“What’s wrong with it?” he asked, nodding towards the tarpaulin-covered box, “Scared of sunlight now, is it?”
“I need you to get me a whip,” said George Penny.
“What, are you going to be doing some kind of lion tamer routine? We don’t even have a lion.”
“Just get me a whip.”
* * *
The rain had stopped, but it still lurked nearby, and the clouds hung black and heavy over the countryside like a bereavement. All day George paced about the camp, unable to rest. He thought about going to see the Yeti, but decided that he couldn’t bring himself to answer its endless questions, that he didn’t want to feel those eyes looking at him as he tried to explain, once again, that there were more important things than the Yeti’s liberty. That people’s livelihoods depended on the circus. That the show must go on.
As darkness began to crowd in they lit torches at the sides of the path that led to the big top’s entrance, and as the yellow flames lapped at the sky and the queue huddled between them, George flitted backstage. Cormac and Finn heaved the cage into position behind the curtain, the tarpaulin by now replaced with the sequinned cloth reserved for the show. George lifted a corner of the cloth and looked into the cage. The inside was lost in a murky darkness, but he could just make out two darkly glinting eyes.
“Just remember what I said,” he whispered.
The Yeti said nothing. George let the cloth fall back into place.
The lights in the big top were brighter than he remembered – or perhaps it was that the darkness behind them was deeper – and when he walked out into the ring he had to stop for a moment to allow his eyes to adjust. He was still squinting as he strode out onto the red-painted wooden podium deposited in the centre of the ring.
He stepped up onto the podium and began his speech, and the hushed audience held their breaths as he mentioned Nepal and the frozen flanks of Annapurna, but George felt that something was different this time. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but there was some kind of itch at the back of his mind that prevented him from settling. A doubt that had followed him around all day.
He lifted his arms, and at that signal the two Irishmen wheeled the cage out into the ring. He spoke some more, reciting without enthusiasm from the script in his head, he raised his hands. The usual pyrotechnics burst into the air. The usual pulley cranked into action.
When the sequinned cover came off, the Yeti was standing at the bars of the cage, its fists clamped firmly around two of the bars. There was fury in its eyes, and the fading sparks and dying flames painted them with reds and yellows that looked like a kind of madness.
The beast began to convulse, to shudder back and forth, and George thought that it was having some kind of fit until he realised that it was pulling at the bars. “See the savage ferocity of the beast,” he said to the audience, and as he spoke he slipped the whip from his belt and uncoiled it.
The Yeti continued to shake the bars of the cage, and George saw the bars begin to loosen and splinters of wood float down from its roof. He stepped forward and snapped the whip at the cage, and he felt its tip lash against the Yeti’s arm, but the convulsing didn’t abate. He whipped again, and again, but the Yeti growled and shook the bars harder.
By now the audience was getting agitated. In the darkness behind the lights some stood up in their seats and some edged between the rows of seats towards the exit. Beneath it all was the turbulent sibilance of people whispering.
“There’s no need to be alarmed,” said George Penny, but both he and the audience knew the fraudulence of his statement.
Then there was a loud crack and a puff of splinters from the cage, and the Yeti wrenched one of the iron bars out of its housing. There were stifled shrieks from the audience, and George sent the whip lashing into the cage once more, but the Yeti dropped the bar to the floor of the cage, took hold of another and shook even more ferociously than before.
The removal of the bar must have compromised the structural integrity of the cage, for the Yeti quickly worked free one bar after another, and in a heartbeat the front of the cage was gaping open. The Yeti stood in the opening for a moment, heaving and gasping, its arms raked with blood, then it flung itself out into the ring and launched itself at the rows of seats.
“Stop,” George shouted, “Stop, I can help you,” but the Yeti was deafened by its fury, and it ploughed roaring into the rows of seats, scattering chairs, pounding benches into splinters. The audience fled, trampling one another in their desperate rush for the exit as the Yeti became a cataclysm.
“It’s going to kill someone,” shouted Joshua Cotton.
