“‘Morning, sure enough,’ answered Gray Ears, as he ponderously rose to his feet. ‘As for tents and clowns and all that sort of thing, I’m sure I’ve seen none, though I must say you were making fuss enough just before you waked up to have been playing hide-and-go-seek with all in existence. But tell me what it all was about.’
“And so, as we busied ourselves gathering berries and green grass for breakfast, I related the whole of my dream.
“‘Now, really,’ I questioned in ending, ‘are there that many clowns with the Very Biggest Circus?’
“‘Goodness, no,’ laughed Gray Ears. ‘Still, there are many—two score and more.’
“‘Alas, then,’ I sighed, ‘they will not need Diggeldy Dan.’
“‘Nevertheless they will keep you,’ answered my friend, as we sat down to our meal, ‘and for this reason: as you of course know, I am a runaway from the Very Biggest Circus, and one of its very great features. Now, while I said nothing at the time, I came upon this placard tacked to a tree while you were examining the circus grounds at the edge of the town last night.’
“And with that Gray Ears produced a square of bright yellow cardboard with these words in tall type printed on it:
LOST Gray Ears, The Elephant Large and Suitable Reward if Returned to The Very Biggest Circus
“‘Goodness,’ I cried at the sight of it, ‘we must be careful else some one will capture you and take you back home before you are ready to go!’
“‘Careful, bosh,’ retorted Gray Ears. ‘Why begin being careful when I am already captured?’
“‘Already captured!’ I exclaimed in amazement. ‘By whom?’
“‘Why,’ said he, ‘by none other than Diggeldy Dan.’
“‘But I don’t understand,’ I began. ‘You mean—’
“‘That you are to take me back to the Very Biggest Circus and claim the reward—the reward of being allowed to be one of its clowns. So come now, make haste and let us break camp. For we must be ready to enter the big tent to-night and between now and then we have a long way to go.’”
CHAPTER XV IN WHICH DAN AND GRAY EARS ARRIVE AT THEIR GOAL
“Some day I may relate the happenings that fell to our lot between the heart of the woods and the great river’s edge,” continued Diggeldy Dan. “But I fancy you are just now most impatient to learn exactly what came to pass when Gray Ears and I reached our long journey’s end. So, suppose we all shut our eyes very tight, give a marvelous jump and, thus leaving the point where breakfast was had, land plump on the spot from whence I got my first glimpse of the tents that were to be my new home.