The Corner House Girls at School Part 38

"This is Neale's uncle, Dot. Mr. Sorber has come here to see him."

At that Dot came forward and put her morsel of hand into the showman's enormous fist.

"You are very welcome, Neale's uncle," she said, bashfully. "We think Neale is a very nice boy, and if we had a boy in our family we'd want one just like Neale--wouldn't we, Tess?"

"Ye-es," grudgingly admitted the older girl. "If we _had_ to have a boy.

But, you know, Dot, we haven't _got_ to have one."

Mr. Sorber chuckled. "Don't you think boys are any good, little lady?"

he asked Tess.

"Not so very much," said the frank Tess. "Of course, Neale is different, sir. He--he can harness Billy b.u.mps, and--and he can turn cartwheels--and--and he can climb trees--and--and do lots of things perfectly well. There aren't many boys like him."

"I guess there ain't," agreed Mr. Sorber. "And does he ever tell you how he was took into the Lions' Den, like a little Dan'l, when he was two, with spangled pants on him and a sugar lollypop to keep him quiet?"

"Mercy!" gasped Agnes.

"In a lions' den?" repeated Tess, while Dot's pretty eyes grew so round they looked like gooseberries.

"Yes, Ma'am! I done it. And it made a hit. But the perlice stopped it.

Them perlice," said Mr. Sorber, confidentially, "are allus b.u.t.ting in where they ain't wanted."

"Like Billy b.u.mps," murmured Dot.

But Tess had struck a new line of thought and she wanted to follow it up. "Please, sir," she asked, "is that your business?"

"What's my business?"

"Going into lions' dens?"

"That's it. I'm a lion tamer, I am. And that's what I wanted to bring my nevvy up to, only his mother kicked over the traces and wouldn't have it."

"My!" murmured Tess. "It must be a very int'resting business. Do--do the lions ever bite?"

"They chews their food reg'lar," said Mr. Sorber gravely, but his eyes twinkled. "But none of 'em's ever tried to chew me. I reckon I look purty tough to 'em."

"And Neale's been in a den of lions and never told us about it?" gasped Agnes, in spite of herself carried away with the romantic side of the show business again.

"Didn't he ever?"

"He never told us he was with a circus at all," confessed Agnes. "He was afraid of being sent back, I suppose."

"And ain't he ever blowed about it to the boys?"

"Oh, no! He hasn't even told the school princ.i.p.al--or the man he lives with--or Ruth--or _anybody_," declared Agnes.

Mr. Sorber looked really amazed. He mopped his bald crown again and the color in his face deepened.

"Why, whizzle take me!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the showman, in surprise, "he's ashamed of us!"

Tess's kindly little heart came to the rescue immediately. "Oh, he couldn't be ashamed of his uncle, sir," she said. "And Neale is, really, a very nice boy. He would not be ashamed of any of his relations. No, sir."

"Well, mebbe not," grumbled Mr. Sorber; "but it looks mightily like it."

Despite the roughness and uncouth manner of the man, the children "got under his skin" as the saying is. Soon Tess and Dot bore the old showman off to the summer-house to introduce him to their entire family.

At that moment Ruth arrived--to Agnes' vast relief.

"Oh, Ruthie!" the second Corner House girl gasped. "It's come!"

"What's come?" asked Ruth, in amazement.

"What Mr. Con Murphy said would happen some day. It's all out about Neale----Poor Neale! The dam's busted!"

It was several minutes before Ruth could get any clear account from her sister of what had happened. But when she _did_ finally get into the story, Agnes told it lucidly--and she held Ruth's undivided attention, the reader may be sure.

"Poor Neale indeed!" murmured Ruth.

"What can we do?" demanded Agnes.

"I don't know. But surely, there must be some way out. I--I'll telephone to Mr. Howbridge."

"Oh, Ruthie! I never thought of that," squealed Agnes. "But suppose Neale comes before you can get Mr. Howbridge here?"

Ruth put on her thinking cap. "I tell you," she said. "Introduce me to Mr. Sorber. Get him to promise to stay to supper with Neale. That will give us time."

This plot was carried out. Ruth saw Mr. Sorber, too, under a much more favorable light. Dolls were much too tame for Dot and Tess, when they realized that they had a real live lion tamer in their clutches. So they had Mr. Sorber down on a seat in the corner of the summer-house, and he was explaining to them just how the lions looked, and acted--even how they roared.

"It's lots more int'resting than going to the circus to see them," Dot said, reflectively. "For _then_ you're so scared of them that you can't remember how they look. But Mr. Sorber is a perfectly _safe_ lion. He's even got false teeth. He told us so."

Mr. Sorber could scarcely refuse Ruth's invitation. He was much impressed by the appearance of the oldest Corner House girl.

"I reckon that rascally nevvy of mine has been playin' in great luck since he run away from Twomley & Sorber's Herculean Circus and Menagerie. Shouldn't blame him if he wanted to stay on. I'd wanter myself. Pleased to meet you, Miss."

Ruth hurried to the nearest telephone and called up the lawyer's office.

She was not much surprised to find that he was not there, it being Sat.u.r.day afternoon.

So then she called up the house where he lived. After some trouble she learned that her guardian had left town for over Sunday. She was told where he had gone; but Ruth did not feel it would be right to disturb him at a distance about Neale's affairs.

"Whom shall I turn to for help?" thought Ruth. "Who will advise us?

Above all, who will stop this man Sorber from taking Neale away?"

She had a reckless idea of trying to meet Neale on the road and warn him. He could hide--until Mr. Howbridge got back, at least.

Perhaps she could catch Neale at the cobbler's house. And then, at thought of the queer little old Irishman, all Ruth's worry seemed to evaporate. Mr. Con Murphy was the man to attend to this matter. And to the cobbler's little cottage she immediately made her way.

The story she told the little Irishman made him drop the shoe he was at work upon and glare at her over his spectacles, and with his scant reddish hair ruffled up. This, with his whiskers, made him look like a wrathful c.o.c.katoo.