by M. P. Barker
The peddler hesitated. “That I couldn’t say. I never seen him misuse an animal, but I never seen him stop it being done, neither.”
“He’ll do something if you tell him to,” Billy said. “You being such great friends and all.”
Mr. Stocking rasped a calloused finger across the stubble on his jaw. “Yes, well, there’s friends and there’s friends.” The peddler stirred uneasily on the bench, then took a decisive breath and continued. “See, it’s like this. Fred, he’s not the type of fella to let friendship stand in the way of profit.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Daniel shuddered at the screams and grunts from the menagerie tent. He’d no idea whether the beasts were fixing to break loose or were merely impatient for their breakfast. The noises left Mr. Stocking unperturbed, which settled Daniel’s nerves some as he and Billy followed the peddler among the cream-colored pavilions, mist swirling at their feet. Silhouetted figures moved about, tugging on ropes and adjusting stakes, securing the pavilions for another day’s performance.
A roar of a different kind came from Mr. Chamberlain’s tent. “Damn ’em both to hellfire and eternal perdition!” the conjurer bellowed. “And damn you, too, while you’re at it.”
“Me?” a reedy voice squeaked. “I never saw ’em go!”
The tent flap flew back, and Mr. Chamberlain charged out in dressing gown and slippers. Humbert Lamb, the menagerie keeper, trailed behind. A tall, thin man with wispy yellow hair, Mr. Lamb looked more a scholar than an animal trainer. But yesterday Daniel had seen him waltz with a bear, wear a snake about his neck like a shawl, and wrestle two panthers as easily as a child playing with a litter of puppies. Now, though, Mr. Lamb looked more afraid of Mr. Chamberlain than of his wild beasts.
“What’s the trouble?” Mr. Stocking asked.
“They’re gone, damn ’em. Neezer and Heloise have run off.”
“Professor Romanov and Madame Staccato,” Mr. Stocking explained in response to Daniel’s and Billy’s blank stares.
“I’ll bet Howes snapped ’em up,” Mr. Chamberlain continued. “I thought I saw one of his people skulking about last night. He’s been waiting to snatch some of my talent.”
“It’s not so bad as all that,” Mr. Lamb said timidly. “He did leave the ponies.”
“He damn well better have. They’re mine. Though how I’m going to—” The conjurer peered narrowly at Daniel. “Jonny tells me you’re good with a horse.” Daniel had no chance to respond before Mr. Chamberlain turned on Billy. “And I’ve heard you sing.”
“Umm—” Billy threw an anxious glance at Mr. Stocking, then at Daniel.
“Fine. It’s settled then.” Mr. Chamberlain spun on his heel and stalked away, his dressing gown flapping like wings in his wake.
“What’s settled?” Daniel asked as soon as he’d recovered his breath.
“I think it means you’re hired,” Mr. Stocking said.
“I do believe so,” Mr. Lamb agreed. He looked toward his menagerie tent, then in the direction that Mr. Chamberlain had gone. A roar from the menagerie decided him. “Excuse me,” he said. “Griselda wants feeding.” Looking almost relieved, he dashed away toward his charges.
Daniel shook his head. “What is it exactly that we’re hired to do?”
Mr. Stocking chuckled as he dug in his pocket for his tobacco pouch. “That’s up to you . . . Perfesser.” He cut off a chew and popped it into his mouth.
“Per—” Daniel backed away. “Oh, no. I can’t.”
“You wanted to see them ponies taken care of, didn’t you?”
“Aye, but not—I mean—I can’t—I don’t know naught about horses.”
Mr. Stocking nearly choked on his chew. He spluttered and recovered. “Son, if you don’t know horses, I’m the queen of England.” He turned toward Billy. “As for you—”
Billy pressed her lips into a tight line. “I told you he knew. It was that look he gave me yesterday, like he could see right through me.” She shuddered.
“When you been playacting as long as Fred, you seen enough boys playing Juliet and girls playing pages and squires that it’s second nature to spot ’em out.”
“At least now you don’t got to pretend to be someone you’re not,” said Daniel.
“No!” Billy shoved Daniel away and ran.
Daniel felt thrown off balance more by the horror in Billy’s face than the push she’d given him. He cast a perplexed glance at Mr. Stocking.
