Mr. Kyle was adjusting a long black patch over one eye, making his appearance more grotesque than before. Suddenly the band stopped playing. The last of the procession, having finished the circuit, wound out of the ring. Then came a blare of trumpets. “Come on!” cried Sam, and he ran from the dressing-tent into the big canvas-covered arena, where the performance had started. Other clowns followed him, and a score of additional performers--acrobats, tumblers and tight-rope walkers--ran out. Jack followed more slowly. This was to be the real test. He wondered how he would succeed. He decided he would repeat the same thing he had done for the manager that afternoon. He had secured several of the paper-covered hoops, and he resolved to give as odd an imitation of a man trying to fly as possible. Once he had passed beyond the canvas curtain that shut off the dressing-tent from the main one, Jack beheld a scene that he long remembered. In the light of the big gasolene torches, high up on the tent poles, he saw many performers going through their acts. There came to his nostrils the smell of freshly-turned earth that formed the ring banks, the damp sawdust, the odor of wild animals, the stifling whiff of gasolene. He heard the music of the band, the shouts of the ringmasters, the high, shrill laughter of the clowns. And he heard other sounds. They were the merry shouts and applause of the big audience. For there was a large throng present. Jack looked about on the sloping banks of people. Their faces showed curiously white and their eyes oddly black in the brilliant lights. Jack’s mind was in a whirl. But he was suddenly roused from his daze by a sharp voice calling to him. “Say, what’s the matter with you? Going to stand there all day? What are you paid for? Get busy! Do something!” Then came the sharp crack of a whip, and Jack jumped, for the end of the lash had caught him on the legs, which were but thinly protected with his cotton clown suit. “Jump lively!” cried the voice, and Jack turned to see Otto Mitz, the ringmaster, in his dress-suit and white gloves, waving his long whip. Once more the lash came curling toward Jack, but he jumped aside in time to avoid it. There was a laugh from that portion of the audience in front of which he stood. Doubtless they thought it was part of the show. With anger in his heart at the man who had been so needlessly cruel, Jack broke into a little run. Though he had not known it, he was suffering a little bit from “stage fright.” The ringmaster had cured him of it. The boy felt a fierce desire to make the people laugh heartily--to show that he could “make good.”