"it's out!" screamed the woman. "oh-oh! it's out and it's got me! save me! save me!"
as polly told her mother later it was "creepy" to hear these screams in the darkness of the tent, and a dozen voices began to ask:
"what is it? what's the matter?"
the snake charmer, who had been behind the scenes of the tiny stage, came out in her beautiful pink velvet dress and spoke calmly.
"what is it, lady?" she called clearly. "what is the matter with you?"
"there it is again!" shrieked the woman. "it's the boa constrictor! i can feel it creeping over my feet!"
my goodness, that was enough to make any one nervous! two or three more people began to cry that they, too, could feel the boa constrictor crawling over their feet on the floor of the tent.
there might have been a panic in another minute, but a carnival attendant who had heard the[pg 124] racket came pushing his way through the crowd of people, a powerful flashlight in his hand.
"what's the matter here?" he kept asking. "what's wrong? hey, madam, keep still and tell me what's bothering you."
"a snake!" gasped the woman. "there! there! get him, quick!"
polly and margy were holding hands tightly and jess had a desperate clutch on polly's skirt. fred and artie were close by. all leaned forward as the attendant swept the floor with his light.
then every one began to laugh and the tent resounded to the sound of relief. there in the glare of the light, flat on his stomach, was ward, his hair sticking straight up, his face red with the heat and his exertions, and the precious pass gripped tightly in his right hand.
"i got it!" he beamed. "somebody stepped on it, but i found it all right."
"my land, was it you crawling around in the dark?" the woman who had begun the screaming asked in amazement. "don't you know any better than to scare folks out of their wits?"
"ladies and gentlemen," began the snake charmer diplomatically, "now that your fears have been proved groundless, may i ask for your kind[pg 125]est attention? i want to present to you richard the third, the noblest snake——"
she began to fondle and exhibit her snakes and the crowd pressed closer. ward made all haste to get further away from the woman who had been frightened. he was afraid she might begin to scold again, but she was too interested in the snake charmer to remember her fright.
the riddle club stayed till the last snake had been put back in its box and then came out, the strong sunlight making their eyes blink after the darkness.
"say, this is your unlucky day all right, ward," said the grinning fred. "first your pass is no good for peanuts and then you give the whole snake show a regular fit. now here's the fat boy. we'll go see him, and if he takes you for his brother, don't blame me."
ward was fat, there was no denying the fact. but he was not as fat as the lad they found propped up in a red velvet chair on a little red velvet platform. this boy looked as though he might be ten or twelve years old, but he was fatter than mr. higsby, the fattest man in river bend.
"willis king, the fattest boy for his age in the world," read artie.
[pg 126]
"sh! that isn't polite," polly reproved him. "you'll hurt his feelings."
"no, he won't. i'm used to that," the fat boy answered, for he had overheard. "i know i'm fat, and i don't mind if people do say so."
ward silently handed him the bag of peanuts, and he took a handful.
"i should think you'd like to travel around," said artie. "it must be fun to see all the different places and people."
"do you have to go to school?" ward asked.
"can't—i'm too fat," said the boy. "i'd break down all the benches. my mother teaches me. and let me tell you, it isn't such fun going around, especially in hot weather. i'd like to spend a summer at the beach and just have a good time."
"why don't you?" margy asked.
"because i have to work," the fat boy replied. "this is work, though you may not know it. i have to sit up here and have people look at me and the lights make it awful hot at night. then going on trains and boats is tiresome. you don't know how lucky you are, to stay in one place all summer."
"how did you get fat?" asked jess, determined to prevent ward from gaining another pound.
"i was born fat," was the answer. "and then i eat lots of food and don't exercise. now i try[pg 127] not to get thin, because i expect to earn my living this way, and if i was thin, i couldn't be an exhibit."
he ate three more peanuts as though he feared he might have lost some weight through the exertion of talking.
"i don't think he is very bright," commented jess, as they left the tent. "first he says it is no fun to be fat and then he says he wants to stay fat so he can be an exhibit."
"well, i don't suppose he'd ever be real thin, and if he is going to be fat, he thinks he'd better be fatter than any one else," polly said. "whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well, mrs. pepper says."
the others laughed and ward asked anxiously if they thought he would ever be an exhibit.
"you'd better be careful," said jess.
"and whatever you do," added fred, "stop when you have had two helpings of dessert. it is the third time that will put you in the freak class, ward."
"mother hardly ever lets me have even two helpings," ward murmured. he would take fred's teasing seriously nearly every time.
there were a few more sights, not many, for the carnival was a small one, and when they had[pg 128] been into every tent they went back to the benches where the three mothers were waiting.
