PAGE 7
The Eagle’s Claws
by
* * * * *
At five o’clock that afternoon, Mr. Medderbrook, escorted by Mr. Gubb, entered the side-show tent. The lady and gentlemen freaks were resting before evening grub, and all were gathered around Syrilla’s platform, for the news that she was to leave the show to enter a home of wealth and refinement had spread quickly. Syrilla herself was in tears. Now that the time had come she was loath to part from her kind companions.
“I tell you, Mr. Gubb,” Mr. Medderbrook said, as they entered the side-show, “if you have indeed found my daughter you have made me a happy man. You cannot know how lonesome my life has been. Now, which is she?”
“She is the female lady in the pink satin dress on that platform,” said Mr. Gubb.
Mr. Medderbrook looked toward Syrilla and gasped.
“Why, that–that’s the Fat Woman! That’s the Fat Woman of the side-show!” he exclaimed. “I thought–I–why, my daughter wouldn’t be a Fat Woman in a side-show!”
“But she is,” said Mr. Gubb.
“Great Scott!” exclaimed Mr. Medderbrook.
For years Mr. Medderbrook had retained a memory of his daughter as he had seen her last, a tender babe in long clothes. As he rode toward West Higgins, however, he had thought about his daughter and he had revised his conception of her. She was older now, of course, and he had finally settled the matter by deciding that she would be a dainty slip of a girl–probably a tight-rope walker or one of the toe-dancers in the Grand Spectacle, or perhaps even engaged as the Ten-Thousand-Dollar Beauty. But a Fat Lady! Mr. Medderbrook walked toward Syrilla. Every eye in the tent was upon him. There was utter silence except for Syrilla’s happy sobbing.
“Shess!” said a voice suddenly. “You bet I vos here! Und I vant my money! Years I haf been collecding dot bill, und still you owe me. Now I come, and you pay me all vot you owe or I make troubles!”
The voice came from outside the tent, and with surprising agility Detective Gubb dived under the platform and wriggled under the canvas wall.
“I don’t owe you a cent!” exclaimed the voice of Mr. Enderbury. “I’ve paid you for every bit of tattoo I have on me.”
“Seven hunderdt dollars vos der contract,” cried the voice of Herr Schreckenheim. “Und ten dollars is due me yet. I vant it.”
“Well, you’ll keep on wanting it,” said Mr. Enderbury’s voice. “Look here! Look at my chest. There’s the eagle you did on me–do you see any claws on it? No, you don’t! Well, I’m not going to pay for claws that are not on me. No, sir!”
“Claws? I do some claws on you, don’t I, ven I do dot eagle?” asked the German-American.
“Yes, but they’re not on me now, are they?” asked Mr. Enderbury, “You can go and collect from the person that has them. What do I care for her now? She’s going to quit the circus business. I’ve paid for all the tattoo that’s on me; you go and collect ten dollars for those claws from Syrilla.”
“Und how does she get those claws on her?” asked Herr Schreckenheim shrewdly.
“I’ll tell you how,” said Mr. Enderbury. “You remember when Griggs’ & Barton’s Circus burned down years ago? Well, Syrilla was burned in that fire–burned on the arm–and they took her to a hospital and her arm wouldn’t heal. So somebody had to furnish some skin for a skin-grafting job, and I did it. The piece they took had those claws on it. That’s what happened. I gave those eagle’s claws to cure her, and I’ve hung around her all these years like a faithful dog, and she don’t care a hang for me, and now she’s going away. Go and collect for those claws from her. I haven’t got them. She’s going to be rich; she can pay you!”