Orphans of the Carnival

by Carol Birch

  “You’re human,” Madame Pankova said, snapped her eyes shut, sighed, snapped them open again and called, “Yeva!”

  Immediately the child appeared, hovering through the darkness like an angel in the candlelight, to the window to throw back the curtains. Light flooded the room. Madame Pankova screwed up her face and muttered darkly to herself in Russian, then raised her ravaged face and said loudly for Julia’s benefit, “The pain is terrible. No one knows how terrible the pain.” Out she hobbled, the stick trembling, and the child blew out the candle.

  A boy. All the way back, hurrying, she held one hand against her stomach. Are you in there? But of course it could happen. Never discussed, never considered. She’d thought she couldn’t. Why? Because she was so wrong in so many ways, somehow she’d thought that would be wrong too. And he’d never said anything. Never a what-if or when-we, like other couples. It must’ve been there all the time like an island in the fog and neither of them had seen it. It might not come, the unimaginable boy. Creature-to-be. It would hurt. The thought of Theo made her scared. He never said he wanted a child. Never said he didn’t. The show. She couldn’t dance, ride horses. Any day the familiar stain, the sense of drain would surely come. The old woman had mostly just rambled, vague—you will make a good friend whose initial will be T, something has been troubling you, your husband thinks about you a very great deal, he is thinking of you this very moment, yes, I’m sure he is. But that thing about Mother. Mamá walking away. Pigtail eternal. Julia’s eyes filled. What a fool she’d been. Keeping that so close all her life, the eternal clue she invoked at night before she went to sleep. That was her mother, neither alive nor dead but simply other, gone. A dream, not in life or death but somewhere else. At no time had she ever thought: my mother is dead. And she’d never wondered about a real woman somewhere up there in those green and sandy sierras, somewhere you could reach by walking. She’d been a child with a story.

  She’s dead now. Final. And this boy.

  It might all come to nothing.

  Theo was there when she got back.

  “Where the hell have you been?” he said furiously, stamping over as she came in the door.

  “I went to the fortune-teller,” she said.

  “Oh, for God’s sake! You can’t do this, Julia! You can’t just go out without me whenever you want.”

  “Well, you know I don’t. It’s all right, I was covered.”

  “That’s not the point.”

  Here we go again. “No harm done,” she said, “I’m back now.”

  “It’s just not fair, Julia,” he said as she unveiled and took off her gloves. “It’s not fair to me. What if something happened to you?”

  “I only went ’round the corner.”

  “You have got to be honest with me, Julia, this is just not fair. You waited deliberately till I’d gone out, didn’t you? Then you sneaked off. I bet you thought you’d get back before me and I’d never know.”

  It was so true that she couldn’t help but smile. I’ve done it, she thought. I went out and nothing happened.

  “It’s not funny!”

  “Sorry,” she said.

  He’d sulk for the next couple of days. He was getting it down to a fine art. Here came the first harbingers, the noble suffering face, the downcast brow. He was spinning a little web of woundedness between them.

  “You know damn well I’d have taken you if you’d asked,” he said.

  “Oh, but you’d have laughed at me.”

  “Well, yes, but that’s understandable. Giving your money to some fraud! Oh, Julia.”

  “You really do think I’m stupid, don’t you?” she said. “Like all those other people who think I must be because I have this.” She pulled on her beard.

  “I know you’re not stupid,” he said coldly. “That’s why it makes me angry to see you behaving as if you are.”

  He walked out abruptly. His footsteps echoed in the stairwell. She went to look. No blood.

  Instead of a heat haze, there was rain falling softly on willows outside the window.

  “I wish we could go to Vienna,” she said.

  “Don’t you like it here?”

  “It’s getting cold again.”

  Theo took a match from a silver box and lit a cigar.

  “I think,” he said, shaking the match with the air of a man with nothing to do, leaning back and blowing smoke upward, “if we give it another two years. Till we have enough for a decent apartment somewhere pleasant—Vienna, by all means if you like, or even…”

  He broke off and gazed into space.

