Nora and Celia Jane, who had lapsed into tongue-tiedness after learning that they were all going to see the circus that night, now started slowly into the house, Kathleen clinging to Nora's hand to keep from falling. But their eyes were turned back towards Sultana until they pa.s.sed through the door.

Danny and Chris were also of two minds whether to follow the great clown or remain outside with the elephant, but their mother's statement that Mr. Darner had come to take Jerry away and was even then in the house finally drew them as a magnet, their eyes also directed towards Sultana until they stumbled through the door.

Jerry saw Darn Darner's father sitting by the living-room window and came to a stop. Mr. Darner was a dour, heavy-set man with a coa.r.s.e, bristling gray beard. He glared at Whiteface through thick gla.s.ses.

"What does all this hullabaloo mean?" he asked Mrs. Mullarkey, in a gruff voice.

"It means," said Whiteface, answering for her and advancing towards Mr.

Darner, Jerry's hand held tightly in his, "that Jerry Elbow has found his parents and the people have followed us here to show how glad they are."

"You his father? A clown in a circus?" asked Mr. Darner.

"Yes, I am his father and I am a clown in a circus," replied Whiteface.

"Mr. Darner is the County Overseer of the Poor," Mrs. Mullarkey explained. "He's been at me to give Jerry up and let him take him to the poor farm ever since my Dan died."

"It's for your own good and your children's--and Jerry's, too, if you weren't too blind to see it," the Overseer stated.

"After Dan's insurance money was all gone--and a good part of it went to finish paying for this house," Mrs. Mullarkey continued, "I couldn't make enough to keep the children decently. Mr. Darner's kept telling me that if I didn't let him take Jerry to the poor farm, I'd break down sooner or later and have to send my own children there or let them be adopted out. Mr. Phillips thought he could help--"

"Phillips is always b.u.t.ting into things that are none of his business,"

growled Mr. Darner.

"But this afternoon Mr. Darner came to take Jerry and I just couldn't hold out any longer--I haven't the money or the strength. And he wants Danny to go to a place in the country to work for his board and wants me to let Celia Jane be adopted by a family in Hampton who are looking for a girl. He thinks I ought to see if Celia Jane won't suit them."

"Mother! Take me away from home!" wailed Celia Jane aghast.

"I'm at the end of my string," Mrs. Mullarkey's discouraged voice continued. "I've never been able to make both ends meet since Dan died."

"She couldn't make them meet so's to give us money to buy tickets to the circus," Jerry explained corroboratively to his father.

"You'll have to come to it eventually, Mrs. Mullarkey," warned the County Overseer. "This is a good chance for Celia Jane. The Thompsons are well fixed; they'll give her a fine home and a good education."

Celia Jane at that sat down on the floor and let her body relax into a limp bundle.

"I won't go!" she sobbed. "I won't leave mother! What would I do without mother?"

Jerry was very much distressed at Celia Jane's misery and he looked pleadingly up at his clown-father; that extraordinary man knew without a word having been spoken that Jerry expected him to fix things so that Celia Jane could stay with her mother. Whiteface spoke at once.

"Don't cry, Celia Jane. n.o.body is going to take you away. Both ends are going to meet now. You're all going to stay here with your mother."

"You talk big," grumbled Mr. Darner. "Now to come down to bra.s.s tacks.

Who's--"

"As long as I have any money, Mr. County Overseer," said Whiteface, "or as long as I have the power to make any, the Mullarkey household will not be broken up."

"Of course it won't, Robert," chimed in Jerry's mother in a crisp voice, as she raised Celia Jane from the floor and comforted her. "You always know just what to do."

Jerry's father continued:

"We are going to take Gary with us now, but we are going to try to repay Mrs. Mullarkey a little for all she has done and suffered for our boy. I have some money saved up and make a good salary. I want you to go to Mr. Burrows, one of the proprietors of the circus, and satisfy yourself on that point and that I am a man of my word. While you are doing that we can arrange with Mrs. Mullarkey. We want to be alone with her. I'll see you again before to-night's performance."

Mr. Darner stood up.

"I do not doubt your desire or ability in the matter," he said, "and, as you wish it, I will consult Mr. Burrows. n.o.body can be gladder than I am that things have turned out this way. I don't like breaking up families and taking children out to the farm, though some people say that I do. I have to do a lot of things that go against the grain. I've wanted to do what was best for you, Mrs. Mullarkey."

"We are sure you meant things for the best, Mr. Darner," said Jerry's mother. "Good-by."

Mrs. Mullarkey was looking so hard at Jerry's parents that she did not return Mr. Darner's "Good afternoon" as he left the house or seem even to have heard it.

"It can't be true, what you just said," she at length articulated in a choked voice. "Such things don't happen to us."

"It is true," Jerry's mother a.s.sured her.

"We shall not forget what you have done for Gary," said Whiteface. "I calculate that I owe you at the least one thousand dollars for taking care of him--"

"A thousand dollars!" gasped Danny. "Why, that's as much as father's insurance! I didn't know anybody could get that much money unless they died!"

Mrs. Mullarkey said nothing; her lips were trying to smile though the tears still stood in her eyes.

"Besides which," continued the clown, "Helen and I will help you look out for the children and we want you to call on us any time that you may be in trouble."

"We do, indeed," said Jerry's mother. "You cannot work so hard and take care of your children the way you want to. If you only lived near us--"

"Helen," interrupted Jerry's father, "I've been thinking, now that we are going to settle down in business, it would be a wise thing for Mrs.

Mullarkey to sell her place here and move to Carroll with us. Then we'll know how they are getting on and can look after the children some.

I'll help her dispose of the place here and buy one in Carroll, if she would like such an arrangement."

"Would you, Mrs. Mullarkey?" asked Jerry's mother.

It took her such a long time to answer that Jerry looked up and saw her lips were twisting. She was crying inside so that you couldn't hear her.

Jerry knew how that hurt--to cry when you didn't dare cry out loud. He had often done it in the night, before he ran away, so the man with the big red scar wouldn't hear him. He left his mother and Kathleen, climbed up on Mother 'Larkey's lap, put one arm about her neck and with his other hand patted her wet cheek.

"An' then Kathleen won't cry for me," he coaxed, "'cause I'll be right there an' can run over any time, couldn't I, Mother?"

"Yes, of course you could, dear."

"There, you see," he continued.

"I should love to," Mrs. Mullarkey replied at last to Mr. and Mrs. Bowe.

"It would be such a relief to have some one I could go to for advice about the children. It's not that they're wayward or bad, but Danny is hot-headed like his father and thoughtless. I'm sure, he didn't mean to steal Jerry's ticket to the circus--"

"Why, mother!" exclaimed Danny. "I didn't steal it! He gave it to Celia Jane of his own free will and she gave it to me, didn't you, Celia Jane?"

"Yet it was stealing," replied his mother, "for you put Celia Jane up to it. Nora told me all about it and Nora never tells what is not true."

"You gave your ticket to Celia Jane, didn't you, Jerry--I mean, Gary?"

appealed Danny.