Miss Vincent had asked Miss Hackett to supper, and prepared herself and her fellow-teacher, Miss Calton, for a pleasant evening of talk, but to her great surprise, Dolores expressed her intention of going to the performance at the circus.

“My dear,” said Miss Vincent, “this is a very low affair-—not Sanger’s, nor anything so respectable.  They have been here before, and the lodging-house people went and were quite shocked.”

“Yes,” said Dolores, “but that is all the more reason I want to go.  There is a girl with them in whom we are very much interested.  She was kidnapped from Rockquay at the time this circus was there.  At least I am almost sure it is the same, and I must see if she is there.”

“But if she is you cannot do anything.”

“Yes, I can; I can let her brother know.  It must be done, Miss Vincent.  I have promised, and it is of fearful consequence.”

“Should you know her?”

“Oh yes.  I have often talked to her in Mrs. Henderson’s class.  I could not mistake her.”

Miss Hackett was so much horrified at the notion of a G. F. S. “business girl” being in bondage to a circus, that she gallantly volunteered to go with Miss Mohun, and Miss Vincent could only consent.

The place of the circus was an open piece of ground lying between Silverton and Silverfold, and thither they betook themselves-—Miss Hackett in an old bonnet and waterproof that might have belonged to any woman, and Dolores wearing a certain crimson ulster, which she had bought in Auckland for her homeward voyage, and which her cousins had chosen to dub as “the Maori.”  After a good deal of jostling and much scent of beer and bad tobacco they achieved an entrance, and sat upon a hard bench, half stifled with the odours, to which were added those of human and equine nature and of paraffin.  As to the performance, Dolores was too much absorbed in looking out for Ludmilla, together with the fear that Miss Hackett might either faint or grow desperate, and come away, to attend much to it; and she only was aware that there was a general scurrying, in which the horses and the elephant took their part; and that men and scantily dressed females put themselves in unnatural positions; that there was a firing of pistols and singing of vulgar songs, and finally the hero and heroine made their bows on the elephant’s back.

Miss Hackett wanted to depart before the Bleeding Bride came on, but Dolores entreated her to stay, and she heroically endured a little longer.  This seemed, consciously or not, to be a parody of the ballad of Lord Thomas and Fair Annet, but of course it began with an abduction on horseback and a wild chase, in which even the elephant did his part, and plenty more firing.  Then the future bride came on, supposed to be hawking, during which pastime she sang a song standing upright on horseback, and the faithless Lord Thomas appeared and courted her with the most remarkable antics of himself and his piebald steed.