“Mr Penny?” it said.
George looked up from his book, for he knew that a member of the troupe would never address him by anything other than his first name. If it was someone from the town, come to take a look at the Yeti for free, then they could clear off. Or perhaps it was an investor? Or a potential business partner? George looked around, but beyond the fence at the edge of the paddock the tessellated blanket of fields that shone like stained glass was empty. The Yeti looked at him with a curious expression. He frowned to himself and returned to his book. Before he had even found his place on the page, however, the voice came again.
“Mr Penny?” it said once more. This time George threw down his book and stood up, but again there was no-one in view.
“Who’s there?” he said, “If this is supposed to be some kind of joke then it’s not very funny.”
“Not a joke, Mr Penny,” said the voice, and this time George looked at the Yeti. It stood subserviently before him, and it looked at him with an expression that George could not quite describe. He felt a sudden unpleasant coldness in his gut.
“You can speak?” he asked.
The Yeti paused before responding, as though contemplating a mathematics problem. “I learned from you,” it said eventually. Its voice was deep, frayed at the edges, and it wavered a little as it spoke, like a cello played by a young musician who has learned how to draw a sound from the strings but has yet to master the instrument. It pronounced each word carefully and allowed silence to cushion the gaps between them, as though each word were fragile and might shatter if delivered without care.
“I didn’t think you could speak,” said George. He felt nauseous.
“I could not. I learned. I listened to you talk.”
The Yeti looked at him evenly, its leathery mouth neither smiling nor frowning, and George wondered what it expected of him. Whether it expected anything of him. He became suddenly aware of the chain that hung from the collar at its neck and traced a lazy parabola to the stake in the ground.
“You mustn’t tell anyone that you can speak,” he said. Around them the first raindrops began to fall, slapping onto the wooden roof of the cage.
“I must not?”
“Not a soul. Now hurry, back into your cage.”
“I like it out here.”
“You’ll get wet. Come on, back inside.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Come on.”
George stepped forward, inside the radius of the chain, then checked himself. The Yeti looked at him. It stood motionless, its breathing slow and measured, and George felt transfixed by its gaze. The Yeti looked at the chain, looked at the stake, looked back at him. Seven feet tall, with arms like industrial cables. George felt sure that he saw in its eyes the beginnings of an understanding of the algebra of power; that for the first time it recognised a vulnerability in him and was already calculating a way to exploit it. George felt as though a balance had tilted.
Then, with a wrinkle of its nose, the Yeti turned and stepped slowly into its cage. Almost before it had ducked its head through the door George darted forward and shut the cage behind it, and it was only when the bolt slid into the lock that he noticed that his hands were trembling.
George Penny cancelled the show that night.
* * *
There was a meeting the next day, inside the big top. The rain had continued all night and into the morning, and it prickled angrily against the canvas of the tent above them.
“What’s going on?” asked Pierre Malon.
“The Yeti’s unwell,” said George.
“How do you know? You’re not a vet.”
“I can tell. He’s off his food.”
“It seems all right to me.”
“I’m giving you all two days off,” George said suddenly, “You’ve been working hard. Go out and enjoy yourselves. Go on. I’ll take care of the Yeti.”
At this the assorted performers and hands sounded various gleeful notes of approval, and the air in the tent seemed to brighten. They filed out into the rain and dissolved away, each seeking his or her own form of entertainment or solace. George remained in the tent for a while, doing nothing more than breathing in the sweet, earthy smells of canvas, wood and flattened grass.
When his colleagues had deserted the camp he went to the Yeti’s cage. He stood in front of it beneath a black umbrella, and he looked at the creature inside. It seemed bigger now, somehow. As though it were growing, and would soon grow too massive for the cage to contain it. The rain chattered against the stiff cloth of the umbrella.
“What are you doing?” asked the Yeti. It looked at him calmly from behind the iron bars.
“I’m just thinking,” said George.
“What are you thinking about?”
George frowned, bit his lip. “Do you like it here? Performing in the show?”
“I like listening to you talk.”
“In the show?”
“In the daytime.”
“What about when the performance is on? And all the people are there?”
“I am in a cage.”
“You’re a star. People love you.”
The Yeti grasped the bars of its cage and looked up at the metallic sky.
“I see the stars.”
“I don’t mean like that. I mean ... it’s a word to say that someone is important. It’s because they shine in the dark, when the spotlight is on them. Like the stars. A star is the most important person.”
The Yeti turned the words over in its head for a moment before replying. “A star is a person.”
At this George fell silent. He felt that he could almost see the machinations of the creature’s mind, and when he spoke his voice was small and mechanical. “Yes. A star is the most important person.”
“Am I a person, Mr Penny?”
Its eyes were like polished glass, the colour of a church-window saint. George could not bear to look at them.
“You’re a star.”
“Can I leave the cage and walk? With you?”
“Not today,” he said, then he turned and walked away.