  She picked up that lump of wood, her old doll, and lay down on the bed, turning on her side. “Thank God, nothing for a while,” she said.

  “Nothing at all unless you want to go to the circus.”

  “On Friday.”

  “Why Friday?”

  “Darmody’s juggling.”

  “Fine. I’ll get tickets.”

  “I have friends in Vienna, don’t I?” she said proudly.

  Theo nodded, savoring the tang of his cigar. He’d get them a box, the best he could. She’d walk in on his arm, veiled. Everyone would know who she was but no one would get near. They’d whisper: that’s Julia Pastrana. But if they wanted to see her they’d have to pay.

  “Vienna is certainly a possibility,” he said.

  “I can’t ride anymore,” she said suddenly in an odd tone.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can’t ride.”

  “Why not?”

  She looked away. “I’m having a baby,” she said.

  Theo’s face didn’t change.

  “You’re not serious,” he said.

  “I think I am.”

  Oh God. His face didn’t change. A thousand voices murmured in his head.

  “I’m sure I am,” she said.

  It couldn’t happen. He was always careful. When? Not always easy getting out in time. When? Oh God, after a few drinks. Who cares then? “What?” he said, screaming inside.

  “I’ve missed twice now.”

  “Twice.” He swallowed, playing for time.

  “A baby,” she said, meeting his eyes with a wary look.

  Time slowed for Theo, his every move, the way his lips formed the shape of an opening to allow smoke to drift from them, the way the smoke seemed alive as it played with the air. He closed his eyes.

  “Do you think that’s why I’ve been feeling so tired?” she asked.

  “Very likely,” he said.

  When he opened them again her eyes were glistening. “You don’t want it,” she said. “You don’t want it because you think it’ll be like me.”

  His eyes filled with sympathy. His brain went tick, tick, tick, bring another poor freak into the world, tick tick, as it is they’re all looking at me, tick, tick, tick, this is impossible. “Not at all,” he said, “not at all.” He knew he ought to go to her but was suddenly afraid. “You have to see a doctor,” he said. “Make sure.”

  “You don’t want it.”

  “Don’t be silly.”

  The shine of tears under her eye. “Will you love it, if it’s like me?” she said.

  “Of course I will!”

  “You don’t want it to be like me though, do you?”

  Tick, tick, tick. Calm. “Listen, Julia,” he said, pulling sense on like a cloak, walking over to her, caressing the sides of her arms and smiling reassuringly, “it’s mine, it goes without saying I’ll love it.” A hairy baby monkey, he thought. “But obviously it would be better for him to be born normal.”

  “Him?”

  “Or her.”

  “But if he isn’t?”

  “Just—I don’t know, Julia, I don’t know what to say, it would just be better if it was normal. But I don’t suppose—I don’t know how these things work. We need to get a good doctor…”

  Trailing off.

  Think, think, think. We have—six, yes, six more shows to February. She’d never get rid of it, not her. Catholi
c. She can sing anyway, play her guitar. They’ll still come. Could she dance? Even if she just stood there, whatever she did, they’d still come, just to see her. “It’ll be all right,” he said with worried eyes. Doing sums in his head. Oh God. We need to rake in as much as we can before. She’ll have to take it easy for a bit. But not for too long. She’s a trouper.

  “We’ll get you to a doctor,” he said. “If we were in Moscow we could get Sokolov.”

  Perhaps she’ll miscarry, he thought. No. She’s as strong as an ox. He laughed. Strong as a Julia.

  “Don’t laugh at me,” she said.

  “I’m not laughing at you.”

  It was confirmed. She was three months gone. The doctor had shaken Theo’s hand and looked him steadily in the eye on parting, and he’d seen it there, the thing he would find in all eyes from now on, the thought: My God, he does! He fucks the ape. Now they’d all know. Looking in the mirror, he practiced the smile he would smile back at them. Calm, proud, defiant.

  Three months, four, five, still dancing, hardly showing. The sparkle was back in Theo’s eyes, and a weight lifted from Julia’s mind.

  “After these shows we should settle for a while,” she said. “Till the baby’s older.”