“He won’t,” said George, but the old man turned and ran backstage without a word.
The Yeti turned to face George, its teeth bared and its eyes wild. It lifted a chair high above its head and hurled it at him. George stepped to the side but could not prevent the chair from glancing against the side of his head, leaving a bright gash at his temple. At the sight of blood the Yeti snorted violently. In George’s palm the handle of the whip felt reassuringly solid, and he gripped it tightly.
“You don’t have to do this,” said George, one hand pressed to his temple, but this seemed only to enrage the Yeti further, and it howled and whirled about once more, tearing at the canvas sides of the tent and smashing chairs against the wooden support poles until the marquee shook and the air was filled with splinters, and then it charged at him.
Perhaps it was the fear of what he saw as his inevitable and impending death, but as this storm of righteous anger crashed about him George’s mind became suffused with a curious and unexpected clarity, as though a heavy white curtain had descended silently and serenely and onto which was being projected various scenes from his life. He saw the Burmese merchant and his stained teeth, the wooden cage lashed together and bunched with chains, the stiff oilcloth bound at each corner. In his mind the journey from India to England had been swift and pleasant, but he now saw it for what it was: a clumsy freighter that rolled and yawed on lumpy waters for weeks on end, conveying him back towards Portsmouth but taking the Yeti farther and farther from its home. When he’d bought the marquee and the caravans and collected the troupe of performers from the remnants of less fortunate shows, when he’d whipped the oilcloth off the cage in front of the crew and the Yeti’s eyes flashed, he’d thought of it as an opportunity; an adventure. And not just for him. But as the storm of righteous anger crashed about him, what remained of the fog of his selfish ignorance burned away.
“Wait,” said George, weakly lifting a hand.
The Yeti slid to a halt in front of him, arms raised like clubs, and at that moment George became convinced that his death would be dealt there and then by that creature’s colossal hands. The beast was vast and stood before him at that moment it seemed to George to fill the entirety of his vision. Its nostrils were two round black punctures, its lips were drawn back past teeth the colour of roasted chicken bones. George could feel its breath hot on his face. It smelt of decay.
“I’m sorry,” he said. He felt weak, his mind growing distant from his body. His fingers trembled and the whip slipped from his hand and onto the floor. The Yeti’s gaze followed it for a second, then alighted on him once more. Its shoulders rose and fell as it breathed. It blinked once. It curled its lips, opened and closed its mouth.
“You need to go home,” he said, and at those words the Yeti seemed to shrink a little, seemed to shiver and recede towards the background, and George wondered whether the blaze of fury was beginning to dim.
Then there was a loud crack, and the creature’s eyes widened, its gaze froze as though fixed on some distant sun. It let out a short, wet moan, lurched to one side, hung there for a moment as though suspended by a cord, fell onto its knees for a moment and then collapsed onto its back. Behind it, George saw, stood Joshua Cotton with a shotgun in his hands and dirty blue smoke curling up from the barrel.
“My God, George, you’re bleeding,” he said, “Are
you all right?”
George didn’t answer. He dropped onto one knee beside the Yeti and cradled its huge head in his arms. The Yeti’s breathing was fast and shallow, and there were bubbles of blood in its mouth.
“Get away from it, it’s still alive,” said Joshua Cotton. He waved the shotgun at the Yeti’s enormous prone body, but remained at a safe distance.
The Yeti looked up at George, its unbearable dark eyes distant and watery. George took its hand in his, threaded his fingers between the creature’s massive digits. At his touch he felt the creature squeeze his fingers, though only weakly. The skin felt cold and rigid, like old leather. He could feel a pulse fluttering there, but he couldn’t tell whether it was in the Yeti’s hand or in his own.
“I’m so sorry,” said George, “It’s too late, and I don’t expect you to forgive me, but I need you to know. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t want any of this.”
The Yeti looked up at him, its breath scraping out of its lungs. Its mouth moved just slightly, as though it were trying to speak, but no words came out. Patches of its hair were matted and dark with blood.
“It was only going to be for a little while,” he said, “Then I was going to send you home.”