* * *
“What makes us human, Joshua?”
“I’m sorry?”
“You said something the other day about how we had imaginations and animals didn’t. Is that what makes us human, do you think?”
It was deep in the afternoon, and the pitiless rain still had not eased. George stood with Joshua in the sawdust of the big top as above them the rails of water rattled against the canopy.
“You’re either human or you’re not, George,” said Joshua Cotton, “It’s just how you’re born.”
“I don’t mean like that. I mean what makes us different from animals.”
“Oh. Well, I think having an imagination is part of it. Although I do think that animals can imagine things too, if you say that imagining things is just thinking about things that don’t exist. Like a cat that sees a hole and imagines that a mouse could be in it. But the only thing that we do that animals don’t, the only thing, is that we can talk.”
“So if an animal could talk, it would be ... not human, but on a par with humans?”
“I suppose so. Because it’d show that it could think about things. Complicated things. About more than just food.”
“It would mean that it had a soul.”
“Would it?”
“I don’t know. That’s the problem.”
“What’s this all about, Mr Penny? You don’t seem yourself. You seem out of sorts.”
“It’s nothing, really. Forget I mentioned it.”
“Are we on for tonight?”
“No. Maybe. I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“We might have to take a break for a while. A few days, maybe. Or a week. Some things aren’t working. I need to think about some things.”
“Is it the Yeti?”
“Why would it be the Yeti?”
“It was ill before, you said. Is it still ill
?”
“Oh. Yes. Yes, it’s still unwell. Not worth risking it in the show. It’s too valuable to risk it if it’s unwell.”
“Well, be that as it may, the crew still need paying. Then there’s the suppliers. And our creditors.”
“I know, but something’s come up that I need to deal with, and we can’t put on a show until it’s sorted.”
“The crew need to work.”
“I know. I know. Look, think of it as a holiday.”
“A holiday.”
“We all need a break.”
Joshua fixed him with a beetly eye, then frowned and walked away on those bandy legs deep in thought, like water leaking down a slope. When he’d gone George loosened the button on his shirt. He felt tight across the chest, and the conversation with Joshua seemed to have left him heavier than he had been. He fetched an umbrella from the upturned bucket by the entrance to the big top and then stepped out into the rain.
The camp was silent apart from the hiss of rain on sodden grass, the weather having chased his colleagues into the village pub or into the sanctuary of their trailers, and when he reached the sucking mud by the Yeti’s cage he was quite alone. When it saw his approach the Yeti hunched at the bars of the cage, and it watched him mutely as he stood before the cage and tried to marshal his thoughts.
“I’ve cancelled the show,” George said eventually.
“Why?” asked the Yeti.
“It’s just temporary, until I decide what to do. But you won’t have to go in there and perform any more.”
“I am the star. You said.”
“You are the star, yes. That’s the problem.”
“Why?”
“You don’t want to perform.”
“I don’t want to be in a cage.”
“That’s just how it has to be. I’m sorry, but I don’t see any other way. You’re not a ...” he faltered for a moment, “You’re a Yeti. People wouldn’t understand. And you mustn’t speak when anyone is nearby. Anyone other than me. They wouldn’t understand.”
“You understand.”
George screwed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. He could feel a headache brewing somewhere behind his eyes.
“I need to think about what to do,” he said, “About what we can do, what’s for the best. For everyone. I just came to let you know that you won’t need to go into the big top and perform.”
“What will I do?”
“Nothing. Relax. Like I said, think of it as a holiday.”
“In my cage?”
“Yes. In your cage.”
* * *
It was on the fourth day after the circus had stopped performing that the man came to see George. Joshua Cotton led him into the big top, and George sat with the man on one of the wooden benches that surrounded the ring.
“Charles Henry Buchanan,” said the man, extending a bony hand. He was elderly, with thin white hair, faintly mottled skin and angular limbs that moved only stiffly, and his blue eyes glittered with a vitality that seemed anachronistic. “I’d like to purchase your creature.”
“I’m afraid you’ve had a wasted journey,” said George, “He’s not for sale.”
The old man allowed himself the tiniest of smiles. “In my experience all that means is that you haven’t heard a high enough number.”
“You must understand that I can’t sell him.”
“I understand that your show is doing exceedingly well. Exceedingly well indeed. A full house every night, packed to the rafters. I do understand that, Mr Penny. And I wouldn’t dream of offering you an amount that did not compensate for the long-term loss of earnings that the creature’s absence would cause. More than compensate. You would not be out of pocket, Mr Penny, I can assure you. Quite the opposite.”
“It’s more complicated than that.”
The old man sighed. “Mr Penny, when you reach my age you realise that few things in life are truly complicated. We are talking about a transaction. An exchange. Money in exchange for a commodity. The commodity is fixed; the only fluidity lies in the amount of money. All we need do is arrive at an agreement.”
“Mr Buchanan, I —”
“A hundred thousand.”