  “Sure,” he said, smiling. “But not for too long.”

  While not quite at rest, his mind had settled now. First, the child might be normal. Firstborn. My seed. Blood of my blood and all that. It was a tangle. He’d no idea how he felt. Fatherhood had never been a consideration. But then, he thought, if it’s hairy, think about it. If they flock now, imagine. The ape woman and her remarkable offspring. They’ll be trampling over one another to get a look. And the science! God, those doctors salivating. How well they lived now—Theo bit the end off a high-class cigar—but this would be nothing. They could live anywhere. A place here, a place there. The best. Sometimes a creature formed in his mind, a baby monkey with human eyes as soft and sweet as a kitten’s.

  “Our baby will grow up in the most wonderful world imaginable,” he said expansively, lying back on the chaise and trying to blow smoke rings, “backstage. Born in a trunk. Town to town. The thrill of it all. The smell of sawdust.”

  “Face facts, Theo,” she said, breaking the thread on something she was sewing. “We can’t drag a baby around all over the place. Not when it’s tiny.”

  “Some of the happiest people I’ve ever known have been born into the business,” he said. “Suckled in the wings. Weaned in a circus wagon.”

  “I think we should go back to Vienna,” she said. “After the last show.”

  “Well,” he said, “we’ll see.”

  To Moscow, where the baby would be born. Ilya Andreyevich Volkov had found them a nice little flat near the Arbat, and was lending them Polina to take care of the place. He sent Tolya to pick them up from the posting stage. The familiar face was reassuring, breathing smoke into the frozen air from deep inside a sheepskin collar. We don’t go back, she thought. Or hardly ever. We move on. And on and on. At night the names of places paraded through her mind as she fell asleep. Moscow, snow, Tolya, Polina, almost a homecoming.

  “My congratulations to you both,” Tolya said, grinning widely as he hoisted the trunk onto the carriage. Look at the monkey father, Theo thought, shivering. He could see the thought in the boy’s eyes.

  “Oh, it’s so lovely to see you again,” Julia said, ridiculously excited as if the boy were a lost kinsman home from war.

  “And you, madame.”

  “Hurry it up, Tolya,” Theo said, “I’m soaking wet out here.”

  “Of course.”

  Theo climbed in and huddled himself up, shivering. “What a climate,” he said.

  Julia laughed. “Look at you, all snowy!”

  It was late afternoon, already dark. The shops were open, the streets crowded. She was humming, leaning forward to watch it all go by. It was pelting down, fat flakes falling intently. Tolya carried their trunk up and Polina was there, smiling and flustered, showing them the bread and pies she’d laid out, the rich pickle-y soup simmering at the back of the stove. The fire blazed. “I’ll make tea now,” she said.

  “Heaven,” said Julia.

  Theo threw himself down in the biggest chair and closed his eyes. Three more months. Oh, well, Moscow. Maybe he’d see Liliya Grigorievna. Julia flittered here and there, opening doors. “Theo,” she said, “come and look.”

  “In a minute.”

  “Will you eat now or later?” asked Polina.

  “Now,” said Theo, “I’m starving. Julia!”

  “Wait until you see,” she said, appearing in the doorway.

  The table was already set. Polina served soup and put out the bread. “I’ll go now,” she said, “if there’s nothing else you want. I’ll come in early and see to the fire. Tolya can give me a lift now.”

  “Of course.”

  “You’re looking so well, madame,” Polina said as she put on her coat. “We’ve all been so excited about your news.” I bet you have, thought Theo.

  “Oh, stop with all the ‘madame,’ ” said Julia. “Call me Julia.”

  “Oh!” said Polina, pausing with her muffler wound half ’round her neck. “That’s so nice.”

  “And you too, Tolya.” Julia broke a piece of bread in half.

  “Thank you so much, madame,” he said, and the three of them laughed.

  “And now,” said Theo, “let’s eat before we expire.”

  “Oh, isn’t this nice?” she said when they’d finally gone. “Aren’t we lucky?”

  “Indeed we are.”