The peddler shrugged. “Better go after her. You’ll catch her quicker’n I will.”
Daniel found her in the paddock behind the tavern, where she stood nose to nose with Phizzy, grumbling a string of Gaelic curses into his floppy gray ears. Phizzy nodded sympathetically, his sleepy eyes deep and sad, as if he were pondering how to advise her. Billy cast a withering scowl at Daniel and ducked behind Phizzy’s neck. “Go away.”
“You can’t be always running away from who you are,” Daniel said.
Billy stepped out from behind Phizzy, her fists doubled. “This is who I am.”
“No. No it ain’t, lass.”
“Don’t call me that!” She flung herself at Daniel, hammering the wind out of him. He sat down hard in the dirt, the shock going from his tailbone to his skull. Billy leaped on him with punches and kicks as hard as he’d ever gotten from a lad, confounding him with how to evade her blows without hitting back. Then she was gone.
Mr. Stocking held Billy around the waist, pinning her arms to her sides. His feet did a little jig as he tried to avoid her kicks. “Damned if she don’t fight like a boy,” he said.
Daniel staggered to his feet. He stood with his hands on his knees, waiting for his breath to settle. “You—you—” He waved a shaky hand at the peddler. “You’re not helping any, leaving her call herself Billy and calling her son. You don’t even know her real name.” He picked up his cap and slapped the dust off against his thigh.
“It doesn’t seem to me like you got much call to be telling people what names they can use.” The peddler’s turtle-like eyes pinned him hard. Mr. Stocking released Billy and cupped a hand under her chin. “As for you . . . You have a gift, and you ought’a be using it for something better than hawking tinware and patent elixirs.”
Billy slapped his hand away. “He’ll be making a girl of me.”
“And why would that be such a terrible thing?” Daniel ran an exasperated hand through his hair.
“I couldn’t be free—not ever again.”
Daniel rolled his eyes. “Whatever does being a lass or a lad have to do with being free?”
“If you was a lass, you’d know.”
Only a lass could be such a bloody puzzle of unreasonable reasons. He looked to Mr. Stocking for support, only to see the peddler nod sagely as if he understood every word.
“Billy, have I ever made you do anything you didn’t want to?” Mr. Stocking asked.
“Besides reading, mathematics, geography, and history?” Billy snapped back.
“And washing up,” Daniel added.
Mr. Stocking rubbed his jaw. “Well, that was for your own good. Look, son—” He winced away from Daniel’s glare. “What makes you think I’d make you sing for Fred?”
“You want to stay with him, don’t you?” Billy asked accusingly.
“Can’t say as I’m not tempted. I’d sell a prodigious pile of tinware,” Mr. Stocking said. “But it’d hardly be fair if you didn’t get a say.” He crossed his arms and looked Daniel square in the eye. “Dan’l, d’you want to see those ponies taken care of proper?”
“Aye, but that don’t—” he began, but Mr. Stocking had already turned to Billy.
“Billy, do you want to sing for all those people like you did yesterday?”
“I don’t want to be a girl.”
“Seems to me there’s more to be gained by you being a boy. Everyone expects a girl to have a pretty voice. But a boy . . . well, that’s something different.”
“Billy Fogarty, the Irish Songbird.”
The conjurer puffed on his segar and sent a smoke ring into the air.
“Billy Fogarty, the Boy with the Voice of an Angel.” Mr. Stocking blew his own smoke ring, which floated over the ruins of their breakfast and merged with Mr. Chamberlain’s.
It was all Daniel could do not to snicker. He took another slice of apple pie, still a bit amazed at the way the morning’s events had turned. Once Mr. Stocking had chased down the conjurer and settled his temper, Mr. Chamberlain had summoned two lads who’d transformed his tent from bedchamber to dining room and laid out a breakfast of bacon and fried potatoes, bread and jam, and cold apple pie as magically as Mr. Chamberlain summoned up silk scarves and colored flames. If show folk all ate as grandly as Mr. Chamberlain, then perhaps it wasn’t such a disreputable life after all.
“The Boy with the Voice of an Angel,” Mr. Chamberlain repeated. “Could be.” He swept Billy with a glance. “But that name’s got to go. Fogarty.” He scowled. “Damn ugly. Needs to be something . . . I don’t know. Maybe something with a bird in it. Bunting? Starling? Thrush?”