As he spoke the Yeti’s eyes turned glassy, its grip on his hand slackened, its breathing became wispy and then ebbed away to nothing. The massive beast’s chest sagged, like a balloon deflating, then it lay still on the ground beside him. George felt lost in a terrible silence.
Joshua took a few tentative steps forward, the shotgun raised.
“Is it dead?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Joshua kept the shotgun trained on the corpse. “Are you all right?”
“You didn’t need to do it.”
“It would’ve killed you.”
“He was angry, that’s all. You’d have been angry.”
“It’d gone mad. It was out of control.”
“He wouldn’t have killed me.” George laid a hand on the Yeti’s arm. It was still warm.
“You don’t know that.”
“He wasn’t a killer. I knew him. He just wanted to go home.”
“George, it was a wild animal. You can’t know what they’re thinking.”
George said nothing. Joshua sighed.
“What’ll you do with it?” asked Joshua, “Have it stuffed? Sell it to a museum? You could make a few quid.”
“I’m going to bury him.”
Joshua looked at the massive corpse and for a moment seemed to be about to say something, but he remained quiet. He stood with George for a time, in silence, amongst the matchwood chairs and wreckage of the big top. Behind them stood the mangled husk that was all that remained of the cage.
“Are we going back on the road?” he asked eventually, “With a new show?”
“No,” said George, “I don’t think so.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to settle our debts and pay off the crew.”
“What then?”
“Then,” said George, “I’m going home.”
The Island
A woman's voice calls out to you from the darkness, its comfort and warmth somehow familiar. A buoy of kindness in this cold and unfamiliar place. "Whatever are you doing so far out, this late at night, child? Are you lost?"
A second voice speaks then, a raspier, more desperate one that says, "Perhaps it is afraid."
"Oh, do not be afraid, love. We only want to help you."
"Offer it things."
"Do you like music? We have music. We have cake and cookies and taffy and gobbles of goodies. Doesn't that sound nice?"
"It does. It does sound nice. Come and see, child. Come and see."
Something splashes shallow water nearby, but you stay low and do your best to quiet your breathing.
"We have sugary treats and nice, soft blankets and so many wonderful toys. Do you like toys?"
"It isn't working. Make it come. Make it come!"
"Oh, be quiet. You'll frighten the poor dear."
"Wait. Listen! I don't hear it any longer."
"Child? Child? Where did you go?"
"Find it! Find it before it escapes!"
The splashing noises grow louder and frantic, and now even the soft, female voice turns hard and cruel as it cries out, "Where did you go you ungrateful little wretch! Tell me before I carve out your eyes and yank out your tongue!"
You lift your head an inch above the edge of the boat and just then the clouds move away from the face of the moon and reveal small grassy island just a few feet behind you. Two figures flop around on the island's beach, their bellies scraping the sand. They have women's faces, but their eyes have been hollowed out, leaving nothing but dark caverns long since crusted over with ruined flesh. Their long, tangled hair is cluttered with dead starfish and fishbones.
They spin in circles, sniffing the air frantically for you, and you their long, green tails, glistening with fins and scales. Mermaids, but to your horror, you realize someone has severed the ends of the tails and left nothing but ugly stumps that slap the ground uselessly in frustration.
They crawl down the beach to the water's edge and lower their faces to sniff again and again like eager dogs, but you are now far enough away that you no longer have to hide. The larger mermaid collapses on the ground and moans, "Gone! Now what will we do? The nasty little creature has doomed us by leaving!"
"We'll starve you insipid brat! You've murdered us! Murdered us!"
They smash the water with their fists and scream, but their voices fade from your thoughts as you turn back in your seat. You find that you are more comfortable in the darkness now, and that it is better to find your own way than risk leaping for the first hand that offers you solace, for sometimes that hand is filled with claws.
