preg — r, the railroad tracks stretch Re and behind, and in the shad- ows of the hour after midnight lay the long train of side-tracked sleep- ers, the show-train, marked against the darkness only by a light that here and there still shone in some car win- dow. ii The night was very quiet, a few pais stars dinging faintly overhead, a ittle breath of wind. Two miles back, three miles, perhaps, a fringe of lights against the sky, was the town where the circus had made its world for a day. There the flat-cars would still be loading. Baggage horses loading blue seats and poles, trunks and cages. Shouts of the bosses. Glare of the torches. Wagons and floats rumbling up on the “runs.” But in this hush of dew-wet clover, with the drowsy sound of crickets in the grass, the tan-bark and spangles seemed very far away. In this side- tracked train of sleepin -cars the per- formers who had played with life and death under the weaving canvas had forgotten all about the crowd and the dare, the thrill and the spot-light. Along the track, red and green sig- nals shone like trick eyes. When the flats in town would be loaded and - Bellefonte, Pa., June 22, 1928. THE LITTLE THINGS. If I can make two words to rime And give a thought a merry chime, If you can make the grass to grow Where grass the stranger would not know, We need not sigh for great deeds, too, ‘Who have the little things to do. The man who solders pots and pans Has work as good as any man’s; He works as well as anyone ‘Who works at work that must be done. "Tis better just to sew a seam Than dream of things, and only dream. The world is full of buildings tall That stand upon some sturdy wall That bumble hands have fashioned; so From little deeds the great deeds grow. Although great things the great world needs, They all must rest on little deeds. So let us try to do our part, And do it with a singing heart. For surely we have right to sing Who do the unimportant thing, Because the things that seem so small Are most important, after all, section and follow. Minnie Cluff, in’ the green bath-robe left alone by the exit of the Snods, looked out along the cars to see who was still up, but the poker-game had gone; there wasn’t even a croon of ukuleles. The long string of cars was quiet as the night. The first car (numbered HELP YOURSELF TO HAY. At a poker game, say twelve, or one, or two in the morning, woman is seldom necessary. “Mr. Cubby Snod, you put down those cards and come in before I bring you in!” It was out on a railroad track where Mr. Cubby Snod was, and Mrs. Snod after him; Mrs. Snod in the shadow, the checkered, long ribbon shadow of a side-tracked string of half-lighted, half-dark sleeping-cars, her blond hair in curl-papers, pink silk pajamas on, bare feet in worsted slip- pers, and a flash-light pointing like a revolver along ‘the cinder bank where her husband and three other gentle- men sat around a flickering lantern with a pack of cards and a pile of chips. ’ . Mr. Snod looked up, pushed his hat back. “Now, Mama, why don’t you go in an’ sign your postal cards?” he said. “Why don’t you run along. in an—" : “Run nowhere!” Dolly Snod broke in shrilly—thin high voice, little toy high steam- whistle, little female chanticleer. “When I go in, Cubby Snod, you'll go right along with me! Am I going to have a husband spend his life with a bunch of poker hounds? No! Will I eat alone night after night and him sitting on the railroad track? No! Is there any reason my - husband: can’t stay home like other husbands? No! TI should worry myself into gray hair for some- one who—" A window-shade snapped up in the dark car behind her. “Dolly, for cryin’ out loud!” some- body said. “Can’t you get wise to the fact folks are tryin’ to sleep! You've got a voice like a rusty baby car- riage” ou = “ Dolly Snod looked up at a face and a topknot of hair, an indistinct daub against the shadows. “Say, this country’s free!” she re- torted. “I've got a right to talk to my own husband! If anybody don’t like it, they know what they—" A tall man with trousers over a nightshirt, shoe-strings flapping, hair mussed by having been in bed, swung down the car steps behind Mrs. Dolly Snod, picked her under one arm like a bundle of laundry and strode down the track. Mrs. Snod kicked and sput- tered, shrieked a little, hit him on the knees. Two hundred feet along he plumped her up on the platform of a car where the door was open, a light shining, a smell of coffee coming out. “There,” he said. “Now stay there’ Tl] tell Cubby what you've got to say to him!” Mrs. Snod stood on and watched him go back up the track, saw him arrive at the circle of lantern-light, reach down, pick up a wriggling something. Then she laughed, got herself back on the plat- form, an dpresently up beside pink silk Mrs. Snod, was popped a rumpled Mr. Snod, with a pair of deuces, a jack and an ace in one hand, and two blue poker chips