"Why didn't they give the money before they took the tiger away?"

"Probably they hadn't so much with them," suggested Aunt Cynthia, who
plainly felt some misgiving over matters; "most likely the money has to be
paid by some officer connected with the show."

"And he may say he never gave his men the right to make such an offer,"
remarked Tom.

"That may be," said the mother, thinking it wise to prepare her son for a
probable disappointment; "the circus is to exhibit at Boorman's to-night.
That is twenty miles off, and all may have gone thither. If those men
choose to disregard their word, I see no help for it."

"It will be awful mean in them," declared the boy, who had become quite
nervous; "I'll never catch any more tigers for them."

Tom loitered on his way to Briggsville, striving not to reach there before
the time named; but despite the effort, he was in town fully a quarter of
an hour too early.

A surprise awaited him. The news of the recapture of the runaway tiger had
preceded him; and, as was natural, the story was exaggerated to an absurd
degree. Jim Travers had told the wondering people that he saw Tom capture
Sipo Tahib, as he called him, by jumping on his back and bending his
forepaws over his neck. (Peter Parley's History, which Jim read at school,
contained a picture of the naturalist Chatterton thus navigating an
alligator, and Jim couldn't see why a tiger should not be handled the same
way. He preferred, however, that some other boy should be the one to make
the experiment.)