  “And wasn’t it nice to see Tolya again? And Polina.”

  “Absolutely.”

  A fog of tiredness was making Theo feel stupid. It was four more days till Christmas and he’d arranged for her to see a doctor the day after tomorrow, get it over with before the holiday. She was well enough, but no harm in making sure. He watched her eat. She was fastidiously clean and dainty, as if to compensate for her appearance. She caught him looking and her eyes smiled.

  “You have lovely eyes, Julia,” he said.

  She did. That wasn’t a lie.

  “He just kicked me,” she said.

  “The brute.”

  She’d put his hand there the other night. That peculiar feeling against his palm, something alive under the skin. Her belly was hard and round. She wore loose gowns now except onstage, where she covered the growing mound with a crinoline.

  “You don’t seem that tired,” he said.

  “I was,” she said, “but now I feel all excited. Hurry up, Theo. There’s a cradle.” She pushed her bowl away and stood up.

  “Aren’t you going to eat anymore?”

  “Later,” she said. “Come and see.” She went next door, and he heard her struggling with the catches on the trunk. He finished the soup and ate another slice of bread with butter before following her next door. The room was pleasant but not large. The bed filled most of it. A blue-and-yellow jug filled with dried flowers and grasses stood on the chiffonier. There was a chest of drawers, a pretty armoire painted peasant style, and above the bed a picture of a country lane in a flat landscape of thin spring trees and low sun. She’d changed into her nightgown and was taking all the little dresses and bonnets she’d been making for the baby out of the trunk and laying them on the bed.

  “Look,” she said. Next to the bed, a hooded cradle with a white blanket.

  “If I die,” she said in a practical voice, folding things neatly away into the bottom drawer, “don’t forget I’ve put his things in this drawer all ready, in sizes. Look, the smallest at this end, getting bigger over there.”

  “You won’t die.”

  “I know, but just in case.”

  “No talk of dying. You’ll have Trettenbacher. He’s the best.”

  “I know.” She shrugged. “No harm in being prepared.”

  He lay down on the bed with his hands behind his head watching the snow drifting above the curtain. She closed the drawer.
Her nightgown was too long for her and she had to hold it up. “And the coverlet,” she said, reaching once more into the trunk and bringing out a tiny quilt embroidered with flowers. “There!” she said, laying it down on top of the white blanket in the cradle, stroking it gently.

  “I’m glad it’s not Sokolov,” she said. “When am I seeing Dr. Trettenbacher?”

  “Day after tomorrow.” He turned back the covers and started to undress.

  “I wonder what he’s like.” She got into bed and sat with her knees up, watching him.

  “Trettenbacher? I told you. The best.”

  “Yes, but I wonder what he’s like.”

  Trettenbacher was a brisk, bluff man with a shiny red face and a heavy thatch of gray hair. “She’s very healthy,” he said, closing the bedroom door after the examination, “apart from the fact that she’s coming down with a cold.”

  “Oh, good,” said Theo, standing by the fire, “yes, Julia’s always been healthy. Polina!”

  Polina appeared.

  “Take her some cocoa, would you, Polina,” he said. “Get her to lie down.”

  Trettenbacher waited till she’d left, then said, “That’s not to say we might not have a problem.”

  “Problem?”

  “Her size.”

  “What’s wrong with her size?”

  “She’s narrow,” said Trettenbacher, snapping his bag shut.

  “Julia? Narrow?”

  “It’s a big baby.”

  “But she’s quite hefty,” said Theo.

  “It’s what’s on the inside that counts.” Trettenbacher looked up, smiling in a meaningless, professional way. “But don’t worry,” he said reassuringly, “she’s not the first. Might have a hard time but we’ll get her through. Now, I’ll see her again after…”

  “Tell me the truth,” Theo said, scared. “Is she in any danger?”

  Trettenbacher looked at the fire. “Well…” he said, and Polina came in with a tray. “Cocoa was all ready,” she said, smiling and bustling through the room. “Any for you, sir?”

  “No.” Theo glared at her. “I am trying to speak to the doctor.”