in the other. “Now, Dolly, hush up!” the man in nightshirt-sleeves said shortly. “If you've got anything to say anybody wants to hear, say it—but if you think you're picked for stump speak- in’—well, you ain’t—see ?” Mr. Snod sqirmed his vest and coat where they were meant to be. “If the time ever comes,’ he remarked, with the scorn of a bantam in ruffled feath- ers, “when Mrs. Snod says anything anybody wants to hear, I'll eat hay via a horse! Stand right up and eat ay!” v A tall, slender girl in a green bath- robe came to the doorway, her hair a bush of pale white, with milk-white skin, pink eyes. “Mrs. Snod, I turned the fire out under your coffee,” she said. “It boiled over. I swiped a piece of your liver-wurst too, it looked so tasty. Been a lovely day, hasn’t it?” Mr. Snod put the deuces, jack and ace in his pocket. “Been 3 lovely night too,” he said, and glanced at his wife. ’ “Oh, positively!” Mrs. Snod twit tered, with a sarcastic lifting of shoul- ders, “and I'm right here to tell the the whole world if you think I'll park home any more while—” Abruptly Mr. Snod shoved her in- side the car, past the girl in the bath- robe, and on down an aisle from which opened a line of stateroom doors. Past one, two, three they went, then in at a fourth. The door shut, locked with a click behind them; and so retired from the scene Mr. and Mrs. Cubby Snod—Mr. Snod thirty inches tall, Mrs. Snod twenty-nine, those mar-ve- lous teen-y mites, the most am-az-ing plat-form ex-hi-bi-shawn in his-to- ry! Those dimp-ling ba-by dolls from Lill-i-pu-shah, seen for the first time under any canvas at the price of ten cents, one dime, on the side-show stage of the great Bonson Cir-cus! ; Cutting across a meadow that ab- 81 where beds, and rugs of woven grass, was just an oblong blot of shadow. In 82, the car of staterooms for featured ar- tists, the first window—belonging to ing poodle; but in the third Mrs. Sel- don’s six-foot bungalow, a light shone, softly shaded with rose. Mrs. Seldon, embroidering for her children, three pale little blond English daughters in boarding-school. tip his chair back, read Dickens out loud. green curtains, and open rows of double beds, spread with dows. The bachelors’ walls were a gentleman’s racket shop. rings, pipe Holders, tobacco jars, pictures of mothers and sweethearts . . . In 83 Minnie heard voices chuck- ling by an open window, where a blaze of pipe smoke came curling out. On the ground outside, by lantern- light, the porter was shining the equestrian director’s high boots. Number 85 had the bandmen in one end, ticket boys in the other. Num- ber 86 was for married folks, a Pull- man car where each lady had one space to keep house in—to arrange wall covering, curtains, pitcures, pil- lows, shelf for books, pockets for oth- er things. Number 87 was the richly furnished private car of Mr. Bonson, parlor, bedroom, bath and kitchen; 88 belonged to the single girls; 89 con- tained the staterooms for stars; 90. Brazilian tumbling troupes; 91, In- dian braves, their squaws and papoos- es; 92 the Wild West, and so on to a hundred. It was a long train, the show-train —a little city. Tailor and barber with their wives (Pansy and Lily, the Au- stralian Contortion Sisters), were in 86. Doctor and lawyer were bache- lors in 83. It was a little city with everything a little city would ever need. It was outside 90 where the poker game had been. It was 84, the side- show car, where the Snods had gone to bed; 84 with out-size accomoda- tions for outsize people—the Snods with their tiny wicker; Major Chris- topher Paddlefora, the giant, in a Space twice as long as any other man had; Miss Loobie, 450-pound nightin- gale, with two rooms in one, her sol- id oak bed and her kewpies, feather flowers, paper plumes, other stands,” Myrtle the Turtle Girl, adjoining Loobie; then Elmo and Florina, the sword swallowers—in pri- vate life Mr. and Mrs. Colette; Spike the Skeleton, Bounso the Rubber Man, Circassian Albino. On the steps of 84 Minnie sat look- ing out at the dark. Across the mea- dow on the road into town a stream of automobile lights crept along. Min- nie watched them, counted them. A star fell. She made a wish. Then in- side the car she heard someone com- the bottom step e light went on, and Loobie’s face with its five dimples appeared in the high window. “Late leavin’ tonight, ain’t we?” Loobie said. “You still waitin’ for Cal 7”? Every night Cal Coney, big bronze Texas cowboy, brought Minnie rolls and cold tea for late supper. “Four- gun Cal, the sharp-shootin’ fool”— lazy smile, gentle, awkward hands, gray, boyish eyes. “Shootin’ straight is nothin’ but a bad habit,” he used to drawl, his hands sliding around the edge of his sombrero, “Almighty often I wish I couldn’t shoot so easy. Sometimes I cain’t hardly keep from shootin’ where it ain’t my lookout to be speak- in’ up aye tall.” Minnie waited for him every