"Pietro told me you have a gold charm that matches these little horses," she said. "I just couldn't resist the temptation to come and see if by chance it might be the one which is missing from this bracelet."
Lolita misunderstood. Frowning, she said, "Oh, my goodness! You don't think I stole it?"
Nancy was aghast. "No, no," she said quickly. "I'm sorry. I'm just interested in knowing whether you've ever seen my bracelet or heard anything about its history."
Lolita shook her head, but she fingered the exquisite little horses. Then, going to a bureau drawer, she brought out a dainty gold chain. Attached was a golden horse. The miniature animal, wrought exactly like those on Nancy's bracelet, was a duplicate of the cantering horse.
"Your bracelet may have belonged to my lovely mother," said Lolita sadly. "She died when I was only eight years old, but I remember very well how she looked."
"Perhaps she sold the bracelet," Nancy suggested.
Lolita agreed this was possible, but it would be difficult to determine the fact definitely. Whenever she asked Mr. or Mrs. Kroon about her parents, the couple changed the subject. The reason they gave was that they did not like to talk about the Flanders' terrible accident. Leaning close to Nancy, she whispered:
"Sometimes I wonder if it's true that my parents are dead."
"Would you like me to help you find out?" Nancy asked on the spur of the moment.
"Oh, could you?" Lolita exclaimed, giving Nancy an impetuous hug.
Nancy told the girl that she had solved a few mysteries and would be glad to find out what she could. She asked if Lolita could give her any clues at all, but the young aerialist shook her head.
"As I told you before, my foster parents are very closemouthed. Sometimes I think there must be a reason back of why they won't tell me anything."
Suddenly Lolita looked at a clock on the wall. The fifteen minutes were up!
"You'd better go now," she said abruptly. "Mr. Kroon will be here any moment and he mustn't see you." Suddenly Lolita again put her arms around Nancy. "I never saw you until a few minutes ago," she said, "but already you are my friend. I feel much better than I did a few minutes ago. Doing my high-wire act seemed impossible then, but now I'll be able to put on a good show."
As they stepped outside, Lolita asked where Nancy would be sitting and said she would wave to her. Learning that the girl and her escort had been unable to obtain tickets, Lolita declared that she would get two for her. The aerialist called to a man who was walking past the trailer.
"Oh, Dan," she said. "Come here quickly, please."
As the man hurried over, Lolita introduced him to Nancy as Dan Webster, one of the horse trainers. Suddenly Lolita laughed, then remarked that she had failed to ask her caller's name. When Nancy told her, Lolita said to Dan Webster:
"Please get Nancy two of the special seats and hurry. Bring them back here."
As Dan hurried off, Nancy saw Kroon approaching. Quickly she ducked around the corner out of sight.
Reaching the trailer, Kroon glared at Lolita. "Well, what's your answer?" he stormed.
"I feel better, Father. I'll do my act," Lolita said quietly.
The man gave a raucous laugh, took her by the hand, and led her away. "Get into your costume," he ordered.
As Nancy waited for Dan Webster to return with the tickets, her dislike for Kroon mounted. She decided to make every effort to find out for Lolita more about her real parents. The fact that the aerialist herself had doubts of their death was a further incentive to the young sleuth.
The horse trainer returned in a few minutes and walked with Nancy as far as the side shows. On the way she told him of her endeavors to learn trick riding from Señor Roberto who used to be with Sims' Circus.
"So this is where Roberto has been hiding!" Dan Webster exclaimed. "Everybody wondered where he'd gone. I'll certainly have to run out to see him tomorrow morning. Where is his riding academy?"
Nancy gave him directions and then left the trainer. She had a difficult time finding Ned in the thronged side shows. But finally she located him munching an ice-cream sandwich.
"I couldn't watch that fire-eater any longer," he said. "I began to feel as if my own tongue were half-cooked."
Nancy chuckled and told him that she had obtained seats.
Ned shook his head in amazement. "I might have known that you would accomplish the impossible."
The seats were in the front row of a box directly along the tanbark. As the performance was about to start, Nancy noticed that the other seats in the box were empty. With the house sold out, why had no one claimed them, she wondered.
When the parade ended, Nancy watched eagerly for the clowns to appear. Every one of them came out except Pietro.
"I wonder what happened to him?" she asked herself.
Nancy was so worried that she hardly saw the funny antics going on near her. Finally she leaned out and asked one of the clowns where Pietro was.
"I haven't seen him," the clown replied, and went on with his stunts.
The act ended and still Pietro did not appear.
"Maybe Kroon is responsible," Nancy thought.
What if the ringmaster had begun to carry out his threat of dismissing all of Lolita's friends!
A few moments later Kroon stepped to the center of the ring and announced that the next performance would be a horse act.
"This is the world's smartest horse!" the ringmaster proclaimed. "He thinks like a human being."
All the lights went out except the spotlight on the ring. A beautiful pure-white horse trotted in from the wings.
Nancy was vaguely aware that a man had slid into the seat directly behind her. But she was too intrigued by what was going on in the ring to pay particular attention to the latecomer.
Suddenly she felt something tight against her throat. The next moment, Nancy realized that she was being choked!
CHAPTER VIA Threat
As the choking sensation increased, Nancy's hand flew to her throat. To the girl's horror she felt a cord around her neck. It was being drawn tighter and tighter.
She tugged at it frantically but could not remove or even loosen the cord. Objects in the circus were swimming before Nancy's eyes and her breath was coming in gasps.
Ned turned just as she was about to black out. Nancy reached out toward him, then fainted. Aghast, he caught her and quickly unwound the cord.
"Nancy! Nancy!" he whispered. "What? Who—?"
She gave a tremendous gasp and a slight tremor ran through her body. Ned massaged her neck and arms. In a few moments her breathing became normal again.
Nancy sat up and looked around her. Then, suddenly recalling the awful ordeal of a moment ago, she clutched her throat. When she found no cord constricting it, she looked questioningly at Ned. Had she imagined the whole thing?
"Are you all right?" Ned asked anxiously.
"Y-yes. What happened to me?"
He told her, pointing to a souvenir whip on the floor. Then he added, "I'll find out who did this devilish thing! It must have been the work of a maniac!"
Nancy now recalled having heard someone sit down in the seat behind her. He must be the guilty person! But turning around, Nancy saw that the seat was now vacant. Getting up, she walked to the box directly back of theirs and spoke to a woman in it.
"Did you notice the man who was sitting behind me?" she asked.
"Why, sort of," the woman replied. "Why?"
"He tried to choke me," Nancy told her.
"What!" the woman cried, looking about her nervously.
Ned had followed Nancy and now asked the woman if she could give any description of the man.
"I'm afraid not. I was watching the show."
The woman said that the only reason she had noticed the man at all was because he had obstructed her view for a couple of seconds as he took his seat. He had bothered her the same way when he had left.