of canvas with its ma.s.s of ropes, poles and pegs that lay on the ground ready for erection. It should have been up by this time, and the parade ought to have been under way. But with the railroad accident, the delay and the strike, the big tent in which Joe, Helen and the others were to perform was not yet raised.

"The cowards!" exclaimed Jim in a low voice; looking at Joe. "I wonder if I'd better give in to 'em?"

"Can you get others to take their places?" the young trapeze acrobat wanted to know.

"Not here. I could if I were nearer New York. But as it is----" He threw up his hands with a gesture of despair. "I guess I'll have to give in," he said. "I can't afford not to give a show. Here, you----"

He called to the departing striker.

"Wait a minute!" Joe quickly exclaimed to the ring-master. "I think we can find a way out of this."

"How?"

"Have you any men who know something about putting up the tent?"

"I know all there is to be known about it myself. But it takes more than one man to raise the 'main top.' There are a lot of the animal men and wagon drivers who used to be canvas hands. They haven't struck. But there aren't enough of them. It's no use."

"Yes, it is!" cried Joe. "We men performers will turn canvasmen for the time being. Give us some hands who know how to lay out the canvas, how to lace up the different sections, which ropes to pull on; men to show us how to drive stakes and to haul up the poles--do that and we'll have the tent up in time for the show!"

"Can you do it?" cried the ring-master, in an eager tone.

"Sure we can!" exclaimed Joe. "There are enough of us, and we're willing to turn in. You get the men who know how, and we'll be their a.s.sistants."

"It might work," said Tracy, reflectively. "I'm much obliged to you, Joe. It's worth trying. But do you think the performers will do it?"

"I'll talk to 'em," said the trapeze artist. "They'll be glad to raise the tent, rather than see a performance given up. Go get your men and I'll talk to the others."

"All right--I will."

"Did you call me?" asked the striker who had been appointed to wait on the ring-master and learn his decision.

"I did _not_!" cried Jim Tracy. "I'm through with you. We don't need your services."

"Ha!" laughed the man. "Let's see you get up the 'main top' without us."