night on the steps of 84. Sometimes it would be in hushed summer darkness and stcrs, sometimes in the roaring train-shed of a city, sometimes where railroad tracks went through strag- gling streets of a town, but waiting on the steps of 84 was always just the same—just waiting on the steps of home, for where your kettle sings, where your window plants reach ten. drils to the light, where you have what you want, keepsakes, clock tick- ing, a neighbor stopping in, that is home, no matter where. Cal would get Minnie’s rolls and tea every night at the privilege car— the lunch-counter car where food could be had after the cook-house was Joaded and off jie lot; end $he privic ege car was always on the section o working men’s bunks at the “runs.” gone, an engine would pick up this trophies of ing down the hall to the wash-room. ! ight like blotting- | Sometimes the railroad sidi sorbed the inky night li £ Sometimes be switch : night the bunk-cars and flats were two, perhaps three miles away, “Where we at tomorrow, Mninie?” Loobie wanted to know, her face streaked with cold cream. Loobie’s complexion was like peach blosoms in June. : “Cincinnati,” Minnie told her. “And we Sunday in Cleveland.” ; A “Cleveland!” the Nightingale war- bled. “You don’t say! And me with three sweethearts that’s Cleveland boys! I'll do so heavy on the _post- cards I'll spoil my fingers takin’ in change! Can't I fix you some coffee while you're waitin’ for Cal 7” “No, thanks,” Minnie said. “He'll be coming.” : : “Take a chair anyway,” Loobie re- marked, and a fat white arm reached out an oblong of canvas and strips of wood. Minnie unfolded it in the slanting light from inside. “Thanks,” she said. “I'll sit down and mate socks.” Out of her pocket she brought z tangle of men’s socks, black, gray and brown. Minnie made pin-monev washing and mending socks for the show boys at fifteen cents a pair. Two days till Monday, she was thinking. Nice shopping in Cleveland. Try to get out and shop a little in Cleveland. Silk dress, light coat, may- be. Get out early before parade, be- fore time for free attraction. Be in Cleveland Sunday morning—go to church—no show Sunday, clean the | stateroon Sunday, get out early Mon- the Jap tumblers had their hard little : i | | top-mounter of the Bicycle | Montana! Cyclones, spent every spare minute | was, | day. Blue silk dress, blue coat . . . She heard someone coming down the track. Steps crunching the cin- ders. A stubby man, in shabby clothes, came out of the shadows, saw her and stopped. He had a long box—a flow- the bareback-riding Cane sisters with er box. their portable organ and hand-painted | ] wall-paper—was dark, and the secone la’ : nd dark too—Jean Kittrige and her danc- | said, staring up at Minnie, old cap “Fer Pete’s sake, where can a fel- find anybody around here?” he on the back of his head, mussed col- lar and tie. “I been tryin’ three hours to deliver this here box to Miss Anna Went where the tents followed the wagons, found all the lions and tigers, but fer Pete's sake where’s the people. He took off Mr. Seldon would his cap and wiped his forehead. “The puff his pipe and guy that brought these here posies | give me a dollar to deliver ’em per- Car 83 was the bachelor car. Berths | sonal,” he said, “but I'm like a Pullman, divided at night with | body wants ’em they can come here in daytime two | and Necktie | eyes as he shuffled away, shaving mirrors, | over railroad ties. of a smile! done! If any- t em!” With a slap of cardboard on the cretonne like the strips at the win- | floor, he left the box at Minnie’s feet, staring at her with squinted curious stumbling Minnie loked down at the name everybody knew, little girl everybody loved, brown gipsy curls, brown love- ly eyes; little girl who rode that In- dian cayuse, holding crowds breath- less while her body, like fluttering scarlet silk, would vault from side to side—would fling up in a straight, beautiful shoulder stand, dark curls tumbling against the yellow leather of her Wild West saddle. Boyish sa lute in the spot-light! Quick ripple Little girl everybody loved—Anna Montana. A swindler with pudgy, persuasive hands and a plump peacock swagger had appeared in the gay winter crowd Biarritz, the season before, and in Biarritz there had also been a tall, | handsome young man, with a dark lit- ’ | tle mustache and eyes like chips of polished onyx, watching everybody, everything as a collector of specimens might pin- butterflies to the wall; a odd, constant smile through shrewd, half-closed eyelids. That smile was the swindlers own language. He had tapped pudgy fingers on the other's coat sleeve. “We must get together,” he said said. “I like you.” Swindlers ! The pudgy swindler, and the other one, looked on together, waiting for a right moment, but sometimes a man will find a thing he isn’t looking for, There was a pale, lovely Countess at Biarritz, and