This attempt at levity drew an immediate response from the two mute sisters. Mrs. Mulrooney the seamstress launched a ball of woolen socks, while Mrs. Mulrooney the gymnast whipped off a shoe. Both missiles struck their target full in the face.

“Bah! Ladies!” the professor complained. “You see what I mean? You have no reason to feel any pity for these two, young lad. They are more than able to look out for themselves! It is I who am outnumbered.”

Mrs. Mulrooney No. 1 licked an end of thread and darted it through a needle with a grin of vindication, while Mrs. Mulrooney No. 2 clapped her feet.

“And now,” said the professor. “Won’t you repay our candor and tell us your story? It’s plain you have one. Else you would not be so far from Zanesville.”

Just then a sound came from behind the cloth partition in the corner. The showman and his two wives showed no sign of acknowledgment. Perhaps a child was sick behind there, Lloyd thought, although the idea of having two wives still occupied him. Two wives this side of the curtain seemed to increase the possibilities of what lay behind. He tried to focus on the professor’s query.

Ordinarily he would not have satisfied such a request with much detail, but as a result of his time with St. Ives he was growing more secure in his ability to gauge people’s character and, as the professor had trusted him with a confidence, so he related as best he could his family’s trek from Ohio and their hopes of beginning a new life in Texas (save for the mystery that his uncle had referred to in his letter and the nature of his relationship with Miss Viola).

The professor and his two mute wives were both entertained and reassured by the boy’s account. “We are all strangers and pilgrims,” the showman summed up when Lloyd was done. “I wish you well on your journey to Texas. We are headed north for the heat of summer and then back south when autumn comes.”