<h2 id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V<br/> <small>TAMBA IN A BARN</small></h2>
<p class="cap">With the smashed circus cars, the
broken animal cages, with some of the
jungle beasts, including the elephants,
cut and bruised, with shoutings, growlings, roarings
and tootings going on, the scene at the circus
train wreck was a terrible one. It was no wonder
that Tamba, the tame tiger, wanted to run
away from it all and get to a quiet place. And
this he did.</p>
<p>He crawled out of his cage, that had been
broken when it slipped off the smashed car, and
gave one last look at it in the darkness.</p>
<p>“Good-by, old cage!” said Tamba, softly, as he
turned to run away. “I’ve been in you for the
last time. I’m never coming back to the circus!”</p>
<p>Leaving the noise and confusion of the circus
wreck behind him, Tamba slunk off into the tall
grass that grew in the fields beside the railroad
track. The accident had happened at a lonely
place, and there were no houses near at hand.</p>
<p>“Ha! This is a little like the jungle where I<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_46"></SPAN>[46]</span>
used to live!” thought Tamba, as he slunk
through the tall grass. “I can hide here until I
see which way to go to get back home.”</p>
<p>And Tamba was right. The grass grew long,
as it did in the jungle, but there were not so many
trees and tangled vines as in India. Only at
night it seemed a very quiet, restful place to the
tiger who had been so shaken up in the wreck.</p>
<p>Tamba walked on and on through the darkness,
not really knowing, and not much caring,
which way he went. All he wanted to do was to
get away and hide, and the tall grass was just the
place for this.</p>
<p>In a little while Tamba came to a place where
there was a small pool of water. It had leaked
from a pipe that filled the tank where the railroad
engines took their water. Tamba drank
some, and then, finding a place where the grass
was taller and thicker than any he had yet seen,
he made himself a sort of nest and curled up in
it.</p>
<p>“I can sleep here, and Nero, that big lion, can’t
splash any water into my nose and make me
sneeze,” thought Tamba, as he snuggled up.</p>
<p>At first he could not get to sleep. He had
been too much frightened by the train wreck,
though he was so far away now that he could not
hear the din, which still kept up. But at last
Tamba closed his eyes, and soon he was slumbering<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_47"></SPAN>[47]</span>
as peacefully as your cat sleeps before the
fire.</p>
<p>It was daylight when Tamba awakened, and,
for a moment, he did not remember where he
was. He stretched out first one big paw after
another and then he called:</p>
<p>“Well, Tum Tum, what sort of day is it going
to be?”</p>
<p>Tamba used to do this in the circus tent, for
the jolly elephant was so big that he could look
over the tops of the cages and tell whether or not
the sun was going to shine. Most animals
awaken before the sun comes up—just as it begins
to get daylight, in fact.</p>
<p>But Tum Tum did not answer Tamba this
time. The jolly elephant was badly hurt in the
railroad accident, but of course the tiger did not
know this just yet. Tamba did know, however,
that he had made a mistake.</p>
<p>“Oh, I forgot!” he said to himself. “Tum
Tum isn’t here! I’m not in the circus any more.
I’m free, and I can go to my jungle. I must
start at once!”</p>
<p>Then Tamba arose, and stretched himself
some more. He liked to feel the damp earth
under his paws, and he liked the feeling of the
dry grasses as they rubbed against his sides.</p>
<p>“Why, I feel hungry!” suddenly said the tiger.
“I wonder where I can get anything to eat in this,<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_48"></SPAN>[48]</span>
the beginning of the jungle.” You see, Tamba
still thought the jungle was close at hand, but, to
tell you the truth, it was far away, over the sea,
and Tamba could not get to it except in a ship.</p>
<p>The more Tamba thought about it the hungrier
he became. He knew no men would come
to him now with chunks of meat, as they had
used to come in the circus.</p>
<p>“I must hunt meat for myself, the same as I
did when I lived in the jungle with my father
and mother,” thought the tiger. “Well, I did
it once, and I can do it again. I wonder what
kind of meat I can find?”</p>
<p>Tamba did not have to wonder very long, for
he soon saw some big muskrats, and he made a
meal off them.</p>
<p>Then Tamba looked about him, and began to
think of what he would do to get to the deeper
part of the jungle—the part where the trees
grew. He wanted to be in the thick, dark
woods. All wild animals love the quiet darkness
when they are not after something to eat.</p>
<p>But it was now broad daylight, and Tamba
knew he must be careful how he went about.
