The Circus of Dr. Lao Read Online Free PDF

good English. Didn't want any free publicity for his show or anything. Said he understood it was customary for newspaper men to get in at all the shows and entertainments for nothing anyway, so he was bringing around a few passes to save trouble out at the grounds. Oh, by the way, Etaoin, did you see the parade this morning? I missed it, but from what I've heard it was a kinda screwy thing."
     "It was unusual rather than screwy," said Etaoin. "Did you hear anything about a bear that looked like a man?"
     "No," said the editor, "but I did hear something about a man that looked like a bear."
     "That's just as good," said the proofreader.
     "Well, what about this unicorn stuff?" asked the editor.
     "Yeah, they had a unicorn, too."
     "Oh, yeah? Seems to me I heard something about a sphinx, also."
     "There was a sphinx there, too."
     "Oh, yeah?"
     "Uh huh. And the golden ass of Apuleius was there and the sea serpent and Apollonius of Tyana and the hound of the hedges and a satyr."
     "Quite a collection," said the editor. "You haven't forgotten any of them, have you?"
     Etaoin thought awhile. "Oh, sure," he said; "I did forget. There was that Russian."
         At a quarter of two Mr. Etaoin started for the circus grounds intent on viewing the sideshows first before the big top opened up for the main performance. He had a pass good for everything anyway; there was no profit in not using it to the uttermost; no sense in not squeezing from it everything gratis that could be squeezed. Money was made to buy things with, but passes were designed to take you places for nothing. The freedom of the press.
     It was hot as he walked through the streets of Abalone. Etaoin reflected how much better it was to have it so hot rather than correspondingly cold — it would be way below zero. Overcoats. Mufflers. Overshoes. Eartabs. And every time he'd go in a door the lenses of his glasses would cloud over with opaque frostiness, and he would have to take them off and regard things with watery eyes while he wiped them dry again. A pox on wintertime. A curse on cold weather. An imprecation on snow. The only ice Mr. Etaoin ever wanted to see again was ice in little dices made in electric refrigerators. The only snow he ever wanted to see again was the snow in newsreels. He wiped the perspiration from his brow and crossed to the shady side of the street. On the telephone wires birds perched, their bills hanging open in the terrific heat. Heat waves like cellophane contours writhed from building roofs.
     By the time he reached the circus grounds he had almost forgotten the circus; and, as be walked up to the tents, he was at a loss to think what he was doing there in that dusty field under the red-hot sun at that time of day. Then over the pathway between the rows of tents he saw a big red and black banner. It proclaimed:

    THE CIRCUS OF DOCTOR LAO

         "So that's the name of it," thought Mr. Etaoin.
     The tents were all black and glossy and shaped not like tents but like hard-boiled eggs standing on end. They started at the sidewalk and stretched back the finite length of the field, little pennants of heat boiling off the top of each. No popstands were in sight. No balloon peddlers. No noisemakers. No hay. No smell of elephants. No roustabouts washing themselves in battered buckets. No faded women frying hot dogs in fly-blown eating stands. No tent pegs springing up under one's feet every ninth step.
     A few people stood desultorily about; a few more wafted in and around the rows of tents. But the tent doors all were closed; cocoon-like they secreted their mysterious pupae; and the sun beat down on the circus grounds of Abalone, Arizona.
     Then a gong clanged and brazenly shattered the hot silence. Its metallic screams rolled out in waves of irritating sound. Heat waves scorched the skin. Dust waves seared the eyes.