suddenly "that dark, handsome man, whose eyes pinned butterflies to the wall, found himself pinned — to the inexorable wall of love! Suddenly he found himself following ‘hands, lips, a voice he couldn’t forget ! Often before he had loved for adventure; but now he sud- denly loved— for love ! She wanted jewels and things like that—— wanted to have them wheth- er she wanted them or not. So he stole $20,000. he was caught. A man is a fool who will try to find his way in the dark by the streak of a comet that rides the sky for one in- stant—to nowhere ! The pudgy swindler came forward to help him—came forward and put up a bond that six months from date the money would be paid. “Now you only need to remember,” he had said, tapping the dark-eyed, handsome thief on the coat sleeve, “that I'm good—but not easy!” So, in search of $20,000, the man with polished eyes had left Biarritz for the United States. The lovely Countess had wept a little—h ad promised to wait for him . . . It was springtime in America. In the odd way of life’s little blocks fit- ting together, that man who had left a countess and a prison bond in Biar- ritz happened in at a certain New York club, happened to meet a cer- tain big, wealthy Anger Bonson, hap- pened to hear Mr. Bonson tell a cer- tain little inside secret of his cele- brated Bonson Show—happened also to hear him say he was tired of trav- eling, was looking for someone with appearance and shrewdness to take his place on the road; and when April turned May someone did take his place—the man with onyx eyes and manner finished as satin—Mr. Rawl Sovaine. And then Rawl Sovaine had begun to watch Anna Montana, little West- ern girl who had come to that Bon- son show with lasso and bronco! Day after day he would watch her go into the ring. Day after day he would be at the back door when she would come out from her act. He would catch her by her shoulder to wipe her flushed, dirt-streaked face with his linen hand. kerchief, she looking up at him laugh- ing, trying to get back her breath from the whirlwind of her tricks. Be- tween afternoon and night show he had come every day to find her—to ngs would walk bled curls, against his shoulder, And now across this flower box at Minnie’s feet Anna Montana’s name was written in the wide purple scrawl, the heavy pen and purple ink of that man the rest of them scarcely knew. Down the track Minnie saw Bo Serko coming—Serko the lion tamer, lanky, stoop-shouldered, coming back from feedings his cubs. “Evenin,’ Minnie.” He stopped, coat over his arm, handkerchief in his col- lar. “Say, that cat Cleopatra ripped my silk shirt again today! Ever see such a lovin’ leopard for jungle stock? Didn’t mean nothin’, just play- ful, but I ain’t got shirts enough to afford no temperamental leopards! I'll have to work Cleo in a suit like Launcelot or some o' them boys! Would you patch a shirt for a pal, Min?” He rolled up his right sleeve. “The rip on the shirt’s the same size as this,” he said. ‘ Minnie glanced at a thick scratch from his wrist to his elbow. “Silk Shiris half a dollar,” she reminded im, “You bet,” he said. “I’ll bring goods right around.” Five minutes later when Bo re- turned to the half-light, half-shadow of the steps of 84, there, in brown Indian moccasins, pink apron, tum- Anna Montana was lifting into her arms a velvet weight of deep red roses. Bo stopped, drew in a breath of their sweetness. “Takes me back to Indiana—me and Jessie,” he said. He saw a card fal- len on the ground, picked it up, held it in the light. “ ‘To the girl 1 adore,’ ” he read aloud. “Well, if I'd sent ’em myself I'd wrote the same | thing.” “You'd be some lover, Bo,” some- body said from the doorway, and Florina came out in yellow Chinese coat and trousers, with auburn braids, a sheet of paper in her hand. “Ana speakin’ of sentimental,” she went on, “pipe this letter! A girl gone cuckoo over my husband! It’s certainly a laugh for anybody knows how bald he is! Listen to this: ‘Beloved, how I long for you! How I dream of cares- sing your beautiful hair!” I says to Elmo why not rent her his wig and get the money back it cost us! If I know my oats hell work bald ‘ after this! ell—love’s a fish-net catching little fish, ain’t it? Keeps ‘em flop- ping and struggling. They can’t stay in it—can’t stay out of it! Speaking of love, Anna, maybe it’s none of my business, but Mr. Sovaine told a per- son or two he asked you to marry him and you said yes.” "Anna looked up, startled, almost frightened, it seemed. “I hope it ain't true,” Florina went on bluntly. “That air of money he’s got would buy some girls but I hope not: you!” | Anna crushed the tissue that had | been around the roses, threw it down { beside the car, then with a quick, con- scious little gesture put her left hand up against the rose stems, where Florina could see on her fourth finger a single stone, a blue-white drop of light.