"To-morrow, if all goes right, I am going to take a train for Hopsville and see Squire Dobb," said Barton Reeve to Leo.

"I hope you have luck," replied the boy. "If he is keeping any of my property back from me I want to know it."

The day in Harmony Falls opened very warm. A haze hung over the mountains to the westward.

"We'll have a storm by night," said Natalie Sparks to Leo.

The two were now warm friends.

"That will make it bad for the ticket-wagon," laughed the young gymnast.

"Oh, I hate a storm during a performance," went on the girl, "especially if it thunders and lightens."

"Well, that's what it's going to do."

"How do you know?"

"Oh, didn't I live on a farm?"

"That's so!" Natalie laughed merrily. "You don't look much like a farm hand now."

"Thanks for the compliment," and Leo blushed.

During the afternoon it grew hotter and hotter. Under the big tents it was suffocating.

"Dandy weather for lemonade," said the owner of the main drinking stand, but he was about the only person who appreciated the sudden rise in the thermometer.

At seven o'clock the circus tents were again crowded, and amid the general excitement but few noticed the flashes of lightning over in the west. The low rumblings of thunder they attributed to the lions in the cages.

At last the grand _entree_ was over, and then the performance settled down to the various specialties.

Then, as Leo and Snipper came on, a louder peal of thunder attracted every one's attention.

To quiet fears the band struck up. Of course Leo and Snipper could not talk against the music, and so they tumbled around instead, Leo casting himself into the most awkward of shapes.

The rain began to fall, but as the canvases were waterproof this did no great harm.

Then the wind freshened up, and every one realized that a big storm was at hand.

Leo had just thrown off his clown's dress and mounted up to a pair of rings when a fearful crack of thunder caused every one to leap up in terror.

The lightning had struck a pole in the menagerie tent!

Down came the heavy stick, straight across the backs of three of the largest elephants.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _THE ELEPHANT MADE FOR THE CROWD_]

The thunder and the fall of the pole frightened the huge beasts. They roared and plunged and finally broke from their fastenings.

Two of them were secured without much difficulty, but the third, the largest, could not be managed.

With a fearful roar he rushed into the main circus tent, under the spot where Leo was performing, and directly in the faces of the crowd, which tried in vain to flee from his path.

CHAPTER X.-CAPTURING THE ELEPHANT.

For the moment it looked as if the mad elephant would crush a dozen or more of the audience.

He was making straight for the crowd, which tried in vain to clear a path for him to pa.s.s.

The uproar was terrible, but it was nothing compared to the trumpeting of the gigantic beast.

Several attendants rushed toward the elephant with prods, but he was too angry to notice them.

"Turn him back!"

"He'll walk right over the crowd!"

"La.s.so him!"

"Shoot him!"

And so the cries went on.

The uproar had caused Leo to stop his performance; indeed, it had stopped everything but the stampede of the audience.

Suddenly the elephant ran directly under the young gymnast.

As he did so there came another crash of thunder.

The elephant raised up on his rear legs, and his trunk went up to where Leo swung.

And then a startling thing happened.

Leo dropped directly upon the beast's head. With remarkable rapidity he slid back on to the neck.

"Throw me a rope!" he yelled to the nearest attendant, and the fellow did so.

Then the end of the elephant's trunk came up angrily. He intended to catch hold of the young gymnast and hurl him to the earth, there to trample on him.

But Leo slipped further back, and at the same time threw the noose of the rope over the uplifted proboscis.

He hauled it taut, and with the end of the rope in his hand, sprang down and ran at lightning speed to the nearest centerpole.