“ ‘We got to get Gus,’ said the strange voice. ‘Gus is the one who’ll know what to do. Don’t talk about him being dead. Haven’t you got any sense? We got to get Gus right now.’ Then Willard spoke. ‘Yeah, Gus, Gus, Gus; it’s always Gus with you. Gus hates me. I’ll be outa the show.’ ‘Leave Gus to me about you and the show,’ said the other voice; ‘but only Gus can deal with this right now. You wait here.’

“The other man went away, and as he went I heard the heavy door of the freight-car—for I was in a freight-car in which the World of Wonders took its trappings from town to town—and I was for a second time alone with Willard. Through my eyelashes I could see him sitting on a box beside me. His Mephistophelian air of command was gone; he looked diminished, shabby, and afraid.

“After a time the other man returned with Gus, who proved to be a woman—a real horse’s godmother of a woman, a little, hard-faced, tough woman who looked like a jockey. But she inspired confidence, and while it would be false to say that my spirits lightened, I felt a little less desolate. I have always had a quick response to people, and though it is sometimes wrong it is more often right. If I like them on sight they are lucky people for me, and that’s really all I care about. Gus was in a furious temper.

“ ‘Willard, you son-of-a-bitch, what the hell have you got us into now? Lemme look at this kid.’ Gus knelt and hauled me round so that she could see me. Then she sent the other man to open the doors further, to give her a better light.

“Gus had a rough touch, and she hurt me so that I whimpered. ‘What’s your name, kid?’ she said. ‘Paul Dempster.’ ‘Who’s your Dad?’ ‘Reverend Amasa Dempster.’ This pushed Gus’s rage up a few notches. ‘A reverend’s kid,’ she shouted; ‘you had to go and kidnap a reverend’s kid. Well, I wash my hands of you, Willard. I hope they hang you, and if they do, by God I’ll come and swing on your feet!’

“I can’t pretend to remember all their talk, because Gus sent the unknown man, whom she called Charlie, to get water and milk and food for me, and while they wrangled she fed me, first, sugared water from a spoon, and then, when I had plucked up a little, some milk, and finally a few biscuits. I can still remember the pain as my body began to return to its normal state, and the pins-and-needles in my arms and legs. She put me on my feet and walked me up and down but I was wobbly, and couldn’t stand much of that.

“Nor can I pretend that I understood much of what was said at that time, though later, from knowledge I picked up over a period of years, I know what it must have been. I was not Gus’s chief problem; I was a complication of a problem that was already filling the foreground of her mind. Wanless’s World of Wonders belonged to Gus, and her brothers Charlie and Jerry; they were Americans, although their show toured chiefly in Canada, and Charlie ought to have been in the American Army, for the 1917 draft had included him and he had had his call-up. But Charlie had no mind for fighting, and Gus was doing her best to keep him out of harm’s way, in hopes that the War would end before his situation became desperate. Charlie was very much her darling, and I judge he must have been at least ten years younger than she; Jerry was the oldest. Therefore, involvements with the law were not to Gus’s taste, even though they might bring about the downfall of Willard. She detested him because he was Charlie’s best friend, and a bad influence. Willard, in his panic, had abducted me, and it was up to Gus to get me out of the way without calling attention to the Wanless family.