Without stopping to consider what the result might be, he ran at full speed from the stage, and the spectators hooted and yelled derisively.

"What is the matter with you?" the manager asked fiercely, as he shook Jet until his teeth chattered.

"Them men are there!" the boy cried brokenly. "I must go right out an'

get hold of them."

"You'll go and stay, you little villain! If you couldn't dance I wouldn't say a word, but I know what you are able to do. Where are you off to now?"

"I want to change these clothes so's I can go around to the front of the house."

"What for?"

"Them men are there, an' I've got to find out where they're stopping."

"What are they to you?

"Don't stop to ask questions now, but let me go!" Jet cried, impatiently, as he tore himself from the angry man's grasp, threw off the stage costume and ran from the building.

With no idea his enemies had recognized him, he continued on without fear until reaching the corner of the building, where one of the men was standing half hidden by the shadow.

The fellow's hand was raised, and as Jet came up he struck the boy a crashing blow on the head with a stout stick, felling him to the ground like one suddenly deprived of life.

CHAPTER V

BAFFLED

When Jet regained consciousness he was lying on the ground alone, feeling dizzy and suffering from a most severe pain in his head.

He raised his hand as if to relieve the anguish, and found that his hair was matted together with a certain sticky substance, which, by aid of a light from a near-by lamp, he discovered to be blood.

From the theater music could be heard, thus telling that the performance had not yet been brought to a close.

It was only after the greatest difficulty that Jet rose to his feet, looked around for an instant as if expecting another attack, and then staggered toward the stage entrance.

He spent ten minutes covering a distance of twenty yards, and, on opening the door, was greeted by one of the company, who had evidently come out for a breath of fresh air.

"You had better not let the manager see you until after he cools off a little more, for---- What is the matter, lad?"

This last question after the boy's pale and blood-stained face could be seen.

"Somebody struck me."

"Struck you? It looks more as if they had been trying to kill you."

"Perhaps that was what they did want to do," and Jet half-seated himself, half-fell on a trunk.

However aggrieved the members of the company may have felt because of Jet's failure, none of them were so hard-hearted as to ignore the fact of his suffering. Those not on the stage were immediately summoned by the boy's questioner, and in a very few seconds a messenger had been sent in search of a surgeon.

"Don't bother about me; I'll be all right in a little while," Jet managed to say, and then he fainted.

It was soon found that the boy's injuries, while severe, were not dangerous.

The scalp had been laid open to such an extent that half a dozen st.i.tches were necessary to close the wound, and the surgeon said, rea.s.suringly, as he bandaged the cut:

"He has lost considerable blood, which accounts for his weak condition.

It will be some time before he feels all right again; but he'll come around in good shape."

"Will it do him any harm to keep on traveling with us?" the manager asked.

"Let him be quiet, and I don't antic.i.p.ate any evil results. Do you know how it happened?"

"No. He was very anxious to see some one in the audience, and I fancy he went out immediately after breaking down in his act."

"Then send around at once and learn if anybody left the hall just before the a.s.sault."

This suggestion was acted upon immediately, and the doorkeeper stated that two men, one tall and the other of medium height, went out very soon after Jet ran off the stage.

"It must have been some fellow who had a grudge against him, and he broke down from fright at seeing the man; but I don't fancy it will do much good to attempt to trace the matter. Show people can't afford to fool around a town waiting for the delays of the law when they are billed to play in other places, therefore the whole thing had better be dropped."

The surgeon received his fee and left the invalid after advising that he be kept perfectly quiet.

The performers continued their efforts to amuse, and Jet, lying on a pile of wardrobe stuff, with the music of the orchestra and the applause of the audience ringing in his ears, tried to decide upon his course of action.

"I'll have to leave the show here an' find them fellers," he thought to himself, and then the pain of his wound prevented any further study of the detective work he hoped to perform.

It so chanced, however, that he did not carry out this resolution.

When morning came he was too sick to have much choice in the matter, and the kind-hearted manager said as he wrapped the boy in an old overcoat:

"We'll take him along in the hope of his getting better. If he don't improve in a day or two he can be left in some other town, for it's certain his life isn't safe in this place. Those fellows. .h.i.t to kill last night, and on a second attempt might be more successful."

It was forty-eight hours before Jet fully realized the condition of affairs, and then the show was nearly a hundred miles from the scene of the attack.

"Have we pa.s.sed Cooperstown Junction?" he asked of the manager as the performers boarded a train.

"Bless your heart, lad, we left that desolate place behind us the morning after you were hurt."

"How can I get back there?"

"I shan't allow you to try it yet awhile. In your present condition it would be as much as your life is worth to make the attempt."

"But I must go."

"See here, Jet, why not tell me what is on your mind? I might be able to help you."