Pecks Bad Boy with the Circus | Page 9

on the road, and I can't write any more in my diary until after we fix

the snake. Gee, but he is as long as a clothesline.
CHAPTER III.
Pa Reproves the Fat Woman for Losing Flesh--The Bearded Lady
Faints in Pa's Arms--The Bad Boy Introduced Into Animal
Society--They Pull the Boa Constrictor's Ulcerated Tooth.
Winter Quarters of the Only Circus, April 20.--Pa has had a hard job
today. The boss complained to pa that the fat woman had been taking
anti-fat, or dieting, or something, 'cause she was losing flesh, and the
living skeleton was beginning to fat up. He wanted pa to call them into
the office and have a diplomatic talk with them about their condition,
'cause if this thing continued they would ruin the show.
So pa went to the office and sent for them, and I was there as a witness,
in case of trouble. The fat woman came in first, and there was no chair
big enough for her, so she sat down on a leather lounge, which broke
and let her down on the floor, and pa tried to help her up, but it was like
lifting a load of hay. So he leaned her against the wall and said:
"Madame, the management has detailed me to censure you for losing
flesh, and I am instructed to say if you do not manage to take on about
fifty pounds more flesh before the show starts on the road, you don't go
along. What you want to do is to eat more starchy food and sleep more
at night. They tell me you go out nights to dances and drink high balls,
and this has got to stop. Drink beer and eat cheese sandwiches at night,
or it is all off. This show can't afford to take along no 400-pound fairy
for a fat woman when the contract calls for a 500-pound mountain of
flesh, see?" and pa looked just as stern as could be.
The fat woman began to cry and sob, so it sounded like an engine
blowing off steam, and she told pa that the cause of her losing flesh
was that she was in love with the living skeleton, and that he had been
paying attention to the bearded woman, and she would scratch her eyes
out if she could catch her. Just then the living skeleton came in, and
when he saw the fat woman sitting on the floor crying, and pa talking
soothing to her and telling her he could appreciate her condition, 'cause

he had been in love some hisself, the skeleton pushed pa away and tried
to lift it, and said: "What is the matter with my itty tootsy-wootsy, and
what has the bad old man with spinach on his chin been doing to you?"
Then he turned on pa and his legs began to shake and rattle like a pair
of bones in a minstrel show, and he said: "I will hold you responsible
for this." Pa said he was not going to interfere in the love affairs of any
of the freaks, and just then the bearded woman came in, and when she
saw the living skeleton holding the hand of the fat woman, who sat on
the floor like a balloon blowed up, the bearded woman gave a kick at
the living skeleton which sounded like clothes bars falling down in the
laundry, and she grabbed the fat woman's blonde wig and pulled it off,
and then the bearded woman began to cry and she threw herself into
pa's arms and began to sob on his bosom and mingle her whiskers with
his.
[Illustration: "I Will Hold You Responsible for This!"]
Pa yelled for help, and I thought it was time for me to be doing
something, so I went outside the office to the fire alarm box and
touched a button, and then I run like thunder for the police, and the
firemen came with the extinguishers and began to throw chemically
charged water into the room, and the police dragged out the fat woman,
who had fainted, and the living skeleton, whom she had pulled down
into her lap, and laid them out in the ring, and then they got hold of pa
and pulled him out, and the bearded woman had fainted in pa's arms
and the stove was tipped over and was setting fire to the furniture and
they brought the bearded woman and the fat woman to their senses by
pouring water on them from a hose. Finally they were sent to their
quarters, and the other owner of the show came to pa and said he hoped
this would be the last of that kind of business, as long as pa remained
with the show, that one of the