Just a Little Pre-Circus Clowning Around : Amusement: Rufus the Clown visits an Orange drug store to paint children’s faces and yuck it up only a few days before Circus Vargas arrives.

Three-year-old Teal Del Tramo stared up wide-eyed at the yellow-haired, red-nosed clown with a mixture of terror and wonder.

A plaid-clad Rufus the Clown clutched the boy’s face with his white-gloved hand as he carefully outlined the boy’s lips with red and brightened his cheeks with yellow diamonds.

Rufus was in Orange on Saturday, four days earlier than the rest of Circus Vargas, which will put on its show Tuesday through Thursday. Rufus had stopped at Watson’s Drug Store to entertain kids and pass out free children’s tickets to the big-tent circus in Hart Park.

As Rufus gently powdered Teal’s face white, the boy squinted with a look of pain.

“This is the kind of kid who screams bloody murder when he gets a haircut,” said his mother, Tracy Taylor.

When Rufus was done, he opened a pocket mirror to let Teal see his made-up face and watched his fear turn to delight as the boy smiled and giggled.

“Does that look like you?” Rufus asked.

Teal shook his head. “It feels good,” he said.

Three-year-old Adam Trusley of El Toro wanted to know why Rufus had such wide, ducklike feet.

“Because I got too near the elephant’s cage,” Rufus explained.

Rufus juggled penguin-shaped beanbags, told jokes and drew his “world-famous drawings” of clown faces for kids, who were breakfasting on pancakes with their parents in the 1940s-style drugstore.

A second clown, named Chuckles, who is not with Circus Vargas, earned free passes for his seven-member family by helping to entertain the kids. He blew up balloons in the shape of swords, airplanes and poodles.

As soon as Taylor’s oldest son, 9-year-old Brent, was handed a sword-shaped balloon, he rubbed it to produce an ear-splitting squeak, to the chagrin of his mother.

“Stop it right now before I kill you with that sword,” she joked, laughing.

Blake Cuiper, 3, of Orange, was sitting at the soda fountain lunch counter when Rufus approached and demanded his pancake, sausage and orange juice.

“Oh, I see my breakfast is here,” he said in teasing the boy as the chef slid the plate onto the counter.

But Blake didn’t buy it and began patting his whipped butter with his knife undistracted.

Orange Mayor Pro Tem Gene Beyer brought his two grandsons, 5-year-old Rick and 2-year-old Reid, who got a clown face before eating.

Asked what the white-powdered face felt like, Reid said, “Snow.”