“Definitely not Thrush. Sounds like he’s got a foot disease,” Mr. Stocking said.
“Billy Magpie,” Daniel suggested. “For isn’t he forever getting into mischief?”
“Raven.” Billy pointed at Shiva and Kali, whose beady black eyes stared hungrily at the breakfast table. She took a crust of bread and poked it between the bars of their cage.
Mr. Chamberlain’s brows knit solemnly. “Needs something with a Mc or an O in it, maybe. But I still like that bird idea . . . Billy O’Bird . . . Billy McBird. . . . No, that’s not it, either.”
“Can’t say I’ve ever met any Irishmen named McBird,” Mr. Stocking said. “But I’ve met a few McBrides in my travels.”
Mr. Chamberlain snapped his fingers. “That’s it! Billy McBride, the Irish Songbird, the Boy with the Voice of an Angel.”
“Aye,” Daniel said, slapping Billy’s hand as she tried to swipe the last bit of piecrust from his plate. “The voice of an angel, and the temperament of the devil himself.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Daniel rested his forearms on the top rail of the fence and stared at the ponies. He thought about the feel of the splintery wood against his skin, the morning sun on his neck, the smell of dung in the yard. He thought about everything except how to train the ponies, because when he did, his mouth went dry, his stomach tightened like a fist, and all he could think of was how impossible it was to take those ruined beasts and have them dancing in a week’s time.
“Well, Dan’l?” Mr. Stocking said.
“I don’t hardly know where to begin, sir. I’m no horse trainer.”
“I’ll set you right if you need it, but I got to see what’s in you first.”
“What’s in me,” Daniel repeated softly. When he looked inside himself, he saw naught but doubt and fear and an almost-belief that everything he’d ever been told was true: that he was a stupid, clumsy oaf who’d never amount to naught. “What’s in me?”
“That’s what I aim to find out.” Mr. Stocking cocked his head so the light reflected off his spectacles. Daniel was sure the little man did that on purpose, so that the thick glasses became more like a mirror than a window, so’s a body couldn’t guess what he might be thinking.
“I know naught about teaching ponies tricks,” Daniel said.
Mr. Stocking rolled his chew to one side and spat. “Any fool can teach ’em tricks. Teaching ’em trust, now, that’s the hard part.” Mr. Stocking’s finger thumped Daniel on the forehead before he could respond. “Think, son,” he said. “Everything you need is in here.” He prodded Daniel’s chest just over his heart. “And in here. Just think on how you trained Ivy.”
Daniel laughed. “I never. She’s the one trained me.”
“There you have it.” Mr. Stocking clapped Daniel on the back and spun him to face the ponies. “I’ll check up on you ’round dinnertime,” the peddler called out as he walked away.
Daniel walked over to where Ivy stood tethered to the fence. “Maybe you ought to be taming them ponies, eh, lass?” He pressed his forehead against hers, closed his eyes, and tried to remember how it had been, those first few months before he’d won Ivy over.
When Ivy had come to Lyman’s, she’d been trained to saddle and harness, and minded well enough in either. But once out to pasture, she’d no use for a scrawny stick of a lad whose only knowledge of horses was how to clean up the messes they left behind. She’d let him get within a whisker of her, then she’d kick up her heels and canter off, spurning him with a toss of her head. An afternoon of it had brought him nearer to tears than Lyman’s thrashings.
So what had he done about it? Oh, aye, he remembered now: he’d sulked.
He sat in the grass hugging his knees to his chest, sunk so deep into his black mood that he lost all sense of time and place until something ruffled the hair at the crown of his head. Without looking up, he tried to brush it away, and his hand found something both whiskery-prickly and velvety soft. A spluttery snort showered him with wet, and Ivy pranced away, the bloody witch. Well, he was done with that game. Just to show her how little he cared, he pulled out the apple he’d planned to give her and began to eat it himself.
Her hooves swooshed in the long grass behind him, her questing nose snuffled at his ear. He hunched over his apple, keeping his back to her. He ate the apple down to a knob of seeds and pith and stem, then sucked the last of the juice from it with loud slurps to show her what a treat she’d missed. “So there,” he said, showing her the meager remains.