Men could easily see him during the day. He
remembered he had been told this in the jungle,
years before, by his father. But in the jungle
Tamba was not so easy to see as he was on this
railroad meadow. The yellow and black stripes<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_49"></SPAN>[49]</span>
of a tiger’s skin are so like the patches of light
and shadow that fall through the tangle of vines
in a jungle, that often the hunters may be very
close to one of the wild beasts and yet not see it.
The tiger looks very much like the leaves and
sunshine, mingled.</p>
<p>“But I guess if I slink along and keep well
down in the tall grass no one will see me,”
thought Tamba. “That’s what I’ll do! I’ll
keep hiding as long as I can until I get to my
jungle. Then I’ll be all right. I’ll be very
glad to see my father and mother again, and my
sister and brother. The circus animals were all
very nice, but still I like my own folks best.”</p>
<p>So Tamba slunk along, going very softly
through the tall grass. If you had been near the
place you would probably have thought that it
was only the wind blowing the reeds, so little
noise did Tamba make. Tigers and such cat-like
animals know how to go very softly.</p>
<p>All at once, as Tamba was slinking along, he
heard the sound of men’s voices talking. He
knew them at once, though of course he could
not tell what they were saying. Besides the
voices of the men, he heard queer clinking-clanking
sounds and the rattle of chains.
Tamba knew what the rattle of chains meant—it
meant that elephants were near at hand, for
the circus elephants wear clanking chains on<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_50"></SPAN>[50]</span>
their legs, being made fast by them to stakes
driven into the ground.</p>
<p>“Ha! I had better look out,” thought Tamba.
“Maybe those are the circus men after me.”</p>
<p>The tame tiger was partly right and partly
wrong. The voices he heard were those of the
circus men, and the chains clanking were those
on the legs of elephants. The men were trying
to clear away what was left of the circus wreck.
Tamba had taken the wrong path, and had
walked right back to where he had started from.</p>
<p>“This won’t do!” he said to himself. “I must
get farther away and hide!”</p>
<p>He peered between the tall grasses and dimly
saw where the circus men were working along
the railroad tracks, lifting up some of the overturned
cars and cages. The elephants were
helping, for they were very strong.</p>
<p>“I’ll notice which way the sun is shining, and
then I’ll know which way to go to keep away
from the circus men,” thought Tamba. Then
he turned straight about and ran off the other
way.</p>
<p>On and on, over the big stretch of meadows
and lonely land near the railroad went the tiger
until he had placed many miles between himself
and the scene of the wreck. In all this time
Tamba did not see any men, or any living creatures
except some muskrats, many of which lived
in the swamp along the railroad. The muskrats<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_51"></SPAN>[51]</span>
were not glad to see Tamba, for the tiger caught
a number of them for food, but it could not be
helped.</p>
<p>No one saw Tamba sneaking along through
the grass. If any one had seen him they would
have hurried to tell the circus men, for a general
alarm had been sent out, telling that some of the
wild animals, including a big, striped tiger, had
got loose after the wreck.</p>
<p>But no one saw Tamba, and he saw no one, at
least for a while. On and on he went until night
came again. Then he found another snug place
in among the dried grass where he curled up to
sleep.</p>
<p>“My jungle is farther away than I thought it
was,” said Tamba to himself, as he awoke on the
second morning of his freedom. “I must run
along faster to get there more quickly.”</p>
<p>After he had eaten and taken some water, he
started off once again, and then began a series
of very strange adventures for the tame tiger.</p>
<p>Toward the close of the afternoon of the second
day of his freedom Tamba stepped out of
a little patch of woods, into which he had gone
from the meadow, and there, in the light of the
setting sun, the tiger saw a red, wooden building
which he seemed to know.</p>
<p>“Why, there’s a barn!” said Tamba to himself.
“There’s a barn. I’ll go in there and stay for<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_52"></SPAN>[52]</span>
the night. I wonder if there are any other animals
in it.”</p>
<p>The reason Tamba knew this was a barn was
because, when he had first joined the circus, he
had been taken to a barn, and there was taught
some tricks. The circus folk and the animals
lived in a big barn instead of tents during the
winter. So when Tamba saw this building he
knew, at once, that it was a barn.</p>
<p>Now it happened that this was a barn belonging
to a farmer, who also owned a house near by,
but which Tamba could not see on account of the
trees. So, making sure that no one was about,
Tamba walked toward the barn, and, one of the
doors being open, in walked the tiger.</p>
<p>He looked all around, as best he could, for it
was not very light, and he sniffed and smelled the
smell of animals.</p>
<p>“Maybe some of my friends are here,” thought
Tamba. “I’ll slink around and see.”</p>
<p>So he walked softly and slinkingly to the middle
of the barn floor, and peered about, and, right
after that, a very strange thing happened.</p>
<hr class="chap" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_53"></SPAN>[53]</span></p>
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