6. The Ogopogo Club - Susan Smith-Josephy
The mosquitoes were brutal, thousands of them, getting into Carmen’s eyes and mouth. And the black flies and horse flies ate chunks of flesh from her arms, her neck, her ankles. If Jason saw her use bug spray, he would slap the can out of her hand and scream, “That shit is poison! What are you, some sort of stupid moron?” Scared, and not wanting to get him angry this early in the day, she hurried, spritzed herself, rubbed it on her face. Knowing Jason would not bother with the grocery bag, she tucked the bottle at the bottom.
She busied herself with domestic duties. Feeding Jason and his buddy remained her first priority, before they drank too much whisky. This was not for their safety; it was for hers.
The sweat oozed down Carmen’s back. Her face was flushed from wearing too many clothes, and from carrying the heavy, beer-laden cooler from the campsite down the path to the lake. She stumbled a few times on exposed tree roots and rocks. She kept the cooler steady, and her gaze steadier. No matter how heavy, she could not drop this cooler and call negative attention to herself. Jason and Randy staggered behind her on the winding path. Their drunken footsteps loosened stones and sent them flying down towards her. She moved faster.
Jason’s small boat, The Casper, tied to a tree on the shore, bobbed on the blackening waves. Carmen hauled the cooler onto the deck, and climbed in after it. Jason ignored her, untied the boat from the tree and jumped in. Not too drunk yet, but he would be soon enough. Randy, unsteady and listing to one side, tried three times before he made it. He got one hairy stump of a leg in before it buckled under him and he fell the rest of the way.
“Whoa, ha ha, what the fuck?!” he said. Jason just har-harred, lit a cigarette, took a suck from his beer, and revved the engine. Bam, into reverse, then he yanked the wheel, swirling the boat and tipping over bottles, fishing tackle, and Randy.
Jason shoved the throttle into forward gear and gunned the motor. The Casper roared over the rising waves, onto the grey lake.
The sky was sulphurous and heavy with thunderheads. Lightning flashed on the distant hills.
Carmen remained quiet and still. On previous trips, Carmen had watche
d Jason start and maneuver the boat. She watched how he’d slowed to troll when the fishing rods went out. It could come in useful. The men grew louder as the whisky took its toll.
“This little baby can beat anything on the lake. I can take anyone, I’ve never done a spit of work to the motor, just gun ‘er and it goes. Fuck, yeah. She’s a beaut.”
“Hey, speaking of beauts, what about the tits on that bitch at the bar last night? I could have fucked her right there, right against the table.”
They kept up a steady pace on the drinking. Jason set out his fishing rod, put on some bait and threw the line over. He handed the rod to Randy, and opened the cooler to get more booze.
“Lunch time,” he looked at Carmen. “Make it snappy.”
She handed out sandwiches. The men ate, talking with their mouths full, and threw the napkins on the deck. She picked them up.
Jason and Randy kept drinking, and did a bit of fishing. She did whatever she was told. Her stomach churned, and she felt heartburn rising with each beer, each drink that the men consumed. The drunker they got, the quieter she felt she had to be. If she could have made herself disappear, she would have. But she remained silent, her face impassive.
She looked at the hills that edged the lake and the reflection of the green trees in the calm water. In the distance, the mountains looked hazy and indistinct. Their snow-tipped peaks darkened by the incoming clouds.
Closer, the rounded hills of the shore faded into the mist, leaving only a hint of their shape. Far away, they looked like the back of a lake monster. Like the Loch Ness Monster, thought Carmen. Or the black humps of Ogopogo, the lake creature. She imagined how it would be if they really existed. They could come up under a small boat like ours and lift us up, and over we’d go. No one would know, and no one would find our bodies. Rumor had it that each time the Ogopogo ate a man, the creature grew a new hump.
At half a mile deep in places, the lake had been scraped out of the earth by glaciers ten thousand years ago. The silence of the water made it seem like this was a land before humans. No buildings on the shore, docks obscured by fog. All that was visible were tree-topped islands and the ripple of their wake on the water. Any other boaters would be ashore, safe.
Carnival of Cryptids (Anthology to Raise Funds for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children) (Kindle All-Stars Book 2) Page 11