"we thought we wouldn't have ice cream till you came," said mrs. marley, "but we are glad we don't have to wait any longer. who knows where we can find something cool to eat and drink?"
the children had passed a refreshment pavilion and they led the way back to this. here they had ice cream and rice waffles, and then it was time to think of starting for home.
as they were standing at the side of the road, waiting for the bus, joe anderson and albert holmes came up the road. they had walked from the bungalow colony and they looked warm and dusty.
"we've seen everything," artie told them as soon as the two boys were within hearing distance. "margy found a diamond ring and we had passes and saw everything free."
joe and albert stared open-mouthed and the members of the riddle club were obliged to explain.
"gee, what did you do with the passes?" asked joe quickly. "perhaps we could use them."
"we gave them back to the manager. mother said to," margy told him.
"i don't see why you did that. we could have[pg 129] had a good time with them to-night, and maybe you could have used them again to-morrow," said joe, looking much put out, as though margy had acted very inconsiderately.
"mother said we couldn't come again, and anyway the carnival won't be here long," fred announced.
"and the man meant us to go in just once, i think," said polly slowly. "it wouldn't be fair for everybody to use the passes and see the carnival free."
"just the same, i think you might have let us have 'em," grumbled joe.
the bus came along just then, and the riddle club members followed their mothers, leaving joe and albert to go on to the carnival and make the most of their nickels.
"i don't believe he liked it because we gave the passes back," said margy, finding a seat between jess and ward.
"who? joe? don't let that worry you," fred counseled. "i'm glad you didn't have a pass to give him; he would have thought he owned the show."
"the hundred dollars would have been nice in the bank account, wouldn't it?" margy suggested, with a little sigh.
now, margy was not the only one who had[pg 130] had that idea, and mrs. williamson had talked to fred about it at some length while they waited for the bus. fred was club treasurer and very proud of the bank account opened in the name of the riddle club. mrs. williamson had been afraid that he would regret the hundred dollars margy might have taken for finding the ring.
"mother said," fred reported, "that she hopes we'll never take money when we haven't done anything to earn it. she said it is all right to offer rewards and to accept them, if we really do something. if margy had heard about the ring being lost and she had gone out and hunted and walked miles and worked her head off and then found it, it wouldn't be so bad to take the money. but mother says all she did was to put her hand down in the crack and pull out the ring. if she kept it, that would be stealing. but if she took it back and took the hundred dollars that would be almost like paying her for not stealing. you have to really earn a reward."
"but we'll not ever have a chance to get a hundred dollar reward again," sighed jess.
"how do you know?" polly challenged. "i'm going to have good fortune all my life—my hand says so. maybe i'll get a hundred dollars reward for doing something wonderful."
"will you put it in the club fund?" asked jess,[pg 131] and polly promised that the money should go in the bank and be credited to the riddle club.
all were tired after their strenuous day, and there were no protests when mrs. marley suggested that every one go to bed at eight o'clock. waking up at his usual hour the next morning, fred discovered that artie was not in the room.
"he's dressed and gone out," said fred in surprise, noting that artie's shoes were not under the chair where he always left them and that his clothes had disappeared.
fred made haste to get downstairs and found that artie was not in the house. the sound of hammering drew him to the barn. there was only one car in it now, of course, since one was in river bend whither it had carried the three fathers.
"what do you call it you're doing?" asked fred, peering in at the door.
the hammering stopped. artie was working in the darkest corner.
"i'm building a raft," he announced coolly. "i want to get it done before daddy comes to-morrow night."
"why don't you build it somewhere near the water?" fred asked. "i should think you'd know it has to be carried down somehow."
"well, i guess a horse can pull it, can't he?"[pg 132] said artie. "lots of boats are built where there isn't any water. i've seen them on freight cars."
so had fred. but his common sense told him that when one lived almost across the street from the ocean, the beach was the place to construct a raft.
"where did you get your hammer and nails, artie?" he asked curiously. "and the boards? it must take heavy boards to build a raft."
"they're already nailed together," artie informed him. "i only have to put on a couple of cross-pieces and it will be done."
"but i think you're an awful chump to build it in the barn," persisted fred. "you can't see in that dark corner, either. and why get up in the middle of the night to build a raft?"
"it isn't the middle of the night," artie argued. "besides, i want to try to sail it before breakfast."
fred suddenly thought of something. he darted out and ran around back of the barn. sure enough, his suspicions were correct.
"come out here a minute, artie!" he called.