“A hun ... a hundred thousand?”
“I am a man of considerable means, Mr Penny.”
“It’s a lot of money.”
“A lot more than you paid for him, I’ll wager. It’s good business, however you look at it.”
“What do you want with him?”
“Does it matter?”
“I’m just interested.”
“It’s a commodity. What does it matter, once you’ve liquidated your investment?”
“All the same.”
“Mr Penny,” the old man’s voice was warmly condescending, “We are both entrepreneurs, you and I; if I were to tell you about my plans then what’s to prevent you from simply turning down my offer and then doing the same yourself?”
“I ... of course. Of course. I understand.”
“I knew you would. So, do we have a deal?”
“I’d like some time to think about it.”
“Of course. Shall I return, say, tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow?”
“I am not a young man, Mr Penny. My time is more precious to me than my money. I have other investments, so if you have not come to a decision by tomorrow then I shall leave you and pursue them. Good day.”
When the man had gone George paced about the ring of the big top for some time, but his restlessness did little to crystallise his thoughts. He considered talking to one of the crew about it, but he knew that to do so would be unwise. In the end he retired to his caravan and listened to the rain.
* * *
Just before lunch the next day John Henry Buchanan returned. George received him in the big top once more, and his greeting was not without warmth. The old man smiled, and the skin by his eyes creased into papery folds. “I don’t wish to be rude,” he said, clasping his hands together in front of him, “But I am in a hurry, so I’m sure you’ll understand if instead of dwelling on niceties we proceed onto the matter in hand. So: have you come to a decision regarding my offer for your animal?”
“I have. And I must say, it was an extremely generous offer.”
“I am renowned for my generosity.”
“Which is what made it so difficult to reach the decision that I must turn it down.”
John Henry Buchanan’s expression didn’t flinch. He straightened, brushed down his trousers, and smiled.
“That is a pity. A real pity. I felt sure that a man of your, er, means would appreciate the value of my offer.”
“I do, Mr Buchanan. I really do. All the same, I feel that keeping him is the right decision.”
“I take it you won’t be persuaded.”
“It isn’t about money. Well, not just about money.”
The old man raised his eyebrows and fixed George with a look.
“Be very careful, Mr Penny.”
“I’m not sure I follow.”
“Emotions and investments rarely mix well. Now, I have other business to attend to, so if you’ll excuse me ...” he said, and he turned and walked away, leaving George alone in the tent.
When the man was gone George breathed in a lungful of the sawdust-scented air and exhaled slowly, then he walked out the back to the Yeti’s cage. The Yeti was sitting in the corner of its cage, chewing on a cabbage stalk, and when it saw George approach it rose to its feet.
“Can I go outside?” it asked. George could not meet its gaze.
“You have to go back to performing.”
The Yeti stopped eating and frowned. “Why?”
“It’s complicated. You just do.”
“I don’t want to do it.”
“You have to. I just ... I’ve made sacrifices. I’ve compromised. Now you need to compromise as well.”
“I don’t like the cage.”
“We’re all in cages. The only difference between you and me
is that you can see the bars.”
“I don’t understand.”
“No. No, I wouldn’t expect you to.”
“I don’t want to perform.”
“You’re going out there tonight; you have no choice in the matter. The only reason I stopped you from performing before was ... well, it doesn’t matter. The important thing is that I say you’re performing, so you’re performing.”
“I don’t want to perform.”
“That’s enough.”
“Am I a star?”
“You ask too many questions. We have to go back to doing what we were doing before, all right? And no talking to anyone.”
“I like talking.”
“Look, the only reason you ever come out of there is because of me. I can keep you locked up in there twenty-four hours a day if I want to. You should think about that.”
“I do,” the Yeti said.
“Look,” said George, “It doesn’t have to be for long. Just for a while. Just until we’ve got enough money.”
But the Yeti seemed not to hear him. He seemed to grow larger, stronger; even within the confines of his cage his posture straightened, like an illustration of the ascent of Man, conferring a new kind of dignity upon him. And as he grew George Penny seemed to shrink.
“I want to go home,” said the Yeti.
“So do I,” said George.
The Yeti stomped forwards, took hold of the bars of the cage and bared its teeth. “But you won’t let me go home,” it said, and it stared at him with a sudden feral intensity. Its thick woody knuckles turned pale and beneath the matted hair of its forearm George saw muscles bunching and coiling, and he thought for one terrible moment that it was going to wrench the bars out, but then it bowed its head and gave out a noise like something dying. It released its grip, grunted to itself and withdrew into the shadows at the back of the cage.
George looked at the hunched, glowering figure in the cage and shivered. He reached up to the overhanging tarpaulin. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly, and then he pulled the tarpaulin down over the cage. As he walked away from the cage Joshua Cotton slipped out from between two of the caravans and intercepted him.
Carnival of Cryptids (Anthology to Raise Funds for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) (Kindle All-Stars Book 2) Page 10