Horses Nine | Page 9

of direction, and when he was finally shunted out through the dressing-tent flaps he was so dizzy he could scarcely stand.
For a horse accustomed to shy at his own shadow this was heroic treatment. But it was successful. In a month you could not have startled Calico with a pound of dynamite. He would placidly munch his oats within three feet of the spot where a stake-gang swung the heavy sledges in staccato time. He cared no more for flapping canvas than for the wagging of a mule's ears. As for noises, when one has associated with a steam calliope one ceases to mind anything in that line. Old Ajax, it was true, remained a terror to Calico for weeks, but in the end the horse lost much of his dread for the ancient pachyderm, although he never felt wholly comfortable while those wicked little eyes were turned in his direction. Hereditary instincts, you know, die hard.
During those four months in which the Grand Occidental flitted over the New England circuit from Kenduskeag, Me., to Bennington, Vt., there came upon Calico knowledge of many things. The farm-horse to whom Bangor's market-square had been full of strange sights became, in comparison with his former self, most sophisticated. He feared no noise save that sinister whistle made by Broncho Bill's long lash. The roaring sputter of gasoline flares was no more to him than the sound of a running brook. He had learned that it was safe to kick a mere canvasman when you felt like doing so, but that a real artist, such as a tumbler or a trapeze man, was to be respected, and that the person of the ring-master was most sacred. Also he acquired the knack of sleeping at odd times, whenever opportunity offered and under any conditions.
When he had grown thus wise, and when he had ceased to stumble over guy-ropes and tent-stakes, Calico received promotion. He was put in as outside horse of the leading pair in the grand entry. He was decorated with a white-braided cord bridle with silk rosettes and he wore between his ears a feather pompon. All this was very fine and grand, but there was so little of it.
After it was all over, when the crowds had gone, the top lowered and the stakes pulled, he was hitched to the leaden-wheeled band-wagon to strain and tug at the traces all through the last weary half of the night. But when fame has started your way, be you horse or man, you cannot escape. Just before the season closed Calico was put on the sawdust. This was the way of it.
A ninety-foot top, you know, carries neither extra people nor spare horses. The performers must double up their acts. No one is exempt save the autocratic high-bar folk, who own their own apparatus and dictate contracts. So with the horses. The teams that pull the pole-wagon, the chariots and the other wheeled things which a circus needs, must also figure in the grand entry and in the hippodrome races. Even the ring-horses have their share of road-work in a wagon show.
To the dappled grays used by Mlle. Zaretti, who was a top-liner on the bills, fell the lot of pulling the ticket-wagon, this being the lightest work. It was Mlle. Zaretti's habit to ride one at the afternoon show, the other in the evening. So when the nigh gray developed a shoulder gall on the day that the off one went lame there arose an emergency. Also there ensued trouble for the driver of the ticket-wagon. First he was tongue lashed by Mademoiselle, then he was fined a week's pay and threatened with discharge by the manager. But when the increasing wrath of the Champion Lady Equestrienne of America led her to demand his instant and painful annihilation the worm turned. The driver profanely declared that he knew his business. He had travelled with Yank Robinson, he had, and no female hair-grabber under canvas should call him down more than once in the same day. There was more of this, added merely for emphasis. Mlle. Zaretti saw the point. She had gone too far. Whereupon she discreetly turned on her high French heels and meekly asked the boss hostler for the most promising animal he had. The boss picked out Calico.
No sooner was the top up that day than Calico's training began. Well it was that he had learned obedience, for this was to be his one great opportunity. Many a time had Calico circled around the banked ring's outer circumference, but never had he been within it. Neither had he worn before a broad pad. By dint of leading and coaxing he was made to understand that his part of the act was to canter around the ring with Mlle. Zaretti