Her breath tickled his wrist as she studied the remnant of apple, its ivory flesh already starting to yellow. Her lips moved across his palm with as little weight as a caterpillar wriggling in his hand. The core disappeared down her throat with one hollow crunch. She whuffed a soft breath in his ear before she walked away.
By summer’s end, he could barely remember when she’d not been a part of him.
“Is that the way of it, lass?” he asked, stirring from the memory. “Turn me back on ’em?” She butted his chest with her nose. “All right, then,” he said. “We’d best get started.”
For the rest of the morning, Daniel sat on a milking stool in the middle of the paddock, studying the ponies while pretending to have no interest in them. He observed the minute changes in the angle of an ear, the flare of a nostril, the rhythm of each pony’s breath. He watched how each muscle and tendon flexed and contracted beneath the ponies’ dusty hides, the impact of each hoof in the dirt and whether it landed true or crooked. He noticed how the ponies looked to the little gray mare for their cues, and how they stood guard on her, not because she was weak, but because they seemed to depend on her.
At the end of the morning, he rose with stiff legs and a numb backside but a confident heart. After dinner, he returned to test what he’d learned. He studied how they responded to an outstretched arm, an open hand or a closed one, an upright stance or a slouch. How he angled his head, the carriage of his body, and where he directed his eyes could turn them wary or calm. He put Ivy in among them. She stirred them up, then with a nip and a flick of her heels displaced the gray mare as their leader. When Ivy came to him, he watched the ponies watching him, their reluctant interest reminding him of the audience observing Mr. Chamberlain’s conjuring act with suspicion and fascination.
Shadows stretched across the pen, and a cool breeze told him the afternoon had waned. The wind stirred the ponies’ manes and tails, chilling the sweat on Daniel’s body. The outside world came back into focus: the house and barn and sheds of the farmer who’d rented his field to Mr. Chamberlain; the pavilions and the wagons and people milling around them; the noises from the menagerie tent.
He blinked and rubbed his eyes. A strange fluttering around his heart warmed him from inside, even though the late September wind stung his ears.
“Not a bad day’s work, eh, son?” Mr. Stocking leaned on the top fence rail, hands together, elbows out, his chin resting on his
threaded fingers, his right foot propped up on the bottom rail. Billy stood next to him in an identical pose, except that her head rested one rail lower than Mr. Stocking’s.
“How long you been watching?” Daniel asked.
“Long enough,” Mr. Stocking said. “Tired?”
Daniel shook his head as he walked toward them. “Nah. I could do this all day.” He ran a hand along his jaw. “Funny thing, though. Me face feels a bit queer—sort’a achy.”
Mr. Stocking laughed so hard he nearly choked on his tobacco. “Never smiled so much in your life, huh, Dan’l?” he finally said, gasping.
“Grinning like a monkey, you was—were—this past hour ’r more,” Billy said.
“I think maybe he’s grown an inch or two as well, don’t you, son?” Mr. Stocking said, giving Billy a nudge and a wink.
Although he knew the peddler was only twitting him, Daniel did indeed feel taller. Older and surer, too, as if he’d started working the ponies as one person but finished as another.
“Congratulations, Dan’l.” Mr. Stocking reached over the fence to shake his hand. “You’ve found your place.” The peddler’s green eyes held him fast, as warm as the handshake.
The warmth inside Daniel quickly faded, though, as a lanky figure strode over to the fence. “You put them ponies through their paces, boy?” Mr. Chamberlain said, rubbing his hands together briskly.
“I—uh—not exactly, sir.” Daniel instinctively stepped back, suddenly glad of the fence between them.
“What’ve you been doing all day? I got to get them back into the show soon’s I can.”
“I need to sort ’em out first. Learn their ways and let ’em learn mine.” Daniel’s throat tightened, making his voice timid and squeaky. His mind became a slate suddenly wiped clean. He looked to the peddler for support, but Mr. Stocking had turned away, one arm draped over Billy’s shoulder in private conversation.
“What’s to learn?” Mr. Chamberlain pinned Daniel with a glare as sharp as his ravens’ beaks. “You think I don’t know everything that goes on around here, boy? I told you to run those ponies through their paces, not sit on your backside all morning or stand around and wave your arms at ’em all afternoon.”